Brand Behavior—Knockout!

It's been forever since I've posted out here. No apologies for that. It's just the way my life is. Hopefully you will find something of value in this post about brand behavior.

Well...it's happened. The org. I work for has run into some bad PR. Of course, in my opinion it's not really BAD PR. Just the responses to it that can be bad. It's ALL exposure to the marketplace and it's all about how you respond that determines if it's negative or positive. Only time will tell if the decisions made have been positive or negative.

What's interesting to me about this particular PR burp is that it revolves solely around the topic of Brand Behavior. That is to say, how the members of the organization act AND is that consistent with what people perceive or believe to be how the organization acts. Notice that it moves from how the MEMBERS act to PEOPLE's perception to how the ORG acts. They are not separable.

You see, there is no separation between the organization or business or whatever, and the way it's people act. If I go into a Starbucks and the people are rude and the service is horrible, it WILL impact my viewpoint of Starbucks negatively in all likelihood.

What's interesting in our case, is that we have always said we believe "X" and it's true. However, within the organization there are those who believe that achieving "X" can only be done this way and others who believe that it can only be done another way.

It's a house divided and no one, thus far, has been willing to rectify it by giving clear leadership to the issue and outlining the organizations stance in a clear and concise way. Therefore, there is a division of belief even amongst the membership of the org. and as a result, since members of this org. are supported by external constituents you can also believe that these external constituents have differing viewpoints as well.

Therein is the issue. A portion of the supporters of this org have believed that when we say "X" we mean what THEY themselves think "X" means.

However, what we have said and what we do are in alignment with everything EXCEPT what a portion of our supporters think we are saying. Confused? Well let's just say that perception is reality and a portion of people are unwilling to make an effort to understand anything outside of their perception.

Therefore, if we want to retain them as supporters, we must adhere to their perception or be willing to cut the confusion by clarifying what we believe and taking a few punches.

For us, in this case, it gets even more interesting because SOME of our PR issues have been muddied even further by the fact that we have relationships with many different organizations around the world and some of what they believe and do has been placed on our shoulder simply because we work alongside of them.

It's a fascinating sociology experiment in some ways. If you rub shoulders with people who don't believe what you believe and you play nice with them (and I think you should in most cases), it's possible your mother may see you and assume you are guilty of doing what they do—even if you don't.

All of this is compounded by the fact that we are a religious organization. Politics would probably raise up a similar degree of reaction.

Some questions for your Friday:
—How does your brand behave?
—Can you point to anything that weakens your brand?
—Do you have people who are in your organization that do NOT believe in the same vision your business has?
—What partnerships do you have that weaken your brand?

Don't forget that sometimes it's not based on reality but on the perception of reality.

It's Art

I've been in the field of design for about 18 years now. There’s only one thing that I’ve been doing longer besides the obvious stuff like breathing, eating, sleeping, etc.

In all of those years I’ve dealt with a lot of brands and brand guidelines. As a designer I felt like they were unnecessary and hampered my creative style... I was too cool for guidelines! My art needed to flow randomly creating as it went along, spewing forth creative juices like a spit-take at the comedy club. Those things are restrictive!!

Now, as a Creative Director I not only see the value of brand guidelines, I help to create them (with the use of the audience and what they like in relationship to our corporate values). They are meant to build a consistency of look and feel, to communicate trust and value, and all of the other things a corporation, mission, or want to communicate. The brand guidelines are the rule book for play of any kind of interaction with the marketplace. Follow them or die!

The truth is somewhere in the middle. There has to be a balance. You do have to understand your audience and what will communicate your particular message the best but you also have to understand that the brand guidelines are not a rule book—they are not law—they are guidelines. Not every question can be answered in such a document. On the other side, there are some things that are virtually absolute and should be followed—logo treatments for example, fonts, colors, etc. Whatever components that your place values.

So what does that mean?

You have to learn as creatives to take what the business values and find your own creative space within that. It can be done, and more importantly, Should be done. It’s all a matter of building consistency within your marketplace, and consistency is a form of trust building. It may also mean that within your environment you have tighter or looser guidelines. Follow them, find the boundaries, and THEN get really creative by staying within those guidelines and Creating!

If you’re creative this shouldn’t be a problem.