It is now commonly understood that brands represent significant corporate value and are among an organization’s most valuable intangible assets, which now comprise up to 90% of the value of the S&P 500. In recent years, Boards and private equity firms have increasingly recognized the additional strategic and financial value that strong brands bring to an enterprise. This value has been demonstrated in brand valuation rankings and acquisition prices worldwide. Brands, therefore, require ongoing attention, management, and investment to grow and generate an economic return to the business.
Properly created and managed, your brand helps generate operational and economic value by:
- Enhancing awareness, consideration, trial and loyalty
- Attracting and retaining customers with an engaging promise and experience
- Guiding and informing business decisions and activities
- Attracting and retaining top-tier talent and partners
- Easing entry into new markets
- Commanding price premiums
- Facilitating brand extensions into new products and categories
One of the most pressing challenges is how to make business decisions that are consistent with what the brand stands for. Companies in many industries struggle to enhance the power of their brands by aligning their activities to deliver a fulfilling customer experience. Without proper stewardship, your brand can languish and result in a diminished or detrimental impact on your business.
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The concept of the Brand Council is key in developing, safeguarding and managing your brand across the organization.
A common misconception is that the brand is the responsibility of the Marketing department or a select few. In some cases, the success of a brand can depend solely on the stance of the CEO – for better or worse.
I encourage you to view the brand as the sum total of your organization’s promises and activities. A brand is too precious to leave to just one department or senior executive.
Consider the following questions:
Your organization is collectively responsible for creating an expected and consistent brand experience. The challenge becomes how your organization, with its multiple layers, multiple divisions and multiple markets, comes together to address the strategic and tactical issues related to brand management.
Enter: Your Brand Council.
A Brand Council is a group, representative of your larger organization, with one mandate: To ensure that business strategies, processes, decisions and actions are aligned with the brand’s positioning and values – namely, your organization’s unique promise and point of difference.
This, in turn, focuses the entire organization on delivering the fulfilling customer experience that secures loyalty and future earnings.
The Brand Council provides strategic brand governance in five categories:
- Creation/management of the brand
- Challenges and opportunities for the brand
- Brand compliance
- Brand measurement and refinement
- Brand culture Beyond “Logo Police”
Following are the types of issues that you may encounter in your Brand Council, grouped into the four categories introduced above.
1. Creation/Management Of The Brand
Alignment between business strategy and brand strategy: What is our business strategy, including our short- and long-term business objectives? How does the brand strategy bring this business strategy to life?
- Business objectives formulation and assessment How can we leverage the brand to achieve our business objectives (i.e., revenue growth, cost reduction, market share growth, etc.)? How have these objectives changed in the last year/quarter and what impact could these have on the brand?
- Product and /or service portfolio decisions Which products/services complement the brand direction and, therefore, warrant a current or future investment? Conversely, which products/services should be rationalized because they no longer match with the brand promise? What is the best ongoing process to review our portfolio?
2. Challenges And Opportunities For The Brand
Operational choices and decisions: How should the brand promise guide everyday operational issues and/or decisions (e.g., work quality, defect rates, product design, response times, communication gaps, product line or service gaps)? Conversely, how do these operational issues and/or decisions affect the brand?
Customer targeting: Which new customers are most likely to benefit from the values, objectives and promise that our brand stands for?
Merger and acquisition evaluation: When evaluating potential mergers or acquisitions, which organization(s) would complement our existing brand promise? How do these organizations fit into our existing portfolio? What would be the brand implications of merging with or acquiring these organizations? How can we manage the brand to maximize value for an upcoming liquidity or merger event?
Prospective partner assessment: Which potential co-branding partnerships will align with our brand promise and values? Which of these partnerships might be most beneficial for building brand equity?
Brand Council’s responsibilities extend beyond “logo-policing” to a much deeper involvement in addressing brand-related issues – issues that have strategic implications for your organization.
Competitive analysis and response: How does the brand help us differentiate ourselves and de-position our competitors? How can the brand dictate our response to competitive activity?
3. Brand Compliance
Visual and verbal expression: How do advertising, communications, signage, online and other applications of our identity (e.g., logo, visual vocabulary, language and tone of voice) align with our guidelines for consistent brand expression? Should there be differences in brand expression in the organization and, if so, what are these differences? What are the challenge areas (e.g., too many versions of the logo, inconsistent execution across applications) in the expression of the brand?
4. Brand Measurement And Refinement
General brand assessment: What is the state of the brand (e.g., metrics definition and tracking, findings and implications from any recent brand research, recent media mentions, share of brand choice, etc.)? How do we measure the brand’s performance against the competition in a changing marketplace?
5. Brand Culture
Brand culture assessment: How deeply are our employees engaged with the brand? How well are our brand attributes being embraced internally to help shape desired behaviors and attitudes? What new programs should we develop to keep people engaged and “living” the brand?
- Customer touchpoint management How well have the multiple interactions that customers have with the organization been considered and aligned with the brand? Have touchpoints been mapped and analyzed for improvement so that investment can be directed to those that have the greatest potential for positive impact on the customer experience?
Constituting The Council
I suggest following two guiding principles to determine who should be a member of your Brand Council:
1. Have organization-wide representation with members from each of your key strategic functions.
Ideally, your Brand Council should have a senior representative from each functional area, since all areas impact the delivery of your brand promise. These include:
- C-suite management (including a senior marketing executive)
- Operations
- Human Capital Resources
- Finance
- Marketing
- Sales
- Legal
- Public/Investor Relations
- Research and Development
- Administration
I recommend that you also retain an external brand consulting partner to maintain an objective point of view and provide your Brand Council with the most current best practices in branding.
2. A member of senior management should be your Brand Council
The Brand Council Leader should represent the importance and visibility that your organization wishes to give to the brand. The Brand Council should also have a Chair. The Brand Council Chair is responsible for setting the agendas and directing the meetings.
Brand Ambassadors form the critical information flow channel between the Brand Council and the rest of the organization. Especially in larger organizations, the Brand Council needs a team of communicators and brand champions to assist with implementation and communication to and from the Council.
Brand Ambassadors embody and champion the brand at the ground level. Every employee is expected to live the values of the brand, but Brand Ambassadors go a step further and promote its values throughout the organization, regardless of whether they work in marketing, finance, operations, logistics, or other functional areas.
Steps In The Brand Council Process
Step 1. Mandate and Formation
The first step is to agree on your Brand Council’s mandate and membership. All key functional areas should be represented, and the critical roles of Chair and/or Leader should be assigned and agreed. The roles and functions of Brand Council should be announced to the rest of the company to validate its importance and to clarify how people can and will be expected to contribute. Taking this step will also prepare the organization to view brand-related decisions as an output of the Brand Council, giving it the visibility it needs to thrive in the long term.
Step 2. Communication
Issues and information are communicated from the functional area. Depending on the size and structure of the functional area and/or the organizational culture, people from a functional area may wish to directly communicate with their Brand Council Member. In these cases, we recommend that the Brand Ambassador(s) be advised of the communication, if appropriate.
Step 3. Forwarding
The Brand Ambassador(s) forward the information to the Brand Council Member for review. The Brand Council Member should then assess how the issue might impact the corporate brand and whether or not it is appropriate to address it to the Brand Council for discussion. The Brand Council Member may already have the knowledge and/or authority to make a decision without Brand Council review, as defined by the Brand Council Mandate.
Step 4. Review
The issue is raised for discussion and resolution at the regular or special Brand Council meetings. The Leader oversees the Brand Council and is the final decision-maker in case of a tie vote and/or makes the final recommendations, depending on the Council’s mandate and recommendation process.
The Chair of the Brand Council runs the Brand Council meetings, sets the agenda, directs the discussion and helps the group to reach decisions and recommendations.
Step 5. Implementation
The Member, Brand Ambassador(s) and other leaders within the functional area(s) prepare an implementation plan on the decision/resolution and deploy the required resources to produce business benefit for the organization.
Step 6. Results
The Brand Council guides the consistent delivery of the brand promise throughout the organization. But that alone is not enough. To create tangible value, Brand Council decisions must be supported by effective implementation from the functional area(s). Over time, this process will institutionalize the brand, helping build customer loyalty and ensure future revenue.
I recommend that your CEO or COO lead your Brand Council.
Step 7. Decision
Once the Brand Council reaches a decision/resolution, the Brand Council Member communicates it, either directly or to the Brand Ambassadors in the appropriate functional area.
Step 8. Distribution
If applicable, the Brand Ambassador communicates the decision/resolution to all or part of the functional area, as appropriate.
The Brand Council oversees the activities whereby the brand contributes to stakeholder value. When your Brand Council guides business activities to align with the brand promise, your organization will benefit from satisfied customers. Over time, consistent and satisfying brand experiences will transform satisfied customers to loyal customers, which, in turn, helps you secure and grow future earnings and create economic value.
Contributed to Branding Strategy Insider by: Benjamin Bidlack, Brand Strategist, The Blake Project
At The Blake Project, we help clients worldwide, in all stages of development, define or redefine and articulate what makes them competitive at critical moments of change. Please email us to learn how we can help you compete differently.
Branding Strategy Insider is a service of The Blake Project: A strategic brand consultancy specializing in Brand Research, Brand Strategy, Brand Growth and Brand Education
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