Tag Archives: Brand Loyalty

Brand Promise, Perception

Credibility is lost when you do not live up to what you stand for

When you repeatedly go against your mission and values, you lose credibility, and your position is in danger. The audience will start to drift – first, slowly towards other platforms. Drifting will accelerate once a critical mass through worth of mouth is reached. Then there is no way back. 

Brands are like people.

If you for example do not like how a friend behaves, you can simply decide to no longer hang out with your friend. The same goes for brands. If a brand behaves terribly, you can decide to stop engaging, buying, or using that particular brand.

It gets tricky when your friend says that living according to noble values is essential and even points the noble way of living out to others. It comes then as an unpleasant surprise when you learn that your friend is everything but living up those dearly hold and communicated values. We get confused because the friend’s behavior does not match the perception we have about the person. The person is no longer credible.  If the friendship continues, it will be an unhealthy one based on disbelief and issues with trust. If a brand stops living the values, the same reaction of disbelief and distrust appears. And over time, we will look for alternatives.

Today I encountered a trust issue with YouTube, the brand that has brought video sharing to the masses. YouTube helped to accelerate the growth of humans by bringing immense knowledge to the fingertips of everyone.

Already for some time, YouTube is actively censoring freedom of speech by removing videos or channels about medical information, science, scientists, specific news channels, or simply videos containing an opinion (how scientific it might be) that is going against a set of guidelines, therefore stopping the debate and opportunity for humans to learn.

Earlier this morning, I decided to take a look at the About YouTube page (link, archive ) to understand what the company is all about and the brand credibility with me.

The first thing you encounter on the about page is a clear mission statement. Unfortunately, YouTube is actually actively going against their own mission. For YouTube not everyone is the same, some deserve to  have a voice, while others unfortunately do not.

When we look at the values we see a similar pattern.

The Freedom of Expression is striking:

We believe people should be able to speak freely, share opinions, foster open dialogue, and that creative freedom leads to new voices, formats and possibilities.

If YouTube in the last year has shown one thing it is that it is not a real advocate of Freedom of Expression.

I have therefore one simple question for YouTube:

—-
Dear YouTube,

You have given me a lot of opportunities to enrich my knowledge on virtually any topic. I thank you for that.

Unfortunately, I am distrusting you and as your friend I see two options going forward:

  1. You live up to your values,
  2. You update the values to reflect your behaviour.

Either way is acceptable because strong brands provide clarity regarding what they stand for and consistency in execution using company values as a steering compass. Only this way, they remain credible.

Make your choice.

—-

Photo by Adam Fejes from Pexels

General

A new way to be even closer to your customers

We all know that humans are emotional beings. In every decision we make emotions play the decisive role.

Understanding emotions are therefore fundamental to be even closer to your customers because once customers are emotionally connected, they stay loyal.

Emotions drive loyalty – Loyalty drives profits.

Brands therefore continuously try to find new ways to be even closer to prospects and buyers, because, once a brand is in the heart and mind of buyers, it will affect purchases and increase publicity through word of mouth.

What if brands were able to accurately understand how consumers feel emotionally about their content, and be able to create content based on desired emotional responses?

This is the holy grail of advertising, and it is here today. With Artificial Emotional Intelligence, brands can create that deeper emotional connection.

Once brands accurately understand how consumers emotionally react to content it will change the way how we become even closer to our customers. Imagine being able to:

  • optimise text in headlines, websites, chats, PR etc to fit the desired emotion of the brand
  • perform emotional analysis on social media and influencers to finally see the true emotional impact of content and go far beyond sentiment analysis
  • Place digital ads only in emotionally suitable pages on websites – no more ads showing up in the wrong places
  • Text to speech engines that become more human
  • And many more!

This is not science fiction. Using Artificial Emotional Intelligence you can be even closer to your customers today.  

Take a look at the BMW slogan. Which slogan will evoke the right emotional reaction in the reader? The Ultimate Driving Machine or The Best Driving Machine?

The brand character of BMW is that of the Achiever archetype, thus fitting well with the evoked emotion of Amazement. Yes, BMW made the right decision.

As an international brand advisor, I am fortunate to work with brands around the globe. I know that many brands struggle to be even closer to customers. Understanding the emotional reaction of customers to content even prior publication sounds magical. 

With the company we have done what nobody else has been able to do before: we accurately forecast the emotional reaction of customers to text and do that in many languages.

Using EMRAYS brands can finally start connecting on an emotional level and be closer to their customers. Read more at emrays.com or contact me for a demo.

Originally published on 15 November in LinkedIn.