Posts Tagged ‘brand identity’
Branding Mistake by Chrysler Hurts Consumer Confidence
In the quest for brands to establish emotional investment by their customers, one of the most important changes that can be made is a move from demonstrating honesty towards building trust. By now, honesty is expected in business. With negative buzz smeared over the internet by every disgruntled hothead, honesty is a requirement. Given that honesty is expected to stand out, brands must now move towards trust.
Building trust takes significant effort. Trust is what you have with a friend. One of the most powerful expressions of trust that brands can make is the No Hassle Return Policy, made famous by Nordstrom years ago.
A company who has recently made a stab at building trust is Chrysler. 
In February of this year, Chrysler introduced its “Minivan Pledge”. This offered buyers 60 days to try a Dodge Grand Caravan or Chrysler Town and Country with the option of returning the vehicle within 60 days if they were unhappy with it in any way. Excellent idea!
Despite their apparent move in the direction of building trust, Chrysler made a disappointing reversal this month. They spun their new program, now available on most 2010 Chrysler, Jeep®, Dodge and Ram Truck vehicles, as an expansion of their old program, although it is actually quite the opposite.
A look at their July 8, 2010 press release reveals that customers must now choose one of several incentives:
• 0% financing for up to 72 months
• cash rebates of up to $4,000 or
• the 60-day guarantee (a $1000 value at $500 per month)
Fred Diaz, President and Chief Executive Officer – Ram Truck Brand and Lead Executive for U.S. Sales, is quoted in that press release saying, “We build great vehicles for just about any lifestyle and with this pledge, consumers will have the confidence to know they made the right purchase or they can return the vehicle no questions asked.”
Unfortunately, with the latest pledge, Chrysler is actually destroying the trust that they were beginning to rebuild with car buyers in America. Bad move.
Laura Strickland is a marketing professional with an expertise in brand strategy. Her credentials include an MBA with a Marketing Area of Emphasis from Arizona State University as well as experience developing marketing strategies for both large and small businesses.
Laura helps businesses succeed by helping to define their competitive advantage and using this as a foundation for marketing campaigns.
Laura can be contacted at lstrickland@phoenixmarketingassociates.com
Emotional Branding: From Consumers to People
Emotional branding is beginning to supersede the old concept of brand awareness. During this transition, I think we’ll see a move from being consumer-focused to being people-focused.
Here’s an example of a great opportunity for Campbell soup.
Because of the “tough road ahead”, Nick Neumann of Louisville, Kentucky exchanged his restaurant lunches for $1.75 Campbell Chunky soup, buying up to 15 cans at a time.
Noticing this trend, Mitchell Pinheiro, a Philadelphia-based analyst at Janney Montgomery Scott LLC, pointed out that 2009 could be “the year of condensed soup, driven by the backdrop of severe economic pressure on the consumer.” 
Further, Edgar Roesch, a Soleil Securities Corp. analyst in New York, said that Campbell soup is “acknowledged as a way to weather a recession.”
Sure, these cheap meals can propel Campbell soup into an out-performer in hard times. But, I see this as a perfect opportunity for Campbell to really bolster their brand so they don’t lose momentum as the economy rebounds.
How can Campbell achieve that? Rather than just ride the wave of the economic downturn, Campbell could stop being so focused on how consumers buy and concentrate on how people live.
Campbell is a bit complacent, as I see it. They’re being lulled into traditional branding concepts that pit consumers against brands. Marketing managers would, and often still do, pin back their ears and attack customers to break down their defenses and decode their language. This is an “us” (manufacturers, retailers, marketing departments) against “them” (consumers) attitude. For Campbell, it turns into a race to sell consumers the maximum amount of soup while they’re still down and out.
Instead, this is a perfect opportunity for Campbell to focus more on the people who are buying their product and how they live. This means Campbell would create more of a partnership approach based on mutual respect. They could start building stronger relationships with their customers so that they could provide information about how they live now and how their lives are changing as the economy recovers. By doing this, Campbell could create desire for their soup that far outlives the economic downturn.
I see Campbell has a Facebook page, which seems like a start. But with unanswered posts like:
• “…what must one do if he finds a mosquito in a can of Campbell’s soup?”
• “Will the catalog for merchandise ever be back online? It seems like it has been ‘under construction’ for about a year now?”
• “…how many people have we got here who actually work for Campbell’s?
I think they’ve got some more work to do to genuinely focus more on emotional branding and discovering how people live.
Laura Strickland is a marketing professional with an expertise in brand strategy. Her credentials include an MBA with a Marketing Area of Emphasis from Arizona State University as well as experience developing marketing strategies for both large and small businesses.
Laura helps businesses succeed by helping to define their competitive advantage and using this as a foundation for marketing campaigns.
Laura can be contacted at lstrickland@phoenixmarketingassociates.com.