When its all said and done, all youre truly left with at the end of the day is your companys brand and what your brand stands for in the minds of both your customers and employees. But do you manage your company brand for the benefit of both constituencies: customers and employees? Most companies that I consult with focus their brand management efforts solely on the customer. But if youre really serious about differentiating your brand from your competitors, then I suggest that you begin to manage and think about your brand from a dual, yet fully aligned point of view: customers and employees.

Your brand, be it appliances, electronics, automobiles, clothing, etc. serves as a powerful magnet that attracts both customers and employees to your front door, while also serving as an anchor to hold them. The best companies manage their brands from both the customer and employee perspective. And why not, after all isnt it your front-line store employees who are the face and personality of your brand to your customers?

Your current brand management focus and responsibilities should encompass the two most important components of your business: your customers and store employees.

Customer Perspective: Great brands connect with their customers on an emotional level vs. logical. It terms of emotion, what does it feel like viscerally to do business with you?

Brand positioning starts with a frame of reference that communicates to your customers an expectation they can achieve when doing business with you. However, you have to know who you are before you can convince others.

Many companies often promote attributes of their products and services that consumers dont care about. Its important to assess not only product benefits and features but in addition the customers buying experience: every point of contact, commonly referred to as moments of truth" or touch points."

From the moment your customers approach your stores to the moment they leave, what was the experience like? From exterior, to store design, to product offering, to service - is your customer buying experience fast, friendly, and helpful?

Its the overall experience that your customers will recall when its time for them to purchase again, therefore make it positive and memorable. While careful consideration of your brands point of differentiation is important, just as important are your points of parity with your other products and services. Be sure to assess on a continual basis your points of parity otherwise brand attributes that were once differentiators may become minimum requirements, also know as price of entry."

Employee Perspective: If providing your customers with a fast, friendly, helpful and memorable buying experience is key to success, then I think wed all agree that the folks serving your customers are the critical link. Not technology, products, or store design; but people! Dont get me wrong, technology, products, and hard assets are indeed important to your business, however, successful branding is all about connecting with your customers on an emotional level, and that can only be achieved on the human level.

Technology is a great enabler, however your brands real moment of truth is when your customers are standing at the transaction counter looking into the face of your sales associate. It is at this moment that all your branding efforts (promises) are either fulfilled or broken (*). Managing the employee dimension of your brand involves: recruiting, interviewing and selection, training, career development and business culture, which includes: motivation, teamwork, reward and recognition, and leadership. It is the people side of the business that represents your brand to your customers that create the emotional link for brand loyalty.

For a free report: Motivating Non-Performers: 20 Dos & Donts of Employee Motivation" go to: http://www.eps-i.com/

About the author:

Terry McKenna is an internationally acclaimed author, speaker and consultant to Fortune 500 companies as well as smaller regional chains. Principal and co-founder of Employee Performance Strategies, Inc. (EPS), http://www.eps-i.com Terry helps companies become the customers brand of choice by becoming the employer of choice.

Terry is a well-known and respected author on a wide variety of business topics. Terry was featured in The Wall Street Journal for his expertise in brand differentiation, as well as the Harvard Business School corporate training video: Benchmarking Outside The Box", for his leadership role in the development and implementation of a national customer service strategy with ExxonMobil Corporation. To learn more about Terry and EPS visit http://www.eps-i.com

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