Providing brand leadership

Who provides brand leadership in your organisation? For many organisations the answer to that question is “marketing”. But, for me, that’s the wrong answer. Your brand should be led from the top of the organisation and owned and enacted across the organisation – just like strategy.

Let’s start with my definition of brand – it is the result of what you believe to be true and what your actions show (all your actions, not just the marketing ones). So when brand is seen as the purveyor of marketing, it can lead to a disconnect from the intent and actions of the rest of the organisation. And that disconnect leads to a corresponding disconnect with what people say their brands represent and what people experience and see they represent.

So how do you get around that and build a brand that shows itself horizontally across the organisation and out into the marketplace?

Firstly, just as with strategy, values and other key functions – it is most effective when the CEO and other executives are leading the charge. Nothing says a strong brand like a CEO who actually includes it as a factor in decision-making, who talks about it inside and outside the organisation and understands that it is a valuable asset not a tactic.

Second, appoint a “brand council”. These people should be representative of the whole organisation – from shipping to boardroom; from customer service to business development and everything in between. A brand council that has this kind of diversity will be more likely to help defend and build down into the nooks and crannies of the day-to-day and not just focus on marketing and communications.

The idea that only people who “know about brand” should have anything to do with the brand is dangerous. And if fact, in my experience the very best insights and ideas for helping strengthen the brand have come from people deep in the organisation who would never see themselves as brand experts – but they know what they see and what they experience.

Strong brands require ownership and ownership comes from involvement.

The brand council should be called on to provide their input and opinions on how major decisions within the organisation will impact the brand or be impacted by the brand. It provides guidance on how to ensure the brand connects with customers and the marketplace so the message and experience are consistent. It can help develop HR policies and recruitment methods that support the brand and bring people into the organisation who are aligned with the values and goals. The list goes on.

There isn’t a strong sustainable brand in the marketplace that ignores the importance of delivering on its promises. That is impossible if the promises are not connected to the reality of the organisation in the first place. True brand leadership is the only way to achieve that kind of alignment.

Who would you put on your brand council?

Michel Hogan is a Brand Advocate. Through her work with Brandology here in Australia and in the United States, she helps organisations recognise who they are and align that with what they do and say, to build more authentic and sustainable brands. She also publishes the Brand thought leadership blog – Brand Alignment.