Fernando Coelho presents tips on how to work on a company's image and success stories .
A weak point in marketing and brand experience management is called REPUTATION. Many CEOs (Chief Executive Officers) and CMOs (Chief Marketing Officers) confuse the strength of their businesses with the reputation of their brands.
The strength of a business is entirely related to the brand's equity, revenue and purchasing and selling capacity. Reputation, on the other hand, is linked to the image, involvement and customer perception.
I can mention two very classic examples from our daily lives. The first is the Carrefour retail chain, which has been in the headlines for several cases of violence, aggression and racism in the media. These various incidents have damaged the company's reputation as a brand. On the other hand, given its equity structure and revenue, it continues to have market power.
Let's look at the second example, Magazine Luiza, which is the bahamas whatsapp data retailer most admired by consumers in two of the 17 categories evaluated in the Ibevar-FIA ranking. The store founded by Luiza Trajano was also considered by teams and employees in the retail sector to be the most admired place to work – these facts are directly related to the brand's reputation, which, added to its revenue and equity, also makes it strong.
When we talk about brand reputation, we need to be aware that good experience management and customer support require relationship management, and for this, there are 2 key elements and 4 brand reputation variables that I list below.
Brand reputation element
• Brand strength: how much equity, sales capacity and revenue this brand has.
• Brand reputation: how much this brand is loved, perceived positively, is in important market rankings and carries out brand actions in a proactive and positive manner.
Brand reputation variables
• Differentiation: ability to differentiate oneself from the competition in matters related to product, technology, discourse, delivery and service.
• Relevance: how much the target audience and persona perceive the brand as fundamental and important. Here it is worth reinforcing the business's ability to address a latent customer pain.
• Esteem: how much this brand is loved by customers and society.
• Knowledge: what the public knows about the brand and their level of awareness about the business.
And how to achieve a good brand reputation?
It all starts in-house, with what I call brand shielding. Managers and leaders need to focus on hiring well, developing and creating efficient internal engagement actions. The next step is to involve suppliers around the brand narrative and business purpose, and then think about strategic communication actions combined with customer experience management and support.
Brand protection is a set of actions, the result of a strategy to create a business reputation that involves employees, media, suppliers and the consumer themselves. For brand protection to be sustainable, it is essential that the brand has a story that connects with the customer and the company's value proposition, but above all, that demonstrates truth in service and support.
It is essential that employees buy into and live this narrative and demonstrate it through service and experience delivery throughout the customer journey. Likewise, suppliers and the media need to reinforce the narrative created, and only in this way will the brand's reputation be created and continually strengthened. Creating an image that combines strength and reputation directly involves this strategic approach and the design of tactics that include marketing methodologies and customer support actions in an agile and efficient manner.