http://exchange.cim.co.uk/thought-leadership/brand-experience-report/
In marketing, we are all after one thing: space in a consumer's mind.
To achieve this, a positive brand experience is required. After all, if a consumer doesn't feel a connection with a brand, then it will fail to make it into the consumer's consideration set.
The choice of brands within today’s market has grown exponentially over the years. Due to this, the expectation and demands from consumers will only continue to increase.
This is one of the core reasons as to why brand has evolved from a purely communications-led concept to one that needs to run through the very heart of every organisation. Ultimately, it’s the customer journey that is now acknowledged as defining the brand.
It’s with this ideology in mind that we here at CIM, with the support of Brandworkz commissioned this thought leadership report to identify key areas within organisations that most urgently need tackling in order to enable marketers to deliver on their desired brand experience.
3. Promises matter
“A brand is no longer what we tell the consumer it is – it’s what
consumers tell each other it is.” – Scott Cook
CIM | BRAND EXPERIENCE – RESEARCH 2016 | WHAT MARKETERS CAN DO
9. It starts at the top
CIM | BRAND EXPERIENCE – RESEARCH 2016 | WHAT MARKETERS CAN DO
10. It starts at the top
CIM | BRAND EXPERIENCE – RESEARCH 2016 | WHAT MARKETERS CAN DO
11. “ Marketers need to agree a clear mandate
for brand within their business”
Recommendation
CIM | BRAND EXPERIENCE – RESEARCH 2016 | WHAT MARKETERS CAN DO
14. “Marketers need to secure collective buy-in
from leaders – translating what brand vision
and brand priorities look like”
Recommendation
CIM | BRAND EXPERIENCE – RESEARCH 2016 | WHAT MARKETERS CAN DO
20. “Partner with HR to integrate brand much
more closely into people and change
initiatives”
Recommendation
CIM | BRAND EXPERIENCE – RESEARCH 2016 | WHAT MARKETERS CAN DO
22. Being part of the right conversations
CIM | BRAND EXPERIENCE – RESEARCH 2016 | WHAT MARKETERS CAN DO
23. Sharing is an issue
Being part of the right conversations
CIM | BRAND EXPERIENCE – RESEARCH 2016 | WHAT MARKETERS CAN DO
24. “Marketers need to show what they can bring to the
table – customer insight, market intelligence, brand
performance data”
Recommendation
CIM | BRAND EXPERIENCE – RESEARCH 2016 | WHAT MARKETERS CAN DO
26. Creating more meaningful measurements
CIM | BRAND EXPERIENCE – RESEARCH 2016 | WHAT MARKETERS CAN DO
27. Creating more meaningful measurements
CIM | BRAND EXPERIENCE – RESEARCH 2016 | WHAT MARKETERS CAN DO
28. “Collaborate with other departments - develop a
dashboard of brand KPIs beyond the easy metrics,
to understand how brand is being delivered across
the customer journey”
Recommendation
CIM | BRAND EXPERIENCE – RESEARCH 2016 | WHAT MARKETERS CAN DO
30. CIM | BRAND EXPERIENCE – RESEARCH 2016 | WHAT MARKETERS CAN DO
31. Where to find more
www.cim.co.uk/exchange
@CIM_Exchange
@stevewoolley10
Notes de l'éditeur
Brand promise - delivery or failure?
CIM/Brandworkz research will show you:
Challenges and opportunities for organisations
Where the pain points are
How to deliver your desired brand experience
Delivering your promises for customers is important – because they set the agenda.
Scott Cook – Intuit founder, Boards of E-bay & Procter & Gamble
Attention - The choice of brands has grown exponentially over the years. In a crowded market it’s crucial to secure space in a consumer’s mind.
Experience - To achieve this, a positive brand experience is imperative.
Connection - If a consumer doesn’t feel connected with a brand, they won’t consider it when making choices.
Demands - And expectations and demands from consumers will only continue to increase. They want companies to follow through and deliver on the brand promise
Disaster - So, in today’s competitive marketplace breaking those customer promises can spell disaster.
bottom-line impact:
Gallup: “The highest-performing companies deliver on their brand promise 75% of the time, according to their customers. These companies have greater levels of customer engagement, which enables them to surpass their competitors in terms of share of wallet, profitability and revenue growth.”
“Gallup research reveals that when consumers are aligned with a brand, they give it twice as much share of wallet. “
http://www.gallup.com/businessjournal/182981/companies-deliver-brand-promises-half-time.aspx
We decided to find out
We found it is hard to achieve
Brands struggle to deliver a joined-up and consistent brand experience
barely half (54%) of marketers believe their organisation achieves it
But we also explored the key areas organisations need to tackle to deliver on their desired brand experience right through the customer journey
It starts at the top
Clarity around the brand promise
Permeating the organisation
Being part of the right conversations
Creating more meaningful measurement
Around three-quarters of marketers believe that brand is a consideration in major organisational decisions.
Which is good – BUT 67% of marketers believe that their senior leadership team see brand merely as a communications concept.
And while 77% think their senior leadership teams have a high impact on the delivery of their brand promise through customer experience.
Only 52% believe these same teams have a strong understanding of their role in doing so.
Even though marketers are confident that brand is a high priority for the entire company – the level of commitment from senior leadership is questionable
Our study shows that the strategic role of brand isn’t fully understood and isn’t making it into the right conversations
Its also apparent that there's a lack of alignment between the brand promise and strategic vision in many organisations.Worrying because as Jez Frampton Interbrand group CEO said at CIM Brand Summit – “BRAND IS BUSINESS STRATEGY BROUGHT TO LIFE”
Efforts to improve brand and customer experience performance could be doomed from the start if there’s a lack of leadership buy-in and understanding.
Worryingly, there is a lack of understanding as to what brand promise and experience represents across the organisation – and this issue begins with leaders.
Only 47% feel senior leaders within their organisation understand the concept of brand and what this means for the areas they lead.
So no surprise only a similar number - 50% - think those leaders use the brand promise or positioning to guide their decision making.
And it’s hardly surprising that just 43% feel employees understand the vision for the organisation and brand
Bringing brand promise and values to life consistently across all parts of the customer journey is an inherently cross-functional endeavour, not the preserve of any single one.
Customer service, operations and HR are all seen to have an impact
Yet Marketers think that only 58% of customer service, 39% of operations, and 28% of HR have a high understanding of their role in delivering their organisations brand promise.
Only 48% of respondents believe their leadership team, and also HR, corporate communications and marketing departments all speak about the brand with one voice.
And when it comes to employees - only 37% of marketers believe all employees (regardless of level) understand their role in delivering their brand promise to the customer.
Looking for possible reasons we found –
1 Inductions: only 25% of marketers say that brand features prominently in employee inductions. The old adage of ‘catching them early’ applies here.
2 Recruitment: more than a quarter of organisations have no link between brand values and recruitment. Missing a major opportunity to bring people into a business that will add to a brands culture and less likely to clash with it.
3 Brand ambassador: 68% of marketers said their organisation doesn’t have an internal brand champion or ambassador programme outside of marketing. Given the cross-functional nature of brand delivery it’s surprising so few organisations seek to leverage a network of authentic evangelists outside of marketing
What’s more, we found that those organisations who do invest in the above initiatives tend to significantly over-index on employee understanding of brand experience and their role in delivering it.
Our research shows that marketers are lacking the data, the influence and the presence in key business decisions.
Little over half of marketers (56%) believe their function is well respected within the organisation, and around the same amount (51%) believe that marketing has an influence beyond communications.
When we analysed the nature of marketing’s involvement in a range of key cross-business initiatives we found consistent involvement is worryingly low in some key areas where brand proposition and customer insight should be taken into consideration - With implications for brand and customer value - NPD (new product development) (53%), new market entry (47%), corporate strategy (44%) and corporate values programmes (39%)
In a finding that might shed some light on this lack of influence, we found that marketers seem reluctant to share the market and customer insights they build
Only around half share with the board and other senior departmental leaders
Only around half share across the marketing team
And only a very worrying 13% consistently share with agency partners
And they need to be prepared to share with other parts of the business
Brand measurement was highlighted as a significant weakness throughout our research.
less than half of marketers (44%) feel equipped to measure how the quality of their brand experience impacts business value.
Only 48% of marketers surveyed believe their organisation consistently measures brand and customer-related non-financial metrics of success – relegating brand performance measurement to a tactical level.
We looked more closely to see what was being measured
We looked specifically at what marketers are actually measuring in relation to key brand KPIs, and what’s done with the insight these measures generate and, put simply, most organisations are measuring what’s easy, not what counts:
51% measure brand awareness (people have heard of us) but less than half that (23%) measure brand preference (people actually choose us).
50% measure employee satisfaction (people are happy with working conditions) however, only a third (33%) measure engagement (people are committed to the role they play).
71% measure customer satisfaction (we’re OK to do business with) but only about half as many (38%) measure perception (what customers really think about us).
And we found that few organisations are sharing the results of brand and customer performance measures internally.
So, no surprise that only a third of marketers say that brand performance and brand related metrics are regularly discussed at the most senior levels in their organisations – for most there is nothing robust to share for the board to have a discussion about!