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Brad VanAuken Brand Blathering: The Conference Board’s ‘Extending Your Brand to Employees Conference’

by Brad VanAuken, BrandForward, Inc.

March 2006

Recommend this article

I recently had the opportunity to present and lead a panel discussion at The Conference Board’s ‘Extending Your Brand to Employees Conference’ in Chicago, IL. The conference provided a forum for marketing, brand, communications and HR professionals to share how they have engaged their employees to embrace and deliver upon their brand's promises.

Here are some of the more interesting quotes from that conference:

“Branding is all about the promises your company makes to external audiences and the promises it keeps with those audiences.”
- Randall S. Rozin, global director, branding and marketing communications, Dow Corning Corporation.

Scott Davis, senior partner, Prophet, indicated that he believes the following three things are most important in branding today:

  • Brand relevance
  • Customer experience
  • Employee engagement and alignment

“It seems to me that when people talk about employer branding, they are talking about one of two things:

  • Positioning the organization to potential and current employees
  • Engaging employees to deliver upon their organization’s promises to its customers

These two things are important and related, yet different.”
- Kristen Weirick, employer brand manager, Whirlpool Corporation

Bonnie Gellas, director, corporate communications, Merrill Lynch indicated that at Merrill Lynch ‘Human Resources (HR)’ has been renamed ‘Leadership and Talent Management,’ reflecting how that company views the evolving role of that function.

Lissa Reitz of Target Corporation indicated that Target’s research showed that their guests (customers) believed that if Target’s bathrooms were clean, it indicated that Target was a well run store. At Target, people are paid not only to clean the floors, but to keep them shiny at all times.

Story telling emerged as one of the most powerful tools to reinforce brand building behavior. Dean Rodenbough, director, corporate communications, Hallmark, indicated that as a part of its internal brand building activities, Hallmark implemented a ‘Stories of Hallmark’ speakers series in which employees tell brand related stories. Yolanda Villegas, global branding leader, GE Insurance Solutions indicated that when her company asked employees to tell a customer story, over 100 employees responded.

Geo-branding

Joao R. Freire recently shared a paper that he wrote on Geo-branding with me. It was published in the November 2005 issue of Place Branding.(1)  It makes some very interesting points about place branding:

  • The worst thing a place can do is not try to intervene in the creation of its image
  • Given that brands often are a part of an individual’s self identity construction, places where one might visit will be influenced by the meaning behind the place and what that communicates about the individual’s lifestyle and self image
  • Some people claim that branding might corrupt a place’s authenticity and abuse its natives. The author argues that rather tourism and geo-brands deliver these important benefits:
    • Contribute to the preservation of local cultures and thus global diversity
    • Provide important community resources, especially jobs
      • Most of the resources created for tourists can also be used by residents
    • Help increase community self esteem by reinforcing the place’s unique values

The most interesting conclusion of this paper for me is the importance of branding places and of choosing meanings that will appeal to the tourists (and residents) that the place desires to attract.

‘Many books have been written about branding in the past 15 years.  Many are short and focus on only a few aspects of the complex process of building and nurturing a brand.  With Brand Aid, Brad VanAuken has pulled it all together in one of the most comprehensive books ever written on the subject.  If you work in marketing, read it.  If not, make sure your marketing team has.’
- Ron Dix, Senior Vice President, Marketing and Sales, Bush Brothers & Company (Bush’s Baked Beans) Available now at http://www.amazon.com.

Brand Repositioning and Organizational Reinvention

I have been working with a number of organizations lately whose brand repositioning efforts involve nothing less than organizational transformation including business model and culture change. Take libraries as an example. In most people’s minds, libraries are synonymous with books. However, for those of us who can afford it, Amazon.com is a much more convenient source of books, with its 24/7 availability, advanced search and browse capabilities, extensive product reviews and very quick shipping. One of the underlying benefits of books is information. How much easier is it today to search for information online using one of many search engines rather than going to the local library? And whether you are looking for information or just the pure pleasure of reading, think about the advantages of going to a Barnes & Noble store with its overstuffed chairs, café, book readings and signings, community rooms, etc. Where then does the modern library fit into people’s need fulfillment? I believe libraries need to redefine themselves from ‘book archives’ to ‘community places’ – places for the acquisition of information, sharing of ideas,  exposure to different cultures and enrichment of life in general. Obviously, this has huge implications for brand position, competitive set, culture, business model, sources of income and the physical environment. I hope this example demonstrates that increasingly brand repositioning is accompanied by culture and business model change requiring the interdisciplinary efforts of marketing, business strategy and human resource professionals at a minimum.


(1)Freire, Joao R., “Geo-branding, are we talking nonsense? A theoretical reflection on brands applied to places,” © Henry Stewart Publications 1744-0696 (2005) Vol. 1, 4 347-352 Place Branding

 


Brad VanAuken is president and founder of BrandForward, Inc., a full-service brand management consultancy with clients throughout the world. Previously, Brad was the vice president of marketing for Element K, a leading e-learning company and director of brand management and marketing for Hallmark Cards, Inc. During his tenure as Hallmark’s chief brand advocate, Hallmark received the Brand Management of the Year award. Recognized as one of the world’s leading experts on brand management and marketing, Brad is a much sought after speaker and writer. He wrote the books The Brand Management Checklist and Brand Aid. His free online brand management and marketing newsletter is read by thousands of marketers throughout the world. Brad has a BS degree from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Email: vanauken@brandforward.com
Company Profile: BrandForward, Inc.
Company URL: http://www.brandforward.com

 

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