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Editorial

Managing brand performance:


Aligning positioning, execution
and experience
Journal of Brand Management (2010) 17, 465–471. doi:10.1057/bm.2010.11

THE COMPELLING NEED FOR customer. This focus demands customer


BRAND ALIGNMENT intimacy to understand customer needs and
The traditional thinking is that brands are self-reflection to understand company and
built through marketing investments such as partner capabilities. Brand visionaries are
communications and advertising. Although also in charge of specifying what will be
advertising is a tool of brand building it is done for the brand providers, which include
over-weighted in its importance to deliv- employees, channel partners and fran-
ering an exceptional brand. Exceptional chisees. The role of brand visionaries is to
brands are delivered through brand align- help facilitate the promises about the brand
ment, of which advertising may be a com- providers’ role in enabling and facilitating
ponent or in some cases may be absent promises about value propositions to cus-
altogether. Google is one of the most rec- tomers. Brand providers are in charge of
ognized brands in the world. It is ranked how the brand is delivered. Frontline staff
at number seven (higher is more valuable) and delivery channels are responsible for
on Interbrand’s Best Global Brands 2009. the interactive co-creation of meaning and
Yet, do you recall ever seeing a Google experience that embodies the value propo-
advertisement on television, radio or print? sitions of the brand. Operational excellence
CEO Eric Schmidt has stated that Google’s insures this interactive marketing consist-
dominant market share is because of quality ently delivers on the brand promise. In the
of searches and not advertising.1 following sections we will discuss the good,
To deliver a strong brand experience the bad and the ugly of brand alignment
for customers the organization needs to and the effect on brand promises.
develop strong internal alignment with the
brand among internal stakeholders and THE INTERNAL LIFE OF THE
resources, and strong external alignment BRAND
with external stakeholders, partners, cus- In every organization thousands of deci-
tomers and consumers. sions are made on a daily basis. It is,
We call this the alignment of brand practically speaking, impossible for the
visionaries, brand providers and brand executive management to micromanage all
believers (see Figure 1). Brand visionaries of these decisions. A strong brand provides
are managers who set the brand strategy in a consistent way to polarize multiple micro-
motion. They are concerned with making decisions, so they reinforce each other in a
promises of value propositions to the way that is synergistic. Southwest Airlines

© 2010 Macmillan Publishers Ltd. 1350-23IX Brand Management Vol. 17, 7, 465–471

www.palgrave-journals.com/bm/
Editorial

Brand
Believers
(Customers)

How Who
Interactive marketing to Making promises
co-create customer External marketing is
experience (delivery of “making promises about
value propositions) value propositions”
Operational excellence Customer intimacy
Value
Delivery

Brand Brand
Providers Visionaries
(Employees, (Management)
Channel)
What
Internal marketing to
“enable & facilitate promises
about value propositions”
Product innovation

Figure 1: Brand alignment framework.

has a simple mantra of being the low-cost bring it to life for the customer beyond
competitor. When Herb Kelleher, the what is possible with media communica-
former CEO, was onboard his decision- tions, by making it personal. This concept
making guidance was simple. If someone of brand ambassador is essentially a role for
came to him recommending that South- management in aligning employees within
west Airlines develop a program to recog- the corporation. Managers need to build a
nize the birthdays of its customers he would vision of company strategy. They also need
retort that if the initiative would support to bring that strategy to life by building a
making Southwest the lowest-priced com- company culture that embodies the essence
petitor on the market that logic would of that strategy. By going one step further,
decide whether to pursue the idea. A simple by using the concept of train-the-trainer,
stated strategy is one that is also easy to companies can educate a few talented indi-
follow for brand providers. viduals within the company and position
The brand reward system needs to reflect them to drive the brand values throughout
the value of the brand to align goals and their areas of influence within the firm.
metrics. Southwest not only made sure the Apple’s foray into retail brought some
minds of the employees were guided by innovations to light regarding how it
strategy; it also made sure their pocketbooks delivers its customer service. One aspect of
were aligned with strategy. In 1974, it ini- that customer service is the Genius Bar that
tiated the first profit-sharing plan in the US is staffed by Genii. Newly hired Apple
airline industry. When the employees own Genii go to Apple’s headquarters in
the company stock it is in their best interest Cupertino for 2 weeks of intensive training
to create future value for the company. where they earn Apple technical certifica-
Front-line employees are brand ambas- tions and learn the minutiae of AppleCare
sadors. They represent the brand and can internal policies. Apple advertises its career

466 © 2010 Macmillan Publishers Ltd. 1350-23IX Brand Management Vol. 17, 7, 465–471
Editorial

opportunity for Genii as ‘To delight. Enrich. to implement a company-wide retraining


Impress. Engage. Inspire.’ and screens its effort.7 Customers were turned away at the
job candidates for those ‘having passion door while the baristas inside the store were
about customer service and a commitment led on a back-to-basics boot camp. One
to exceeding expectations’.2 Its hiring is would think that the ‘coffee taste and flavor’
aligned with its brand promise as Apple’s would be paramount in importance for cus-
customer satisfaction score is at 84 with its tomer satisfaction yet higher ranked than
closest rival, Dell, trailing at 74.3 There are this is ‘friendly staff’ and ‘treatment as a
some compromises in the system, such as valuable customer’. A smile launches hap-
the Genii are trained mostly for current piness, and Starbucks realizes it needs to
products, and therefore legacy products do focus on soft skills.
not get much support, and unlike Dell with The best companies measure their
its 24-hour turnaround time Apple does employee’s intellectual and emotional
not guarantee service turnaround times, engagement with the brand. Company cul-
which can be a huge hassle for individuals ture is aligned to the brand in a similar
with only one computer.4 But for many of fashion where any brand campaign aligns
Apple’s fanatics it is a small price to pay to the brand promise with the value proposi-
be a part of the club. tion for consumers. Employees need to
In addition to the Genius Bar, Apple also know what the brand promise is all about
offers free workshops in many of its stores and what the value proposition is for them
on using Apple hardware and applications. to deliver on that brand promise. In this
The Pro Lab series offers free sessions to context it is critical to ensure ‘quick
learn applications like Aperture, Logic Pro recovery’ from negative brand experiences
and Final Cut Pro. The Apple stores’ One owing to service failures. The best way to
to One training offers a year of weekly handle service quality mishaps is to work
training for just US$99 per year. At that them out of the system. This is the strategy
price the value seems quite unbeatable. for Singapore Airlines, which is recognized
Apple efforts do not go unrewarded at the worldwide for its excellent service. The
cash register. Its stores, on average, bring company runs an academy where all staff
in over $23 million per year at estimated are retrained on a regular basis and cabin
sales per square foot at $4000, as compared crew are evaluated at least four times a year
with Best Buy’s $930, Neiman Marcus’ to ensure the brand is delivered with integ-
$611 and luxury store Tiffany & Co.’s rity across normal service processes and
$2666.5 Apple brings it all together where special situation handling. The Singapore
the brand promise to the brand believers Airlines staff always appear quite engaged
and the brand providers are as one. in delivering the best possible service. A
Great brands consistently renew their way to gauge employee engagement is to
brand culture. In 2008, Starbucks recog- view it through the framework of Csikzent-
nized its quality was deteriorating.6 Howard mihalyi where people act with ‘flow’ for
D. Schultz, its CEO, bemoaned the ‘watering their work.8 Flow is a mental state where
down’ of the Starbucks experience. There a person is fully involved in their activity
was a lot of coffee confusion behind the with an energized focus. It is described as
counter as too many times when a cappuc- an innately positive experience because it
cino was ordered what was served would makes use of skills for optimal performance.
have been called a latte as it was filled to Flow is correlated with a higher motivation
the brim with milk. To address this issue to perform and perform well.9 Brand
Starbucks shut down 7100 of its stores engagement assessment needs to go a

© 2010 Macmillan Publishers Ltd. 1350-23IX Brand Management Vol. 17, 7, 465–471 467
Editorial

step further and measure an employee’s can lead things astray. Google developed a
knowledge, beliefs and attitudes towards software platform called Android that it
the brand. licenses to hardware manufacturers including
Consistency across the brand portfolio is HTC, Motorola, Samsung and Sony.12 In
a necessary element of strong brand strategy. December 2009, Motorola launched the
Samsung has risen to a path to quality across Droid phone based on Android 2.0 on the
its brand portfolio. Not only does it pro- Verizon network to a frenzy of sales
duce stellar televisions and personal elec- reaching a million units sold faster than the
tronics but it is also rated number one by iPhone. After this great success Google
JD Power on home appliances including announced on 5 January 2010 that it would
refrigerators, clothes washers and clothes launch its own phone called the Nexus
dryers.10 It is important for the brand to One. However, unlike the Motorola Droid
guide and represent a specific level of the Nexus One tripped on its way off the
quality to deliver across the portfolio and, starting block. Its hardware was top notch
in addition, it is important to continuously but its software was overhyped. It con-
support the quality over time. Canon is a tained Android 2.1, which was a minor
solid example of this in cameras. Its cameras upgrade and less than what the customers
are consistently rated highly by expert expected. But the biggest hurdles were not
reviewers. Canon delivers on this by having based on the product. The phone was orig-
made a commitment to achieving the best inally sold exclusively on T-Mobile that
in optics across its wide product portfolio trails in markets share at 12 per cent com-
of cameras, copiers, projectors, scanners, pared to Verizon and AT&T at 31.1 per
eyecare, freespace optics and motion pic- cent and 25.2 per cent, respectively.13 Sub-
tures equipment. Brand consistency is sequently, the phone was made available
driven by a strong brand vision to guide on the AT&T network but it was sold only
what the brand providers are to deliver. in an unlocked version at $530, which
Brand vision also helps guide decisions places it at a very hefty premium over the
over product lifecycles. Apple also has been $199 iPhone that is sold locked and subsi-
a good sequencing value from Mac to iPod dized by the carrier. The final slip-up was
to iPhone to iPad. By establishing consist- that Google was not ready for prime time
ency over the portfolio the new brands as a consumer electronics company as its
launched not only are supported by the customer service was greatly lacking. Users
legacy brands, but the legacy brands are found it hard to connect with a real human
revived and revitalized by the new brands. to handle service support and the response
In this down economy, one of the few time for service requests was dismal, taking
bright spots is Apple, whose sales have con- several days turnaround on emailed ques-
tinued to climb, and the company claims tions. The result was tepid sales with the
9 out of every 10 dollars spent for com- Google Nexus One gaining only 2 per cent
puters over the $1000 price point. In the in market share by the end of Q1 2010 of
first quarter of 2008 it only claimed 6.6 Android phones. A company expanding its
dollars of every 10 dollars spent.11 The call portfolio from a product oriented to a
to brand consistency across the brand port- service or solution orientation needs to
folio helps employees know what to strive retool at a deeper level to understand what
for in the new generation of products. will drive the overall value for the cus-
Google’s Nexus One phone provides a tomer. The expected promise at the cus-
good illustration of how a lack of internal tomer level needs to be aligned with brand
focus on the customer value proposition providers’ delivery of the brand.

468 © 2010 Macmillan Publishers Ltd. 1350-23IX Brand Management Vol. 17, 7, 465–471
Editorial

Strong brands align their external promises proceedings it was forced to shut down
to their internal operations. Southwest Air- Song.17 The problem with imitation is if
lines, as a low-cost provider, has aligned its you do not get all the interlocking activities
activities with its strategy. It offers limited right you are bound for a competitive dis-
passenger service with no meals, no seat advantage. To make things work for radical
assignments, no connections with other air- innovation a company needs to manage its
lines and no baggage transfers. It has fre- businesses more like independent portfolios
quent reliable departures made possible by or else the dominant culture will crush the
15-min gate turnarounds, automatic tick- fledgling before it can take wing.
eting machines and highly productive
grounds crew who are motivated through
high compensation, and stock ownership. EXTERNAL ALIGNMENT
The union contract is flexible, benefiting OF THE BRAND
the airline. In addition, the costs are con- Brands need to be aligned to markets and
trolled by limited use of travel agents, for developed world companies there is a
standardized 737 aircraft, high asset utiliza- tendency to overinvest in mature markets
tion and service via point-to-point routes and underinvest in emerging markets. Big
between mid-sized cities and secondary air- American automakers General Motors and
ports for larger urban airports. The com- Ford totally missed the bottom of the
petitive advantage does not come from one market. Ford especially is out of touch with
activity but rather the holistic group of its heritage as the Model T is generally
interlocking activities.14 regarded as the first affordable car. Tata
As the saying goes, the greatest compli- Motors is at the vanguard of the new
ment is imitation. Delta launched a wholly emerging market of new car buyers and
owned budget carrier Song Airlines and its Nano car priced at $2000 it is being
intended to copy Southwest’s model by called the world’s cheapest car. Months
offering limited in-flight catering, single before the release of the first model in 2009
aircraft type, higher asset utilization, Tata Motors stated there was already a
improved staff utilization and reduced waiting list of 203 000 people who have
channel costs.15 Although the changes placed orders for the car and a wait until
improved Song’s cost by 20–30 per cent 2011.18 Ford can count that as a missed
over Delta, it was still short of the 28 per opportunity.
cent and 39 per cent costs advantage over BP is in the middle of a crisis of one of
Delta by JetBlue and Southwest.16 Song’s the biggest man-made disasters ever. The
strategy was caught in the middle with BP website states ‘We help the world meet
compromises it had to make as a subsidiary its growing need for heat, light and mobility,
of Delta including having to participate in and strive to do so by producing energy
Delta’s expensive pilot contract, negoti- that is affordable, secure and doesn’t damage
ating schedules, routes and pricing with the environment’. The company used to
Delta, and recruiting cabin crew from Del- be known as British Petroleum that it cast-
ta’s furloughed employees. At an estimated off for a catchy ‘Beyond Petroleum’ tags.
cost of launching Song at $65 million, it Greenpeace had already pointed out in
was an expensive experiment to make. 2008 that this tag was but a farce with 93
James Whitehurst, the COO of Delta at per cent of the companies investment tied
the time, is quoted as saying it was ‘very up in petroleum and the remainder 2.79
expensive’ to support two brands, and per cent in wind, 1.39 in solar and 2.79
given Delta was undergoing bankruptcy per cent in biofuels.19 The oil leak in the

© 2010 Macmillan Publishers Ltd. 1350-23IX Brand Management Vol. 17, 7, 465–471 469
Editorial

Gulf of Mexico is currently spewing an accomplished with focusing on best prac-


estimated 210 000 gallons of oil a day and tices in measuring brand engagement.
an estimated four million gallons in total For optimal internal alignment of resource
has leaked to date. Any goodwill BP had the brand visionaries need engender atten-
built up with its investment in advertising is tion to the price/value ratio of their offers
flowing out the door. The risks of oil drilling across the portfolio and over time. Consist-
includes disasters, but the technologies to ency in value delivered helps brand pro-
mitigate a disaster should not be ‘new and viders understand the value targets and
untried’ as it is said ‘the first rule is – don’t helps the customers understand the brand
make things worse’ than they already are.20 positioning. The best companies explore
Clearly, the promise to customers by BP is the most effective ways to build a brand
misaligned with its internal priorities. that balances both to current sources of
Companies also need to align to pulses revenue and to future value.
in the market. Big shows like the Con- Companies need to pay attention to
sumer Electronics Show are important for aligning strategy and execution. There are
many companies to make major announce- different needs for structuring around rad-
ments. However, Apple is bucking the ical versus incremental innovation so com-
trend on this one. The MacWorld Expo panies need to pay attention to their
held every year in January in San Francisco structures to make things work. Imitation
has been anchored by Apple.21 In 2008 it is the highest form of flattery, however if
was announced that Apple would no longer one element is in misalignment it can throw
provide a keynote address at the show as out the entire value proposition. Compa-
the firm decided tradeshows had become a nies need to align their external promises
minor part in reaching the customer, given to their internal operations to a high level
the increasing popularity of the retails stores of detail. Activity mapping can help under-
that handle 3.5 million visitors a week. stand if your strategy is different and how
Nonetheless, tradeshows are of great impor- to make it different. Companies consist-
tance in many industries as they consolidate ently need to revisit their activity maps as
the buyers for a big sales push. they need to realign across the product life
cycle from innovation to efficiency.
Delivery of strong brands does not take
BRINGING IT ALL TOGETHER place in a vacuum. Brand partners need to
What have we learned from this array of be aligned to deliver on the brand promise.
examples on brand alignment? For internal And brands need to be aligned with pulses
branding the company must align its people, in the market. The buying cycles for certain
resources and operations. The most impor- industries, like skiing, is drastic and in other
tant asset for a company is its employees, industries there may be not seasonal factors
who need to be fully engaged to deliver but rather artificial timing elements like
on the brand promise. The company cul- tradeshows, or complimentary product
ture is the leader of the brand as it guides release cycles.
decisions for the staff. Appointing brand As we see from the examples manage-
ambassadors to lead the company culture ment that align the ‘who’, ‘what’ and the
is a way of institutionalizing the brand ‘how’ of brand delivery are amply rewarded.
throughout the organization. And the Although this is part science and part arts,
engagement of the people needs to be those who master the triangle of brand
tracked to ensure the delivery of the brand alignment stand triumphant in the eyes of
matches the internal partners. This can be their shareholders, customers and partners.

470 © 2010 Macmillan Publishers Ltd. 1350-23IX Brand Management Vol. 17, 7, 465–471
Editorial

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© 2010 Macmillan Publishers Ltd. 1350-23IX Brand Management Vol. 17, 7, 465–471 471

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