Brand Promise

I was talking with a business associate of mine today. She is working with an organization that has grown from a start-up to a company with more than 1,000 employees. The organization produces high quality products and is growing rapidly however to the CEO’s credit, he is noticing chinks in the company’s armor, chinks that are due to organization growth and size.

In The Blake Project’s line of work (brand consulting) we spend most of our time helping organizations identify and develop the most advantageous brand strategies and brand promises. But of equal, and perhaps greater, importance is consistently delivering on those strategies and promises over time.

A brand promise is the commitment to deliver made between that brand and its audience.

Brands make promises and then they must keep those promises. Making the promise is easy. Keeping it is the hard part. One can make a promise with words. But it can only be kept through actions. Consider BP repositioning itself as an environmentally friendly brand with the “Beyond Petroleum” slogan and the bright yellow and green sunburst icon. BP supported this with a $200 million public relations advertising campaign designed by Ogilvy & Mather. It worked well until the Gulf of Mexico oil spill in 2010. Then other actions came to light, like the environmentally controversial oil sands project in Alberta, Canada.

To the degree your brand meets the expectation of your customers, will define the true value by which your brand is measured.