While marketing professionals historically thought of the brand and its positioning as being the result of its identity system and marketing communication, because the brand is owned in the mind of its customers, it is really the gestalt of all of its touch points. Brand managers have been talking about customer journey mapping and customer touch point design for the past two decades. However, it would behoove marketing professionals to occasionally revisit all of the ways their brands make an impression on the customer.
Does the brand's website make it easy for customers to reach someone at the brand if they have a question or a problem? Is the customer support telephone system easy to navigate? Are customers able to have their problems solved quickly or do they go through an annoying seemingly infinite loop of "press one for x, press two of y, press three for z"? How well trained are the brand's front-line employees? Do employee objectives encourage good customer service or are they more sales or profit driven? Have you ever waited an inordinate amount of time to be served at the counter of fast food restaurants or cafes because the front line employees are measured on drive-through efficiency, not on-the-other-side-of the counter customer service? Or how about filthy restrooms? Or unhygienic front line employees? Or user's manuals that are unclear and difficult to follow?
What does the brand's distribution strategy say about the brand? How about its pricing? Its product design? Its package design? How accessible is the brand? What value-added services does the brand offer? Does the brand provide competent technical support? What payment methods does it accept? How fast can it be shipped to one's house? How are returns handled? What do customer testimonials say? What do third party product reviews say? Does the brand have third party endorsements? Is the brand known through its community involvement or its charitable support? Does the brand publish a newsletter? Is its marketing automation well-thought-through and relevant? What is its social media presence like? Do YouTube videos feature the brand? Are customers acquainted with the brand through its sponsorships? Have customers seen the brand placed in movies or television shows? What is word-of-mouth on the brand? What are customers' family, friends and co-workers saying about the brand? Do the company's computer systems support easy purchase and use of the brand? Is the brand in the news? Is the brand news positive?
Yes, brand identity and marketing communication is important in the management of brand perceptions, but so to are overall company mission, vision and values, system and process design, user manual clarity, organization design, employee hiring criteria, employee training, common measures, individual job performance objectives, employee reward and recognition programs, product design, customer journey design, marketing automation design, brand-community involvement and company charitable giving among other company, brand and product elements that effect customer perceptions of the brand.
All of this speaks to the CEO being the ultimate brand manager, with the designated day-to-day brand manager reporting in at a very high level in the organization so that he or she can affect brand perception levers outside of just brand identity and marketing communication.
