When Sales and Brand Collide

By Kim Frazier, principal of Frazier & Co. LLC

Anyone with “sales” or “business development” in his or her title usually cares about only one thing when it comes to his or her job – selling. Branding or brand usually isn’t brought into the sales equation. In fact, many in sales or business development might have a hard time describing what brand is or isn’t. That’s not anyone’s fault, but it’s a shame it hasn't been determined that it’s tough to make a sale without brand.

Of course, the same impairment can be said for some marketing folks. They can sing the praises of their latest brand marketing campaign and the metrics. But ask them to accompany a field sales representative on a client visit (a client who may be unhappy because the product didn’t do as promised in the marketing literature), and suddenly they are too busy that day rearranging their sock drawer or house-sitting their neighbor’s goldfish.

Attitudes like those can quickly put the two groups on a brand collision course. Usually neither camp will admit to a problem. If there are issues, management attempts to reconcile differences with something like a “it would be good for everyone to attend” lunch series on sales for the marketing/branding group, which is diligently followed by a seminar on branding for the sales team. Everyone “gets it” for about three months and then the focus reverts back to sales or a new marketing initiative.

Can a clash between the groups be averted? Or is brand a failed concept for sales and something only marketing understands?

B–R–A–N–D spells sales
Sales professionals need to understand brand and the sales connection for collisions to be more of a fender-bender versus a total loss.

So what is brand? Simply put:

• It’s your product and company personality.
• Brand is an identity of your company or product that your target customers know and understand.
• Brand is a customer’s experience with your company product or service built over time. That can be a good experience or not so good; it’s your choice.
• It’s the positive feelings and trust customers have in you, your product and company.

Brand is important for sales professionals because without an identity, your products (and you) are relegated to the hinterlands of your client’s purchasing landscape. In the sales outback, you are no more recognizable to them then your competitor. We all know that if you and/or your product aren’t special to a customer – if identity or the brand is out- of-focus or nonexistent – then it’s almost impossible to build customer relationships. In today’s highly competitive and fast-paced market, no relationship means no sale. It’s that simple.

Sales professionals – take heart
Let’s assume your company has a branding effort in place, but you don’t know how to translate it into your everyday sales environment. There are some easy and helpful actions you can take do to improve your application of brand.

A. Visit marketing and track down the person(s) in charge of developing and nurturing the brand. Ask questions about what they do in brand development. More importantly figure out why they do what they do. 

B. Translate the brand attributes to readily identifiable customer dealings. For instance, if reliability is the brand message, then your daily business interactions need to mirror that same consistency.

C. Live the brand. Make your sales presentations and interactions look, sound and feel like the brand. Assuming your company marketing and sales support literature is brand-focused, use the same tone and verbiage from the pieces in your client conversations.

There are many ways to incorporate brand into your daily customer contacts. Resources on brand include the American Marketing Association website, www.marketingpower.com.

Also, there are numerous books written on brand and how to make a brand or manage brand. Two of the most relevant for folks outside academia are Building Strong Brands by David A. Aaker and The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding by Al Ries and Laura Ries.

Marketing and brand responsibility
As a marketing guru, one of your major responsibilities is to present customers with an accurate, positive and ethical representation of your products or services. Whether you’re working on a tradeshow display, marketing brochure, data sheet or website, it does little good to stretch reality with your brand. You might be thinking – is it possible to accomplish all that without some hype?

Hype is a distant cousin of truth, and that relationship should stay that way moving the organization forward. “The truth shall set you free” is never more applicable than when marketers embrace a communication style that is accountable to the marketplace. Does that mean copy or design need be boring or mundane? To the contrary – let your creativity be your guide and reap even larger rewards.

Here are a few practical ideas about improving your brand communications that every marketing professional should consider.

A. Periodically review all literature your company produces, whether you had a hand in it or not, to make sure it’s brand-accurate.

I’ve lost track of the times clients have presented brand literature to the market that was outdated in message and style. A new brochure isn’t needed every six months. However, if you’re still using the same marketing pieces now that were produced last year at this time, a review is overdue.

B. Reviewing your brand communications, keep the customer in mind as to their impression of your approach. This means your external, not internal, customer. Internal customers are important, but brand communications to internal personnel must echo what you’re telling the outside world. That way messaging consistently travels the length of the brand highway – from inside to outside.

C. You gain points for consistent presentation since that helps customers quickly recognize your brand. Using your logo, tagline, design, and photography in a way that’s easy to read, view and understand is key. Many graphic designers are great visual communicators, but it’s your job to strike a balance between impressive visual impact and usefulness.

D. Tone is one of the most overlooked areas of brand communications, yet it is one of the most critical. Sounding too high and mighty is a put-off. Humble yet confident works best. Mix in too much hype and your audience will tune you out.

E. Make sure the sales, engineering and even the administrative staff know what you’ve produced and why. They talk to customers every day and can provide you with valuable feedback.

“One thing”
Your brand standing for just one thing is tantamount to success. What this means is that you can’t be everything to everyone. Your brand has to stand for something and stay focused.

For some sales professionals, it’s almost impossible for them to not figure a way to make a sale work out one way or another. If it’s a price objection, they lower the price; a quality objection, they add product options – for free. Like a Broadway show – the sale must go on!

That approach is a great way to train customers that they can negotiate their way to a purchase without regard for brand or value. When that type of sales process is the norm, brand is worthless as the product just stands for low price. In my mind, that’s a sure way to never have a brand. On the other hand, the sales process is trouble-free when the product is a hero standing for one vital attribute and brand, since customers are buying trusted performance.

Looking outside the technology industry is a great way to see how other business sectors have taken the leap to focus on one thing and have prospered. Southwest Airlines and more locally The Heathman Hotel are two good examples of how the practice can lead to positive results.

Southwest Airlines stands for low fares, value, and usefulness with a very humanistic approach to air travel. Its employees embody the brand in spirit and attitude. Southwest is not trying to be something it's not. As long as the company remains focused on its core brand elements, travelers support it.

The Heathman Hotel stands for tradition and graceful, understated elegance, with enough flair to make the property special without being gaudy. Its sales approach and branding materials reflect the same look and feel as the hotel. The company's tagline says it all: “Where Service is Still an Art.” Stay there and you see what they mean.

Standing for one thing – hotel management knows the property is not for everyone. But it is for guests seeking a sophisticated and relaxed atmosphere reflective of the Northwest. The result has been, and will continue to be, long-term success.

Collision avoidance
Sometimes it’s not easy for sales and marketing to avoid a brand collision while speeding along to profitable and successful business outcomes. But each group needs to travel via basic rules of the brand road. By applying those conventions, paying attention to market and organizational conditions along the way, each will arrive at their respective destinations with the brand no worse for the journey.

About the author
Kim Frazier is principal of Frazier & Co. LLC, a corporate marketing products and services business. He can be reached through the Frazier & Co. LLC website (www.frazier-co.com), at kf@frazier-co.com or 503.697.8798