Tag Archives: branding

Government Relations

Every Contact Counts

10 Comments

Ever start to do one thing only to find that you have actually achieved something quite different? Well, the two young men in the following story set off to deliver some tickets to an important contact, what they accomplished was some very effective, albeit negative, branding.

Two young airline executives were on Parliament Hill for some meetings with members of parliament and thought they would take the opportunity to drop off a dinner ticket they were holding for the Chair of the Transport Committee.  When the young execs arrived at the Chair’s office unannounced, the assistant greeted them with a smile and asked if she could help.  They explained that they had a dinner ticket for the Chair and could she pass it along.  She looked a bit puzzled and then asked which dinner they were referring to. They explained which dinner they had in mind and were somewhat surprised when she shook her head in the negative.

“I’m sorry, there must be some mistake,” she said, “the Chair is attending that dinner, but he is not sitting at your table.”

The young executives, who had risen up the ranks of the airline based on their brilliant assessment skills, collectively shook their heads in the negative. “No, no, we know he is at our table.”  The assistant, looking a little less pleased said, “No, I just checked his schedule, he is not sitting at your table.”

Clearly, the assistant was new or uninformed they thought, “No, you’re mistaken we know for a fact that he is.” they insisted.

The conversation went on in this vein for quite some time with the executives getting increasing short-tempered with the assistant.  Finally, in a fit of temper, they stormed out of the office with their ticket.

As it happens, the assistant was right; the Chair was attending the dinner but not sitting at the table with the airline.  More importantly, they had left a very unfavourable impression with the assistant, which was unfortunate since she was not only the Chair’s Senior Policy Assistant and adviser, but she was married to the Executive Assistant to the Minister of Transport.  While she may not have ever consciously done anything negatively towards the airline, the story of the rudeness of their executives certainly made the rounds and couldn’t help but to contribute to an overall impression within government ranks that, that particular airline bred a lack of respect in its staff.  That lack of respect seemed to explain a lot about their customer service reputation.

A brand is not just a logo and it doesn’t just reside in your advertising, its reflected in every interaction you have with clients, customers and stakeholders. In fact, your brand is probably best displayed in your human to human interactions. The following tips may be helpful.

  • Assume nothing when walking into a situation, when confronted with conflicting information, do your homework.
  • No one likes surprises at work, avoid unplanned visits.
  • Treat everyone with respect and if a conflict develops, don’t escalate.
  • Every contact that you have with customers counts, so never take them for granted.

Related Articles

Marketing Attitude

Share
Communications, Internal Communications, Leadership

11 Dangerous Misconceptions about Communications

10 Comments

Communications is as necessary to our survival as breathing. It’s how we engage and interpret our world. We label and reference what we see hear and smell and then use that information to share ideas, solve problems and fire imaginations. Despite the integral role it plays in helping us to navigate our lives we often take effective communication for granted. We assume that everyone is seeing the world through our eyes and experiences. This can lead to misinterpretations, disagreements, and confusion.

Misconceptions can shape how we see and understand messages. They can inform decisions and drive objectives. While errors in understanding can sometimes be funny, too often the results are far from humorous. If you are in business then you are in the field of communications. Without the proper care, you and your brand can be felled by misinterpretation.

The following are some of the most common misperceptions I have encountered working in business communications.

  1. Communication happens when messages are sent. Sometimes people assume that because they have sent a message, that it has been received or that receiving a message is the same as understanding it.  Consider how many messages are sitting in your inbox unopened or all of the promotional mail that goes directly into recycling. Most messages never get to their intended audience. Assume communications has happened when you hear an answer or see an outcome that confirms it. This is especially true when it comes to social media. Thousands of posts don’t mean thousands of views, much less that people have understood or engaged with your content.
  2. Fluency means comprehension. This misconception is related to the idea that your proficiency in a language is somehow a measure of your effectiveness in communicating.  If that were true, then someone with a large vocabulary need not listen, ensure that messages were actually heard, understood or retained. If you have ever read an academic paper you know that a deep understanding of a topic is no assurance of the ability to communicate about it effectively. Unfortunately, having a deep understanding of a particular topic can actually result in lowering your ability to communicate about it well. One reason this happens is that you can get into the habit of using the jargon or abbreviations that are well known to those in the field but become a barrier to those outside of it.
  3. If people don’t agree with you, then they misunderstood.  Overconfidence in the truth or righteousness of your message can sometimes result in an assumption that everyone will agree with you. The belief that your message is the only message can be a reflection of your commitment to an idea or your passion for a cause. Think about how often political convictions can result in disputes amongst friends. Sometimes people hear your message just fine but they simply don’t agree with you.  This is not necessarily a prompt to restate, repeat or say it louder.  It can be a prompt to rethink.
  4. You can’t plan for crisis communications. As a business, not having a crisis communications plan is a strategic blind spot that can result in a hard and fast fall. Consider conducting a vulnerability audit. If you are a small business or operating on your own, ask yourself questions related to worst-case scenarios. What would need to be in place if you got sick? What do you need to do if your regular suppliers are unavailable? Who do you need to train if they need to take over? Are there processes you should be documenting? Do you have an emergency contact list? If you have a larger business, ask people responsible for various departments to consider potential weak spots and plan for worst-case scenarios. Do you have a communication tree set up so that messages can quickly reach multiple people? Make sure that your response process is efficient. Slow responses in times of crisis can grow the crisis.
  5. Always stay positive. Optimism is awesome, its good for you and practising optimism is important to success. However, while having a positive and happy brand has become the default for many organizations, sometimes you have to disagree with people or take a stand on a topic that affects or offends a large segment of your market. Avoiding conflict or negative conversations can actually result in tarnishing your brand or hindering innovation. Innovation often requires taking risks and risks can result in negative outcomes. Employees need to feel comfortable enough to take chances. Risk can be the difference between making the mediocre good and the good great.
  6. One message fits all. If all humans had identical needs, experiences, and aspirations, perhaps one type of communication would be feasible. Since we have unique needs or at least groups of people have unique needs, then we have to tailor communications to match our various audiences. Not only do people learn and understand things in different ways, they have different expectations and priorities. By keeping communication styles responsive and flexible you will be better at getting your message delivered.
  7. Any problem can be resolved with effective communications. Communications is not magic.  There are some challenges that communications simply will not overcome. In some situations, the best that communications can do is facilitate interpersonal exchanges and help to make the position of both sides clear. 
  8. The more communications the better. Whether you are talking about interpersonal communications or the media more is not necessarily better.  If you want press coverage sending countless press releases may only result in reporters learning to ignore your messages. Being stingy with knowledge is rarely a good idea if you are trying to influence an outcome, but as with most things, balance is important. Measure your responses, take the temperature of your audience to determine if your message is getting through.
  9. Good logic makes for good communications. This misconception assumes that emotions play no role in communications. The reality is that you can get different reactions to the identical message depending on how it’s delivered when it’s delivered, and how you and the recipient are feeling at the time of delivery. Think about how effective it is sending a “get to work” message late Friday afternoon in the summer.
  10. Ignore social media in a crisis. It’s hard to believe that anyone still thinks they can ignore social media during a crisis, but every year organizations that should know better do. Not only do you have to engage on social media during a crisis, you have to do so quickly or risk having your brand negatively affected. Being responsive means having a clear policy in place letting employees know what they can and cannot respond to in case of a crisis. It also means being available to respond after hours.
  11. Communications is easy. Just because everyone does it doesn’t mean they do it well. While most people can learn to be better communicators with time and practice, good communications take work. Communicating effectively with broad and diverse audiences requires research, skill, and knowledge.

Related Articles:

Marketing Attitude

 

Share
Communications, Marketing

Marketing Attitude

10 Comments

Marketing Attitude, what story is your brand telling?

It was my third day of business travel and I was tired but looking forward to a seminar on motivation. About halfway through the presentation, I realized that the longer I stayed the more demotivated I felt. The speaker was engaging,  she was actually quite funny, but her material was dated. My table-mates were a bigger problem. They were unhappy co-workers. Their underlying unpleasantness towards each other and their missing colleagues was tangible. It was disrespectful at best and openly hostile at other times. Made me glad I didn’t work with them and wonder if their boss understood the brand they created.

I left the session after an hour and ended up in a conflict resolution lecture. I’ve rarely laughed so hard. It was clever, insightful and I can say without a doubt, conflict has never felt so good. The rest of my day unfolded in a pleasant fashion, but as I was reflecting on the morning’s adventures I couldn’t help wondering about how attitudes, our own, those of service providers and even other customers influence and affect how we perceive brands.

While I was waiting for the conflict resolution lecture to start the woman ahead of me in line gave me a big smile, she turned out to be the lecturer. Her smile was an accurate indicator of the attitude she conveyed throughout her lecture. It reminded me of a study I read on the effects of greetings on shoppers, no not the typical Wal-Mart greeting, but a real greeting, like, “Hi, is it still raining out?” for mall shoppers. The study indicated that shoppers are more likely to report a positive experience if they are greeted and told goodbye. So although they may have a neutral journey through a store, the emotion they experience on coming and going will dictate their impressions.

Of course, the customer’s attitude before they enter a store or a website will also influence their experience. Had I been in a cranky mood when I started the first lecture, I doubt I would have lasted 15 minutes. I also wondered about the experience of customers going into the store of my original tablemates. I couldn’t help but think that their office dynamics would make for an unpleasant environment. Their dislike of each other would dominate the atmosphere, not exactly conducive to a positive retail experience.

So many elements are at play when a brand is being experienced that we constantly have to ask ourselves, what am I’m doing contribute to my brand? Even when we are being vigilant we can get into trouble. On my way home I was standing at airport security waiting to be scanned when one of the security personnel walked up to her colleague and reprimanded him for complaining about something in front of passengers. I wonder what she thought her reprimand in front of me was doing for customer relations? Marketing attitude is something we have to be thinking about all the time. Marketing the wrong attitude can have such a lasting impression, that no matter how good the product, people will be reluctant to engage. The same can be said about marketing the right attitude; it can carry you through even the most unforgiving lapses.

Tips on Managing Brand

  • Your attitude is your brand, make sure that you are conveying the right messages.
  • Employees are your brand ambassadors.  Their attitudes, likes and dislikes will play into your brand and how your services or products are perceived. Make sure you are properly aligned.
  • You cannot control your customer’s attitudes, but you can ensure that you are not contributing to a negative experience. Manage the atmosphere you are responsible for and the rest will follow.

Have you had an unpleasant experience work out because the attitude was right or perhaps the reverse is true? Have you had any great experiences that came as a result of great attitude?

Related Articles

Marketing Attitude

Share
public relations

That Awkward Personal Branding – Improving your LinkedIn Profile

33 Comments

Gone are the days of anonymity, to be successful in 2018, you have to embrace personal branding. I’ve had quite a few people ask me for help with their LinkedIn profiles. They have asked where to start, what to do and what to say. The exchange generally begins with reluctance to include a photo and is followed by a hesitation to post projects or examples of their work. As for the summary statement, well that conversation usually requires a strong coffee or glass of wine.

Given the number of tools, hints and prompts LinkedIn gives to users to enhance profiles, I’ve often wondered why anyone would have an incomplete or weak profile.  But after years of giving advice (solicited and otherwise) I realize it all comes down to personal branding. People want help because it’s weird tooting your own horn in public. It’s not so much that the concept of personal branding is new as much as it’s new to most of us.  Hollywood stars, corporate leaders and political candidates to name a few, worry about personal branding and so they should, but the rest of us?  Well, we may want to maintain our good reputations but we never had to take out an ad to do it and it feels weird, awkward…like bragging, but with more reach.

In the past, resumes were generally discreet documents.  They were shared with potential employers and human resources employees, they weren’t posted for just anyone to look at.  Now we have LinkedIn and it can provide far more information about us than any resume ever has.  What’s more, potential employers are eating it up.  HR professionals will often look at your LinkedIn profile before they even consider looking at your resume.

It’s also where colleagues go to find you.  Unlike Facebook, there’s no awkward role confusion. I don’t generally want to talk about my weekend with my LinkedIn contacts.  So, when people ask for help with their LinkedIn sites, they are generally looking for the public relations support that used to be the purview celebrities.

Clever photographers have figured it out and will offer suggestions to clients for the perfect LinkedIn photo. Automated graphic design companies are offering the use of programs that can transform all that information into a poster, which can be added to your profile. Perhaps it’s inevitable that communications people would start to assess and suggest how to achieve a better digital persona. In any case, I would suggest this:

  • Be honest: The same rules apply to LinkedIn as apply to resumes, times ten.  If you include false information on your LinkedIn page, someone, somewhere will spot it and talk about it.  I’ve had no less than four people approach me about a particular persons “inaccurate” LinkedIn page. I use the word inaccurate, they used words like, liar, faker, self-centred, conceited, who does that jerk think …well you get the picture.  That can have a serious impact on your reputation, the very thing you are trying to protect and promote.
  • Provide brief descriptions of your roles: Do include a brief description of the jobs you held. Titles can bear little resemblance to the work we actually do. For instance, one of my old titles was Senior Director Communications and Relations.  If I asked fifty people to tell me what they thought I did, I’d be lucky if I only got back 50 descriptions and amazed if any of them actually resembled my job.
  • Use the summary to differentiate yourself: Do take the opportunity to use the summary option. It is a chance to share a little about your personal style and your intentions, not to mention a great opportunity to make the different pieces of your background come together. This is your chance to define yourself in a few words.

Feel free to take a look at mine, it may actually prompt me to update it.

  • Engage with peers and potential clients: Engage in some of LinkedIn’s communities or groups that fit you.  Aside from expanding your professional network, and accessing useful information, you will meet some amazing people.There is more to personal branding than LinkedIn.  It’s an easy and obvious tool, but consider making it a gateway to other things like personal projects, blogs/websites, PowerPoints, YouTube offerings, your imagination will provide the limits.
  • Don’t be shy: My best piece of advice is, don’t be shy. There are no prizes for the most modest LinkedIn page and no potential or current employer, client or colleague is looking at your profile to see how mediocre you are, so take the opportunity to shine and show your best sides. Showing your best includes always taking the time to be polite on LinkedIn’s various communities.
  • Ask for advice: If it feels really weird then ask a friend or colleague to help you fill it out so you don’t let unhelpful modesty get the best of you.  Don’t forget to look to LinkedIn itself for best practices and tips. There are professional services like storeylineresumes.com who can help you with your resume and your LinkedIn profile.

    Above all, think about the old Dove commercial slogan,  you’re more beautiful than you think.

Share
Communications, public relations

Getting the angle right, your personal brand photo

Leave a comment

I was thinking about pictures the other day, pictures of scones to be precise and wondering how I wanted to set the scene for them. What props would work, what lighting would be good, how would I convey quality? It struck me that I was more worried about how the food would look than most people are about the pictures of themselves they post. They weren’t even my scones.

I’m even worst when it comes to people. I will spend ages thinking about how I want board members, senior management or the CEO viewed. I have destroyed images of senior management I thought were in poor taste or inconsistent with the corporate brand. I’ve also used funny pictures of the CEO to convey warmth and humour to staff. The point is, some thought should go into each photo and how it’s used.  What is the objective, what message is being conveyed, what audience are you talking to?

I have watched with some curiosity and a little dismay as coquettish, slightly boudoir, images have shown up on LinkedIn. I have a sense of humour, so while I often find them funny they also make me a touch uncomfortable because they really don’t belong on LinkedIn. I can’t help but wonder what the person is trying to convey in a business setting. Here are some tips for what to avoid.

The Boudoir Photo: If there is a feather boa in the image, then don’t use the image for your professional shot. It’s not that I have anything against feather boas but what they call to mind are things like, the Rocky Horror Picture Show and exotic dancers. Unless you are selling costumes or polls for dancing, lose the feathers.

The Angry Woman: Do you know what happens when you hold your phone in your hand and look down on it in concentration as you take a selfie? You get the Angry Man/Woman photo.  It’s a photo of your nostrils, always attractive, while you look down your nose at the viewer. How appealing.  If you are smiling then it can look creepy or patronizing. If you’re not smiling, you have the perfect Angry Man. If you’re going to use a selfie, lift your hand to head level or slightly higher.

The Location Shot: I’ve seen quite a few “professional” shots of young men at the beach lately. The attire is what you might expect for a beach photo, shorts, and shades. In some really interesting branding choices, the person is not wearing a shirt. The individual is often trying to give me advice. I think they are trying to say, “Look at me, I’m so successful I now live the good life.”

What I see is a guy too inexperienced to know what’s appropriate. Here’s my advice, if it’s good enough for a restaurant, then it’s good enough for your professional photo. No shirt, no shoes, no service. Extend the thought to include that there should be no shorts or shades in a professional photo.

Where’s Waldo: The Where’s Waldo photo comes in many forms. It’s can be anything from a family photo or a corporate shot. What they have in common is that there’s more than one person visible. So now the viewer gets to choose.  Is it the guy on the left or right?  Where is the subject? If it’s a man and woman in the photo, the poster’s name might give you a clue, providing their name isn’t gender neutral like Kelly, Beverly or Pat. Even if the name does make it clear, why is the other person in the photo? What is the unstated message?

Eye Spy:  These are among my personal favourites. It’s really about not wanting to include a photo of yourself so you use one where you are so small that the viewer can’t quite see you. It’s the photo of the Grand Canyon and you’re off to the side like a perspective reference. This is a useless shot and tells the viewer you don’t really get the point of including a photo.

I could go on, the photo with plunging neckline for men or women is a no go, as is the open mouth speech shot. The point is, decide what you are trying to convey about your personal brand with a photo. Do you want to earn trust, their time or just their attention?

I get that people don’t want to be sheep.  I appreciate wanting to do something a little different, you can do that without becoming goofy. Above all else, a professional photo is supposed to make you look like a professional, or at least it shouldn’t make you look like a felon.

Some quick tips for good shots. 

  • Use natural lighting. This does not mean squinting into the sun, but it does mean avoiding unnecessary shadows or that shiny-face look that can happen in night shots. Not to mention the red eyed demon that comes with poor lighting.
  • Focus on the chest up or just head and shoulders. This means you will be the central focus of the image.
  • Think about how you want to be seen by a client, not your buddies.
  • Use a professional photographer.  When chosen well, they are worth every penny.  Consider it an investment in yourself.

How did you choose your photo and why? Do you think your photo matters to your brand? Have you ever seen a photo and thought…what were they thinking? Have you ever seen a photo and thought, brilliant!

Image courtesy of stockimages/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

 

 

Share
Communications, public relations

Random Acts Of Branding

Leave a comment

 Random Acts of Branding

What happens if everyone in an organization decides to engage in branding activities without first engaging in an internal conversation? This question prompted an extended conversation with my friend Janet MacLeod, who like me, is a communications professional. This post is the consequence of that discussion and so our joint offering.

So what happens when an organization starts to perform random acts of branding? A commercial in one area, a public relations program somewhere else.  Essentially, a variety of initiatives delivered over time that are unrelated but intended to improve profile or set a tone for services? Even if the initiatives aren’t identical, they would at least get attention right? Raise the profile of the organization and if luck is with the organization, it might even result in a viral moment.  It’s possible that many of those individuals will have a brilliant idea…right.  Who are we kidding? First of all, there aren’t that many geniuses and second, if you have different people doing their own “thing” with a brand, then that probably means that they have no communications experience.  Even a mediocre communicator understands the benefit of being consistent.  A good communicator would say that inconsistencies in branding eventually result in diminishing the brand and yet so many organizations allow their brand to be shuttled about with little regard. Despite what you might think, it isn’t just the little organizations who do this either. Unless you are an organization that sells products like soda or toilet paper, items that live and die based on brand, you may not fully understand the strength and impact of brand.

Too often the description of a corporate brand can sound like little more than jargon to employees. And really, it’s often treated as a descriptive phrase that illustrates what corporate leaders would like employees, clients or customers to think and feel about a company. The thing is, brand is a pretty loaded word. It represents a concept that seems to mean a multitude of things to people and can also mean next to nothing. Brand is color, it’s a logo, it’s a font, it’s how you are perceived, how you deliver service and how your products perform.  It’s the feeling the public gets when your name is mentioned. It’s the choices that people make to use or not use your offering.

Brand is the unique features that distinguish one organization from another – it may be the words used, the procedures you follow and most likely it is a combination of all these things.  Brand becomes the things people see, hear, feel, and touch so that a perception or idea develops about what can (and should) be expected of the organization. The authentic feelings and emotions that are triggered by brand – whether factual or not – become the reality. In effect, the brand is the organization.

Since internal activities drive the brand exhibited and understood outwardly, it is concerning (to say the least) when those activities lack cohesion. Unfortunately, even with the best intentions, companies sometimes “run with scissors” and become susceptible to brand breakdown. Change is often the trigger. Whether it comes as a result of shifts in culture, technology, finances, staff turn- over or simply poor strategy, changes that are poorly executed or poorly communicated, can lead to dysfunction and can put a huge dent in what had been a perfectly fine brand.

A living example is BlackBerry. It used to be RIM or Research in Motion. It was Canada’s technology darling. People loved it, trusted it, and expected good things from it. Then it changed. It went into the consumer marketplace (and grew itself accordingly). But soon it went from being the industry leader, to being perceived as the industry follower. In truth, it was still making reliable, secure devices, but because it didn’t do what the iPhone did, it was perceived as being a poorer product. BlackBerry lost momentum. Investors stopped coming, people stopped buying the product. Layoffs ensued.

So although the quality of the actual product had not altered the perception of the product had to the point that the brand was seen as waning.  The changes that impacted BlackBerry happened in the market, yet organizations often inflict negative shifts in perception on themselves by ignoring or poorly attending to their brand. Brand is a powerful device. It needs care and attention and there should be nothing random about it.

What do you think about branding?  Do you have favorite products you buy because of their brand?  Do you have a favorite beer, pop or paper towel? Do you know what your own brand is? 

Share
Communications

A Simple Lesson About Brand Taught By Disney

Leave a comment

Day One of Our Disney Trip - Miami 165I went on a Disney Cruise with my kids in February. I specifically chose Disney because my husband wasn’t going with us (he’s busy working on his master’s thesis). I felt that if I was going to travel alone with my kids to unfamiliar places, I needed to have some back up. I needed to be completely confident that no matter what happened, we were covered. I wanted the comfort of a solid brand. Disney does that. It gives me comfort. Disney says you can feel safe taking your kids onto that giant ship and your first cruise.

We had a wonderful time – an excellent vacation complete with 200 plus photos. Based on the conversations I’ve had with different people both during and after my cruise, chances are I would have had an equally wonderful time on a number of other cruise lines too, but that’s not the point. I would not have taken another cruise. I took the cruise because of Disney. When you build a powerful brand, amazing things happen. Grown women dress-up like princesses, executives laugh like pirates and people take risks on new ventures based on your reputation.

So how do you get your brand to where you want it to be? Well if you’re a communications professional working in an association or not-for-profit, the most difficult things to accept are that a) good brand building isn’t up to you and b) you can’t help it along with advertising or promotional work. The best thing you can do to improve your brand is to talk internally. Your brand isn’t about what you portray, it’s about what you do and what the public and your clients perceive about you.

Let’s go back to the cruise for a minute. As you can imagine, if you put thousands of people in a confined space and throw hundreds of over-excited children into the mix, things don’t always go as planned. There were melt downs and temper tantrums, not to mention some of the children‘s bad behavior, but those things never got in the way of service.  The staff was always pleasant, funny, innovative and even on occasion suitably sarcastic. They got adults to laugh off situations that can quickly escalate into anger and distracted children who were revving up to whine. At one point, my 15-year-old came back from the breakfast buffet angry because another passenger had been rude to the server at the counter. When I asked him how the server dealt with the rude passenger, he said, “He just kept trying to do what the passenger asked.”

And there it is in a nutshell. You build a good brand by giving customers what they are asking for. My son didn’t want a scene at breakfast; neither did any of the other passengers at the buffet, so the server did his best not to create one. The result was that my son was angry at the passenger on behalf of the crew member. When a four-year-old girl had a fit while the ship was debarking at one of our island stops, the staff immediately distracted her. They got her attention focused on them and not her parents and managed to keep the rest of us moving.

So if you want to build a strong brand, build a strong service orientation into your team – even if that team only serves internal clients.  Make your raison d’être centred completely on helping your clients be successful. In health care we call it client-centred care, but experienced business people and the folks at Disney simply say, the customer knows best.

Lessons learned

  • Good brands come from good client centered experience.
Share