Times they are a changing!
Used to be a company's Brand was created by a few people meeting in a room to decide what Brand Positioning was going to be. Then they spent a ton of money buying advertising to tell people what their Brand was. If they were able to spend enough money, they were able to build a brand.
Today is a very different world. If companies like it or not, with the Internet connecting everyone together, companies are becoming more and more transparent. An unhappy customer or a disgruntled employee can blog about a bad experience with a company or an agent, and the story can spread like wildfire. Hopefully you are protecting yourself with Google Alerts on your name and your company to be aware of what is being said.
The good news is that the reverse is also true. A great experience with a company or agent can be read by dozens, if not thousands or even millions of people almost instantaneously as well. The problem is you cannot possibly anticipate every possible touch point that could influence perception of you or your brand. For example, if you happen to meet an employee of a company at a bar, even if the employee isn't working, how you perceive your interaction with that employee will affect how you perceive that company, and therefore that brand. It can be a positive or a negative influence. So every employee can affect your company's brand, not just the front-line employees that are paid to talk to your customers. Yesterday one of the executives at RE/MAX LLC was telling a story of a "Boys" weekend in Vegas with RE/MAX President, Vinnie Tracy, this executive was getting a little goofy and Vinnie reminded him that "They're everywhere" to make sure you don't do or say anything you don't want your clients to brand you with. A few seconds later one of their clients, a RE/MAX agent walked up and said Hi to Vinnie. That is great advice, you too on a level large or small have "them everywhere."
At RE/MAX Ability Plus we decided that the Brand we want is about the very best client services on the planet. So everything we do is to create that "Wow!!!" experience with our clients. ( for us our clients are our agents.) We believe that if we can Wow our clients, they will in turn better be able to Wow their own clients when they help them buy and sell their real estate. We believe that client service shouldn't be a department it should be the entire company.
The cost to try to buy a brand with advertising only gets you so far. If you ask most people what the "brand" of the U. S. Auto industry is today, odds are the response will not be in line with what the automakers project in their advertising. So what are you to do if you cannot just buy a brand you want?
What's the best way to build a brand for the long-term? In a word - Culture.
If you get your culture right, most everything else like great customer service, building a great long-term brand, and passionate employees and customers will happen naturally. The company's culture and brand are really just two sides of the same coin. The Culture comes first and it creates the Brand, because ultimately your Culture Becomes Your Brand.
How do you build and maintain a culture that you want? It starts with being selective who you choose to join your company. Do they have the skills, the professionalism, the relevant experience to come and make an impact? Are they also a cultural fit, are they passionate, positive, do they value what you value in how business is to be done? One of the companies most recognized as THE culture based superstars is Zappos, they are hyper critical in their hiring process of making sure people fit their culture. Once they do hire they put everyone no matter what the position they were hired for through the same four week training program working in customer service. They also offer to pay every new employee to leave if the employee doesn't feel they're a fit after going through training and seeing how things really work there. When Amazon bought Zappos they now offer the same 5,000.00 check for any new employee who decides this isn't the right job for them. That is putting their money where their mouths are, they want to make sure their employees are there for more than just a paycheck, that they believe in their long-term vision and want to be part of the culture. On average less than 1% take them up on it.
One of the great advantages of focusing on culture for us, when we are recruiting agents from other firms, unlike most companies, we don't just give them a handful of names and contacts to ask about us. We say come in and ask anyone, we give them access to our entire roster on our website and say ask whoever you like whatever you like. It is one way for us to be as transparent as possible, which is a big part of our culture.
At the end of the day, just remember that if you get the culture right all that other stuff - including building a great brand - will all fall into place!
