Making brands more distinctive

What a few weeks for reputations being savaged. A senior government whip swears at the cops, denies it, then resigns and finally confirms the story as true.  Even the Chancellor of the Exchequer was caught trying to blag first class travel with a cattle-class ticket (why on earth doesn’t he travel first class anyway – is this some naive sop to “where all in this together”? )

In our world of instant media coverage and comment it’s easy for a reputation to be tarnished overnight.

Inanimate objects can also be subject to the vagaries of reputation. Supposedly the value of Jimmy Savile’s old car, up for sale since his death, has tumbled. Despite the vehicle being an inanimate object it appears no-one wants to sit in the same seat as the alleged criminal.

The reputation of brands is not dissimilar (to inanimate objects, not criminals). Often the products or services that we sell are fundamentally similar. So what’s the point in brands?

Brands help you choose. They are the personality of the inanimate object or service we sell.  Too often this is well understood but not acted upon by those who control how their brands communicate through advertising, design or online.

We humans are emotional beings. Brands have to recognise that we make decisions because of emotion along with price and specification.

Check out the story from last week where a chap called Thomas Cook used social media to ask the renowned travel company of the same moniker if he could garner a free weekend away as payment in lieu for him having to put up with the lifelong pee-taking over his name. The mighty Thomas Cook replied publically with a robotic one line answer – no.

However a cheeky start-up holiday company saw the opportunity and responded in the positive making the corporate leviathan look mean-spirited and humourless. Now, I’m not suggesting that companies go around flinging freebies to every Tom, Dick or Thomas but had our PLC responded with a light-hearted, witty or more inventive “bog-off” then the outcome would have appeared totally different. Our cheeky start-up in fact won the reputation brand war simply by being more human.

Who would you rather deal with – the caring, humorous, responsive brand or the uncaring giant? (Note from my lawyer – the uncaring giant is not Thomas Cook but a generic term for personality deficient companies).

Every conversation, tweet, advert, brochure or webpage is a projection of your brand’s personality. Just make sure it upholds the reputation you want it to have.