Strategic Thunder

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Trying to sear your brand into the minds and hearts of your target consumers is no guarantee that they will get your message much less respond to it. Many marketers' notion of branding conjures up imagery from old cowboy movies: innocent calves with their legs tied, helplessly eyeballing the red hot branding iron as it sears a "mark" into their skin... forever branding them. The assumption here is that the company has all the power and control in the brand/customer relationship, and that the customer is helpless to resist the branding. It's a fallacy for a company to think they can say, "Here's the story we came up with about our brand, and this is what you will think about us." Marketers and their agencies are mistaken if they believe they can develop even the most creative and intrusive message, and then by the sheer weight of their advertising dollars and heavy spending gain their customer's attention and motivate the desired action. The fact is, branding isn't something that brands do to people, it's what people do to companies. Marketers cannot accomplish their goals to induce sales without the complete cooperation, and voluntary effort of their target audience. Today's consumers "rule," and have complete control over your brand. Twenty-five years ago, a marketer could tell America their story and establish their brand in one night with one commercial aired across the three major networks. And if it was a particularly clever commercial, everybody would be talking about it at the water cooler. Today, consumers are too savvy and sophisticated to blindly participate in the old patterns of marketing: show me a commercial or ad, and I'll think about buying your product or service. With "touch point marketing" and messaging at every point of brand contact, consumers are exposed to an estimated 5,000 advertising and branding messages a day- possibly over 1 million a year! The clutter and "noise" is deafening, and many consumers actively tune our advertising, choosing to pay attention to those categories where they feel they have a need or desired product and service. And even then, they are highly selective about what experiences they will let in. In many cases, consumers like gathering their own information, doing their own research, forming their own opinions, getting in-put from trusted friends and impartial third party resources. So, your brand is not what you say it is, it's what your customers think you are. A " brand is a promise of a specific experience that you will have with a company's product or service that you can count on to be the same, or better, each time. The perception of that experience is in the consumer's mind Consumers create this perception at their own discretion as they choose to interact with your company's messages, services or products... or not! They decide what they will or won't process. No matter how memorable or great a brand's advertising is, your target audience still has the final say about how they will think about your product or service. Therefore, in every way and every time customers interact with your brand is marketing.

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