Defensive Branding 101: Troubleshooting Your Brand in the Age of Consumer Control
Holy crap!
It’s an ugly world out there ...
If you came into this session depressed about what the online audience might be saying about your brand or about the enormity of the task of managing conversations about your brand online, there was no virtual Lexapro to be had.
The number-one word associated with “advertising” is “false” . . . there’s a huge amount of cynicism and negativity out there that needs to be overcome . . . dissatisfaction is viral. And on and on. It’s enough to make a brand manager weep.
Pete Blackshaw, Executive Vice President, Nielsen Online Strategic Services, to the rescue with a virtual tissue.
Perhaps this session would have better been titled, “Crisis Communications In the Hyperlinked Era of Social Networking.” Much of the discussion (and indeed, it was a real discussion, with plenty of audience interaction along the way) was focused on how to monitor negative buzz about your brand online and what to do about it.
Blackshaw uses the metaphor of shelf space to address Google search results, and it works. Type any brand into Google, and it’s consumer-generated media that’s dominating the top results, that’s taking up the shelf space. In today’s world, he noted, “brand equity is the sum total of your search results.”
Well, that’s probably overstating the case a bit, but the point is clear. Customers have control, and C-level folks are waking up to the fact that their digital shelf space is being co-opted. So: What to do? Here are a few practical tips:
Monitor the conversations. There are sophisticated tools for doing so (Nielsen has a few), but a basic start is to use Google Alerts, Technorati, Blogpulse and the like. But don’t just monitor, pay heed: As Blackshaw put it, “If we’re really going to get into this conversational game, how do we listen to customers on their own terms?”
Audit your company’s customer conversations. How are customers speaking to your company? How is your company responding? Customer service is on the front lines of this issue, and making sure they’re trained and empowered is important: After all, customer service (good and bad) is one of the biggest drivers of conversations on the Web. And if you’re looking for customers likely to speak out to the Web at large, it’s quite possible that they’re also speaking out directly to you. How you respond to incoming customer e-mails and Web site comments can affect how your brand is perceived online.
Enter the conversation carefully. “I worry that brands are jumping into the social media space recklessly,” Blackshaw said. It’s a crucial concern. Trust in brands is eroding, and ham-fisted participation in social media serves not only to damage the specific brand’s reputation, but casts a shadow on any marketer’s subsequent participation in that network. So: Tread, but tread carefully. If you think you’re being reckless, you probably are.
Ultimately, though, maintaining your brand’s health online is a multi-dimensional long-term strategy that requires a lot of passion and elbow grease. I like how Blackshaw said that “credibility is a brand’s operating system,” and went on to elaborate the six main components of credibility: trust (“you can’t PR your way around trust”), authenticity, transparency (“Wikipedia is completely rewriting the rules of transparency”), affirmation, listening and responsiveness. Of course, there’s no magic bullet for creating credibility where it doesn’t exist. It needs to be part of a brand’s DNA.
If it’s not, the voices online are waiting to tell the world ... loud and clear.
