A company’s brand needs to be strong, clear in its purpose, and straightforward in its message, and it should ideally be flawless. But the people behind it are not always perfect. Simple mistakes, lack of direction, or even feelings can reveal weaknesses in your brand. Here are some ways you and your team might unintentionally harm your brand and how you can address it.
Make sure it’s well and truly defined
Your brand should be easily and clearly understood by anyone who needs to tweet, contribute to an ad, write content for the website, send a press release, or communicate in any other way. Define your core brand values in simple terms and create a brand guide that covers everything from which logo and visuals to use to the specifics of the voice that keeps the content consistent. If you allow your team some freedom, be ready for them to represent your brand in various ways.
Enforce it constantly
Once it’s defined, make it easier to apply the brand evenly across the board. Company-wide brand control means ensuring the brand resources, like logos and images, are available and visible to everyone creating content. Ensure that everyone knows to the check the brand bible to ensure that their content fits every one of the requirements listed.
Be ready to put out any fires
Of course, mistakes will be made. A customer may feel mislead by a piece or branding or a member of the team might not handle a complaint or feedback well. Repairing brand reputation damage is not impossible. Own up to your mistakes and go one step further. Show your customers, if possible, a way in which you’re going to ensure it doesn’t happen again. Even if the customer isn’t necessarily always right, it’s counterproductive to try and convince them (and the many watching on social media) of anything different in most cases.
Be engaging, don’t engage
You want to start conversations and evoke emotion, but if you get caught up in them, you could be making your worst mistake yet. Some brands get away with sass. However, many of the people operating corporate social media accounts take this as license to be rude to customers, or to start online feuds with competitors that simply look petty and ugly to onlookers. Unless you have someone who can master that sassy online persona (and that is rare), it’s best not to try.
Don’t let just anyone use it
Finally, a simple reminder that you need to invest in protecting your intellectual property from theft. You might not be the one misusing your brand, but if you’re allowing it to happen, it’s still your failure.
At the end of the day, you have to remember that while your brand may be perfect, you and your team aren’t. Don’t rely purely on instinct and individual reading of the brand. Systematize it and create a process that catches and eliminates errors before they happen.