Moral Dilemmas Of Scaling Up Your Brand And How To Overcome Them

The Subway Footlong Controversy is just a reminder of growing public consciousness about brand promise

Marketing is a cruel, cruel discipline, young marketers are trained to become sharks from the very start. It is hardwired in them that if they do not keep moving forward, they will drown.

Marketing could be an entrepreneur’s worst nightmare, I know many good people with good ideas who are bad at marketing. With all their smart and useful and benevolent thoughts, they are unable to translate their passion to something tangible. I can tell they are working hard but that fact alone doesn’t seem to be contributing to their success.

There ought to be a reason behind that. In many ways our generation has learned to associate achievements with money and there is no getting around that fact. It is strange that how we have become so blind and devoid of faith. We can’t see originality unless being pointed out. We can’t see beauty in anything until it serves our individual purposes.

In a world where business excellence is not just a matter of self awareness but also a marketing hook, building a brand image invariably falls blindly on advertising excellence as well. A case to be quoted here is of the marketing genius Steve Jobs himself. There was a time when he was naive, he wanted to be an inventor more than a marketer. Probably he originally felt more inclined to take an operations role in his company and let someone else do the selling. Much to his realization, he was tricked out of his own company. He had to learn marketing and he became the best in that.

This post is not just about marketing, it is about how we give importance to the outward appearances, about what we consider as assets and liabilities. Companies are succumbing to market competition and misjudging character for efficiency. People on the other hand are getting weary of everything. Social media is all so good but the narcissism is killing it. There is no way you can sell a holiday package to anyone without telling them how much they deserve it. The idea of brand storytelling is reaching new heights of self indulgence and everyone is asking – “what’s in it for me?”

The irony of marketing is that while it is done with the purpose of improving productivity by enforcing trust among the consumer, is counter-productive when done in excess because it incites skepticism instead of trust. Promises that are not delivered hurt you back. While the competition increases and everyone keeps making bigger, better promises, actual attention to detail reduces.

The current trends are to make the customer believe they are getting more than their money’s worth. If in fact everyone does get their money’s worth then how are businesses making profit? Over and over again we are led to believe that there is no way a business can survive with benevolence. Image builders and spin doctors have tried to change that perception since the beginning of time but that is misleading to some extent. True profiteers know better. As they say – “no good deed goes unpunished”. But is that really so? When businesses feel discouraged to invest in the product development or delivery it exactly means so. Many businesses that scale from small and medium to big brands face similar dilemma.

Don’t differentiate your Marketing from Production

We always find discrimination within a company, between employees, based on their direct contribution to the company’s earnings. That is when a hard-working process or operations person’s efforts are completely ignored. Very few organisations manage to grow without such disparities. More often than not, businesses think that the workers are replaceable liability. You groom them, feed them and yet they don’t seem to be bring any money. Marketing people are always the favorites because they are always scheming about making more money and the sales people are assets because they are like the workhorses or cash cows or whatever you like to call them but operations or design departments is just good for nothing bunch of nerds who no one knows what they do.

This situation seems more prominent in small businesses where there is an urge to expand quickly. More the business runs after gaining market share, the decisions keep getting tougher. Eventually the real innovation or operational excellence are compromised for profits and sales volumes. We get substandard products, substandard services and more ways to present them otherwise to the customers. Expenses on promotion increases and the kind of number crunching, self serving marketers that we are, we declare ourselves as a brand. The real significance of being ‘brand’ is comprehended by a handful of businessmen. To be a brand it means you have to be good in every sense both inside and out.

To truly establish a brand that stands the test of time, it has to be really innocent and yet walk on fire. Be crucified for doing good and yet keep doing better…

Don’t try to bully your Customer

Of late there have been a slew of events where a minor customer related altercation blew out of proportion and the brand suffered social media backlash. However, there is still hope. Modern CEO is not afraid of apologizing and people take such apology as a positive stand which is a good thing. As businesses break through local barriers and grow in strength, the human factor needs to be emphasized more. Businesses are fallible organisations and they can make mistakes. There is no need to hide behind aggressive denial. It is important to understand that a customer can be demanding and often irritating by your standards but that does not warrant a retaliatory behavior. People respect politeness and they forgive mistakes so it is necessary that brands act natural even in competitive environment.

Live and Die to Deliver a Promise

Some brands go extreme lengths to deliver a promise. This is a seemingly simple business maxim but the results could be really far reaching. Many a times the marketing department invents a hook to attract customers which essentially translates into a set of promises which are difficult to deliver. Such over enthusiastic messaging can come back to hurt your brand. It is necessary for brands to realize that although cool marketing promises sound good, consumers are rapidly evolving. They are much more aware than before and they have the destructive power of social media by their side. It is better to avoid going a mile than to fail by an inch! (No pun intended for the Subway controversy). On the other hand if you design deliverable promises and make sure that those promises are fulfilled, your brand will be appreciated more.

Don’t Fly Blind

Ultimately, hubris has a steep price. Brands sometimes invest in expensive campaigning without realizing what the customers really want. Don’t go to an advertising agency with an idea that you think will lure your customers in. Talk to your potential customer. Find out what will really serve them well. If you don’t know how to do that, then hire a market research team and give them time to come up with insights. You might think that its all gibberish or that it makes no difference but it does in the long run. Take customer feedback anonymously. That way you can avoid biased opinion. Use social media to interact with customers on a more personal level.

Another aspect that is frequently overlooked in business is the testing. Your product or service needs to be tested well before embarking on wider promotions. A simple concept well used in digital businesses and advertising is the A/B testing where two sets of design or user interface with fundamental variations are tested with sample users to determine which one gets more response. The purpose and outlay of testing can vary from case to case but whatever your testing methodology may be, it is always wise to give it due importance and keep improving. The testing methods should be continually employed long after the product or service is launched.

Mystery Shoppers

Scaling up could be a dream for most businesses but that dream can suffer many setbacks if your present brand delivery is not up to the mark. Many fatal attributes of a small business get translated into bigger problems when a business decides to go big. Sometimes as a business owner you might not be able to see through your own staff and organisational behavior. That’s where mystery shoppers come in. Online businesses, retail, luxury, franchise based and hospitality sector businesses are especially prone to malpractices at low level which can go undetected for a long time. Company auditors and experienced mystery shoppers can help identify errors and weed out bad tendencies in your business early on. By employing mystery shoppers you can establish a fair practice and transparency in your business that will get embedded in your brand culture.

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The articles published under TLB Bureau are either written by our staff writers or are selected works from contributors who are featured by our publication and are published with permission of authors.