A veteran in brand reputation management,
Prateek Chatterjee, Senior Vice President, Corporate Communication and Marketing, NIIT Limited shares, “The mantra is- listen, engage and react. We're seeing a huge paradigm shift in an age where reputations get shattered in moments. For brands the phrase ‘Innocent till proven guilty’ has changed to ‘Guilty till proven innocent’ and that is why brand reputation management has become very critical. Brand’s reputation was always managed by organizations. It’s not a new concept. It used to be called PR earlier, which has now evolved to Brand reputation Management. BRM helps you to manage the references, conversations, and feedback on your business. A loss of goodwill can play out in the form of decreased revenue, loss of clients or suppliers and loss of market share. Brands, are more susceptible to a tarnished image today, than in any other day or age. Brand monitoring, social media, reviews and recommendations, customer service and culture, PR management are some brand reputation management imperatives.
Talking about the current trends and marketing initiatives,
Adele Coelho, Head of Marketing | India, Middle East & Africa, Meltwater says, “Something that many businesses are doing, and that we’re also doing is focusing on a content strategy plan to create and curate quality content and events. These efforts serve to enhance the knowledge sharing between customers as a collective. They help in creating a trust with your brand. Another trend we saw with one of our customers, which is a leading bank is that they are leveraging social media as an opportunity finder. When they see that their competitors’ customers are unhappy on social media, they are quick to reach out to their competitors’ customers and lure them with special offers to their own bank.” She adds, “We need to combine marketing and branding to activate buyers and also make them loyal customers. Your brand is essentially a sum total of customers’ entire experience with you. If your customer has an unpleasant experience with the sales or customer service teams, then it doesn’t reflect well on your brand as well. In most companies, marketing serves as the branding and brand experience gatekeeper. Marketing can create that warm and fuzzy feeling that makes customers feel good and enhances their experience, so that they go and tell their friends about the brand/ product they just purchased.”
Mr. Gaurav Khurana, Head Marketing, Online & Affiliate Partnerships, PAYBACK India shares, “The market has evolved and so have the consumers. In a dynamic and rapidly changing environment, brand management is critical for marketers and they need to have a 360 degree approach towards business so that their marketing campaigns are more effective. The customer today is spoilt for choice owing to diverse factors like multiple brand choices, extremely attractive value propositions and availability of content 24X7. So, it is a dire need to choose the right medium of communication and going beyond the norms of traditional marketing to create top of mind recall among consumers. Brands need to constantly make things better, faster, smarter and more rewarding.”
Sharing views on the importance of events and promotional activities for brand management,
Kiran Shetty, Managing Partner, Collective Heads says, “Event & promotional activities both are a strategy that involves face-to-face contact between companies and their customers at special events like concerts, fairs, and sporting events. Brands use them to reach to consumers through direct hand-to-hand sampling or interactive displays. The key to pulling off an effective event marketing campaign is to identify the target audience correctly and create an experience that remains in the consumer’s mind. By finding an opportunity to interact with the right demographic of people, both current customers and prospective buyers a brand can build favourable impressions and long-lasting relationships. The best, most creative events create interactions that not only reflect positively on the brand at the time, but generate a buzz long after the event is over. He adds, “Brands have started investing a lot more towards experiential marketing. They want the consumer to experience the product and develop emotional connect with the brand. Event apps are on the rise, and are here to stay. Integrating technology solutions are important to better understand things like event ROI.
Sharing his views on brand building through user experience,
Ganesh Pande, Managing Partner, Collective Heads shares, “Brand building is isn’t about pretty colours or cool logos, it’s about an identity that resonates with your customers and ultimately makes them want to do more business with you. In order to build a brand we need, be sure with what the consumers’ needs. For example -The idea of paying a stranger for a ride isn’t new or innovative. But Uber created an experience that made the idea feel fresh and exciting, and users have bought in. The experience of Uber is as essential to its existence and growth as their core business model. Uber isn’t alone in that respect, and I think we’re going to see a lot more brands in that position in the coming years. He adds, “Branding defines who we are while our marketing defines what we do for the consumers. First, build your brand, and then execute the marketing that brings the brands to life. When both are combined we can create campaigns that work hand in hand to communicate value through simple, creative, show-stopping executions which results in building brand loyalty & activate buyers for the brand.”
Hence, brand management is a sum of every experience that a customer has with the brand and it is an on-going practice. A brand becomes a good brand only when it comes out of its logo and is available to the customers starting from the time of purchase all the way to its usage.
