While the marketing department should have the skill sets
necessary to create the brand’s identity, communicate its promise, increase its
awareness and generally promote the brand, it takes the entire organization to
consistently deliver on the brand’s promise.
A brand’s promise is delivered through its product, but also
though its services, including the services that are wrapped around the
product. And the promise is delivered by something broader than its products
and services - the entire customer experience of the brand from first awareness
of the brand through brand purchase and usage. That is, the brand’s promise is
either delivered or not at each point of contact the customer has with the
brand.
This is why employee selection, training and management are
critical to the brand’s success. This is why organization culture is critical
to the brand’s success…and business metrics, systems and processes are critical
to the brand’s success, as are investment and budgeting decisions. Everything
must be aligned in support of delivering the brand’s promise. Otherwise, the
brand is just making a hollow promise, which is much more likely to fail.
The marketer who has primary responsibility for the brand
needs to be well respected throughout the organization. He or she needs to be
an outstanding communicator and a highly skilled influencer as many actions
that need to be taken on the brand’s behalf will exist outside of his or her
formal authority. However, ultimately,
the CEO should hold the brand’s vision, embody its values and carry its torch.
This is the only way to ensure that the customer experience of the brand is correctly
and consistently delivered each time he or she encounters the brand.
In my experience, CEOs like taking on the role of chief
brand architect and advocate because the brand is a very useful vehicle through
which they can deliver their vision for their organization’s success. CEOs can
talk about the brand’s mission, vision and values. They can talk about its
essence, promise and DNA. They can talk about its personality and how
it should treat its customers. CEOs can even use the brand to talk about
business models and competitive strategy.
In my ideal design of brand support, the CEO is the chief
brand architect and advocate. He or she is assisted by a senior level marketer
who is assigned overall responsibility for management of the brand. And
together, they enlist the support of all employees as enthusiastic brand
advocates.
Understanding of and delivery against the brand’s promise is
an enterprise-wide activity. This is why it requires vision and support from
the top and all-hands support throughout the enterprise. The marketer with
primary responsibility for the brand has the heady task of being advisor to the
king (CEO), but also the king’s designated “point person” in ensuring that the
organization’s resources are aligned in support of the brand’s promise. While this
is not an easy job, it is a very rewarding one.
So, I am arguing that the CEO should be chief brand
architect and advocate but that it is also important to assign a senior
marketer the task of managing the brand on a daily basis. And finally, I am arguing that all employees
be enlisted in support of the brand’s promise.
If this feels very different from the way you support your
organization’s brand, consider how you can move your organization toward a top
to bottom approach to brand advocacy.
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