How to Humanize Your Brand
Imagine that you are preparing to travel for business. You are a very thorough individual and you decide to map out the logistics of your upcoming trip. You discover you will need to rent a car to get around on your trip. Fortunately, there are plenty of rental car companies to choose from. In fact, your analytical side tells you to make a list of all of your options. Naturally, you list roughly ten potential brands you can rent from. Enterprise, National, and Hertz make it to the top of your list. These are the brands that matter most. According to your list, you’re familiar with ten car rental companies and you can list them all which means they have all successfully established mindshare in their customer; however, the difference between the top three rental car companies on your list and the rest are their degree of salience.
The mental real estate of customers is what every company is competing for. This is called brand salience. Brand salience is the likelihood of a brand to be thought of or recognized in a buying situation. Brands that have a lot of salience are embedded in the minds of their customers to the point in which they become the only option in a buying situation. The mere thought of purchasing a phone from anyone other than Apple or flying with anyone other than Delta is absolutely disgraceful.
In the B2B space, establishing salience among customers can be quite the task. It’s easier for B2C companies to access mental availability in their customers mainly because Coca Cola does not have to explain to their customers the functional application of soda, whereas an equipment finance company will have to put in some leg work to close a deal.
The problem with that is many B2Bs see marketing and branding as a mere sales support function. Too often, we see companies approach their marketing strategy as a sales activation funnel. And while sales activation can hold some short-term promise, it is a strategy that most certainly does not have skin in the long game. Sales activation has its benefits: say you’re a start up company and your goal is to keep the lights on, then the marketing approach for you is sales activation; although, sales activation only captures demand. It does not create it.
The remedy to this incomplete approach is superseded by brand building. Brand building combines both long term growth and short term growth. As it turns out, brands can have their cake and eat it too. The fundamental value of brand building is that it reaches future buyers, creates future demand, and ensures a durable stream of future sales and profits. This long game approach becomes the biggest driver of business growth.
The real question is how does a brand access customer share-of-mind? We are living through the humanization of business. It’s not enough for a brand to say how much they value their customers. Brands must live that truth. We see a lot of businesses on Linkedin smothering their audience to death with self-serving and self-interested messaging which tells us that they have become complacent and are no longer actively listening to their audience. You will find brands looking at one another for direction in the shifting digital landscape. The problem is, B2B marketing campaigns all model a safe approach and are difficult to differentiate from one another.
GenZ is the first generation to grow up fully immersed in the digital era. GenZ parents have no playbook to reference to help their children navigate the minefield. It’s a learning experience for everyone and the slippery landscape has led to parents staring at one another for direction. This is the same thing we are seeing today for B2B marketing in the digital world. This is a classic case of the bling leading the blind.
It’s true there is no formula that keeps your business relevant and in high demand; but, all paths lead back to the customer. The best way to reach your audience is through social listening by taking cues straight from the source. The purpose of gathering a sentiment analysis through social listening from the audience is not to stroke your own ego, but to extract actionable insights and feedback to improve the customer experience.
According to PwC’s Global Consumer Insights Survey 2018, more than one in three consumers surveyed ranked “trust in brand” among the top three factors, other than price, influencing their decision to shop at a particular store. So, companies need to build trust with their customers. How do you get your customers to trust you? You show them the human side of your brand.
There are a lot of ways for brands to get more real and human with their audience. Whether that be sharing internal updates like new hires or employee spotlights and taking consumers behind the scenes of your business or storytelling about your company’s failures, triumphs, and all things in between; provide an opportunity to your customer to relate to you and form a connection. This connection is what will bind you together.
The simple truth is people don’t trust brands. Many consumers see brands as faceless entities that are purely motivated by profit. In order for your company to win over your audience, you have to start with the fundamentals like building trust. There are new rules in this marketing game. It’s time for businesses to step out on the field.
