Your Employees Own Your Brand - Like It or Not!

I explored Mike Wagner’s archives a little this week and came across a posting titled, “Your Employees Own Your Brand – Like It or Not!” In this posting, Mike explores the idea of employees are brand representatives and communicating brand messaging to consumers through these employees. While the idea initially seems quite logical due to the fact that it is an organization’s employees who interact with consumers on a daily basis, however, Mike makes the assertion that “treating your employees as ambassadors for your brand is still considered a radical notion…. Perhaps the reason the employees in nearly every industry and retail store poorly represent their company is that leaders can’t get off their power trip and equip everyone to tell the story and live the brand.” He continues to hypothesize that this may in fact be the reason that so many people lack engagement in the workplace.

The element of this posting that makes it marketing related is the fact that employees are a main communicator with the customers of a business and brand communications to customers is a key part of marketing. As I previously stated, this seems like a logical concept, however, after contemplating Mike’s assertions and relating them to the employees of stores and businesses that I frequent, it has become clear that this concept is not universally applied to the level one might expect it to be, thus entering the ways that this posting informs marketing. It advocates that managers must develop the capability to relinquish control and empower their employees to participate in some of the most powerful techniques possible. Customer service is one of the most important aspects of any transaction and if a company determines a way to integrate their brand messaging into this interaction then it is likely, in my opinion, that the bond between the customer and the brand will strengthen and increased customer loyalty will be fostered. In addition, I believe that marketing managers must apply this concept to their hiring and training policies and ensure they are hiring people who properly display their brand image and have the skills necessary to communicate this properly to customers. Marketing managers must give up the idea that they have all the tools necessary to properly communicate a brand message and transfer some of this power to the face of the brand: the employees.

This posting improves my understanding of marketing by reinterrating the fact that sometimes the most logical and obvious marketing strategies are overlooked. It also got me thinking as to what companies I feel engage this theory and which have still not caught on to the power of their employees customer interactions. An example I came up with as a company who actively participates in this practice is Abercrombie and Fitch. Abercrombie goes through a great deal of trouble to ensure that the employees hired portray a specific image: attractive and cool, the message that they emulate as a brand. By hiring attractive employees (however shallow this may be) Abercrombie is actively stimulating their customers by presenting them with in your face advertisements of attractive people wearing Abercrombie clothes, an image that most Abercrombie customers are likely seeking.

As far as a critique for this posting, Mike provides a link to an article on how to create engaged employees, however, you have to pay to view it. I want to read it but, I won’t lie, most college kids aren’t willing to shell out $6 for an article download (then again, by assuming I’m the target market I’m making a mistake… so maybe this will be effective for Mike’s intended audience.) I also wish that Mike would have expanded a little more in terms of his own opinion. I would have loved to read more about what his experience in the industry says about this topic and ways he has tried to overcome it.