The idea of a brand can be hard for many marketers to get their heads around, especially in the context of their own organizations. It all seems impossible to measure, at least beyond aided and unaided awareness. There is a way, however, to not only clearly define a brand but also measure it and define its weak points: by using the brand vector method.
What Is A Brand?
Before we get into brand vectors, we really need to define the word “brand.” Brand means many things to many people, and there are even disagreements in the marketing community as to its meaning.
Iterative Marketer Elizabeth Earin described a brand as “the intangible perception, the gut feeling, that our customers have about our product or service.” Seth Godin defines it as “the set of expectations, memories, stories and relationships that, taken together, account for a consumer’s decision to choose one product or service over another.”
Personally, I define a brand as the emotional and logical associations that drive rational and irrational consumer choice. It is a set of hooks into the lizard brain that influence lower-level decision-making. Humans are wired to make fight or flight determinations when encountering other humans. If you know, like and trust someone, you don’t think twice before doing business with them. That being said, we’ve also all turned and walked the other way when confronted with people who just seem sketchy. A corporation is an artificial (and thus emotionless) construct, and it is it’s brand that drives emotional responses toward or away from it.
What Is A Brand Vector?
That all sounds pretty intangible, doesn’t it? How could anyone possibly begin to measure gut feelings, expectations, memories and emotional associations?
The trick is a simple line and dot. We call this a brand vector, and this tool is extremely useful in identifying the feelings and expectations that a brand projects and then aligning those expectations with reality.
Take a moment to think about a good friend. What characteristics drew you to them? Can you think of someone else whose personality equally drives you away? Personality traits are responsible for drawing us in or pushing us away from brands as well.
We use a brand vector to represent each personality trait or market position of our brand. The vector is a line with two (believable) extremes at either end. A dot to represent your organization’s position is placed somewhere between these believable extremes.
So for example, if I wanted to measure or communicate my organization’s degree of openness, I might put “Secretive” at one end of the vector, and “Utterly Transparent” at the other. I’d likely follow those words up with a brief definition as to what they are, such as:
My job as a marketer is to then figure out where our organization sits on that line and place a dot at that point.
How Do We Measure a Brand?
There are three pools in which we need to take a measurement for each brand vector:
- Senior Leadership: How do those at the top of the organization perceive the brand?
- Employees: How do those on the front lines of the organization live the brand with our customers, prospects and partners?
- Customers and Prospects: How do those who have interacted with us perceive the brand?
By measuring the three groups independently, we have the ability to understand if there is true brand alignment within the organization.
We have found that a simple survey is sufficient to get a finger on the pulse of the brand. If at all possible, use a survey tool that allows respondent to fluidly slide a dot between the two ends of the vector. This removes the artificial constraints of a one to ten number system and, therefore, any bias that one end of the spectrum is better than the other.
How Do We Select Our Vectors?
Brand vectors fall into two categories: brand personality and market position.
When selecting brand personality vectors, begin with the strongest personality traits of your organization. These are usually represented by your company’s values. You can refer to this reference for a list of potential brand personality vectors, but any personality trait that has two believable extremes will work.
Take careful note of the word “believable.” While honesty might be a shared value of your organization, it makes a horrible brand vector: If one end of the vector is “Honest to a Fault”, what does that make the other end? “Bald-Faced Liars?”
Market position vectors help you to understand your logical differentiators. These answer the question “Why buy from us?” They are also what your buyer uses to rationalize their buying decision after they have made their purchase.
Again, it is key that you come up with a vector that has believable extremes at both ends. For example, “Low Cost Leader” vs. “Luxury” is a common vector for many organizations. Accuracy, however, makes a lousy brand vector, especially if you’re an accountant. You end up with “Perfectly Accurate” on one end, and something like “Occasional Errors” on the other. Any accountant with occasional errors has a problem, not a market position.
We’ve Measured Our Brand – Now What?
Once you have a set of brand vectors that you believe represent the essence of your organization and you have surveyed your three populations (leadership, employees, customers/prospects), it’s time to regroup with your senior leadership team.
It’s worth noting that you will have surprises along the way to defining your brand. You are not likely to find an alignment among your employees, leadership and customers. That lack of alignment, and how to compare your vectors against your competitors, are issues I will address in a future blog post.
These challenges aside, the insights you gather from this exercise are worthwhile on their own and will set you up for drafting an outline of exactly what your organization stands for.
Carefully select the vectors that have alignment and are significant to your organization and your customers. Then distill your position on these vectors in a brand manifesto. A brand manifesto takes your brand’s vectors and brings them to life, articulating not only your position but also the reasons behind it and the feelings that this position evokes in your leadership, employees and customers.
You should end up with about 300 words that succinctly convey what makes your organization unique and what it feels like to work with you.
Once you have your brand manifesto, distribute it to the entire organization. Make sure that it is part of onboarding employees. And, when working with outside marketing and advertising partners, make sure that it is part of their creative brief.
Rinse and Repeat
This sort of “snapshot” of your brand is definitely valuable. Where this tool gets to be really powerful, however, is when you repeat the same survey year-over-year. By repeating this exercise annually, you can see how your branding efforts have impacted perception internally and externally, as well as recognize and understand any drifts in brand perception.
Damir Radovic says
Good read! You’re right, this should be done every year, so you can measure your progress, or see where you’ve made a mistake and fix that as soon as possible!