Above All, Experiences
When it comes to brand reputation experiences are what truly matter. The quality of experiences influences brand reputation — whether at the enterprise level or among product or service brands. In fact, experiences are the embodiment of organizational values and value. These are the three key things to remember about brand experiences:
Experiences are the chief determinant of brand reputation — Brand-led organizations recognize that every interaction with their stakeholders comprises an experience of one type or another. Experiences can be active or passive, fleeting or lasting, online or in person, human or machine, product or service, or informal or official. The quality of each experience produces a reputational data point, and more experiences aggregate as a reputational quotient. This places a premium on knowing the touchstones of brand touchpoints and orienting the organization to reflect brand expectations.
Ideal brand experiences require an organization-wide commitment — Experiences occur across multitudinous organizational touchpoints every day, most of which are beyond any direct choreography. This puts brand reputation in precarious situations on a regular basis despite the best efforts of brand practitioners, senior leaders, and people managers. When brand becomes a unifying principle for organizational strategy, culture, and operational priorities, designing and accomplishing ideal experiences comes closer to fruition.
Better processes contribute to better experiences — No matter how skilled, motivated, incentivized, and resourced employees may be, they remain an unpredictable variable of the brand experience equation. The best muscle memory for consistent brand-touchstone performance is achieved through well-designed processes and the use of automation and other enabling technologies. In brand-led organizations, a premium is placed on the rigorous adoption of process improvement methodologies under a governing operating system. People remain a fundamental component of operating systems, provided they are guided by a prevailing mandate consistent with brand expectations.
The brand system encompasses a range of unique, interconnected organizational components, including expertise, capabilities, culture, strategy, people, and operational readiness, all of which coalesce in some fashion to express the values and value of the brand.
Experiences represent the supreme expression of the brand’s values and value and can range from visual stimuli (logos, designs) to cognitive impressions (advertising or marketing tactics) to interactive exchanges (human or otherwise) and to physical interfaces (product usage).
While the brand system frustrates absolute design, when purposefully oriented as a foundational and defining part of the organizational ecosystem (i.e., through culture, strategy, and operations), sought-after brand experiences transpire almost organically.
And when brand-inspired outcomes back-feed operational protocols, e.g., knowing the brand experiences you want to produce and working backward to engineer corresponding SOPs and processes, the brand embeds as the governing philosophy for the organization’s operating system.
Ultimately, brand experiences across countless touchpoints are the true test of organizational differentiation and performance. In this respect, brand execution has more to do with satisfaction than impressions, reach, engagement, leads or other tactics-oriented metrics. While the latter are easier to track and measure, when it comes to brand reputation experiences are what truly matter.