Simran Jaiswal
Every day we prioritize and every day we choose to prioritize other work over building a strong employer brand. Whether or not this is an active decision is debatable. Read how employees who understand its meaning and importance engage in developing and delivering a strong brand.

Is the understanding of your organisation’s branding strategy important to your employees?

The mistake of overlooking branding efforts is made by many organisations because they think of themselves as a business and not a brand. For all size business branding is equally important as it increases their value, gives employees direction and motivation, and makes acquiring new customers easier. Billions are spent every year by companies who want to develop their brand, yet despite all this spending, many firms neglect a key part of any branding strategy – their staff.

A strong brand strategy will take all that value and put it to work in new ways. It will elevate the importance and relevance of what is already known and believed about your business. A well-constructed brand strategy can be used to unite and motivate your employees. The fact is that your organisation’s brand isn’t just your logo, your advertising campaign or colour co-ordinated interior design, it’s also your staff. Research shows the biggest impact on how customers feel and think about a company is their interaction with it,  and thus the majority of direct interactions will involve the staff in your organisation. For a branding strategy to be a success, it is important that every single member of your organisation understands the brand message, and is able to communicate and reinforce this message, every time they come into contact with a customer. 

Why it’s important for employees to understand their company’s brand:  

1. Understanding of the brand is the best manner to help employees make an emotional connection with the promise you are making to your customers. Without that comprehension and unifying beacon, employees are misaligned in priority-setting and decision-making.

2. When employees understand, care about, and believe in the brand story, they’re inspired to work harder, together. And we all recognise that a unified team increases motivation. 

3. By establishing that every employee, no matter what their role, is an important role of growing and protecting the brand, they feel entrusted to contribute an important and meaningful charge. If you are developing or refining brand strategy, ask employees for their input to show that leadership finds each person’s involvement valuable.

4. Understanding the brand makes storytelling come naturally. ‘Brand training’ isn’t about memorising a mission statement or 5 brand pillar words. Intrinsically living the brand means that each employee does it in his or her own fashion, effortlessly. Employees see the benefit of a strong brand for their own personal success and the overall company success.

5. Employees, at every level, make decisions all day that mould a company and influence how the brand shows up to customers. If your brand stands for, say, trust & safety, employees will use that tenet to decide what level of risk to take with partnership, or which product to prioritise.

BRANDING INFLUENCE STAFF
How to Authentically Connect Your Employees to the Brand

Define, give voice and share the brand promise.
Mission: a functional description of your business, Vision: a lofty goal for the company, Positioning Statement: a unique space in the market in which you intend to operate, Personality: characteristics or descriptors used to embody the brand, product, or service, Voice: style of written communication reflective of the brand personality, Visual Expression: visual elements (colours, imagery) reflective of the brand personality. Ensure that this is clearly defined and articulated and most importantly, shared with everyone from raw recruits to seasoned executives. Otherwise, how can employees be expected to connect with something they can’t describe?

Engage your employees in the creative process. 
You should examine and reinforce your employees understanding of your brand strategy through regular focus group meetings. As well as giving you a chance to explore how well your staff understands the brand, it will likewise provide the opportunity to get employee feedback about which parts of the branding strategy are most meaningful – and which might need updating.The brand has to be co-created by the employees, not shoved down people’s throats. If they are not involved in some capacity — if they don’t see their fingerprints all over it — they will say, ‘This is not my company.

Align rewards and assure accountability. 
This section does indeed come from the top down. While the brand definition should include everyone, it has to be reinforced by leadership through resource prioritization, rewarded behaviours, and accountability. Ultimately, people will only do what they are held accountable to, If you really want to drive the business and brand a certain way, leadership needs to measure and reward the right activities and behaviours.

Employ the right people and commit to development.
HR needs to be a key part of the brand building process. Why? Because people are your most important brand assets. They are your brand ambassadors. It’s essential to align recruiting and hiring to the brand promise so you can draw in the right people. Otherwise, a company may find itself without the right brand ambassadors to fulfil its external promise.

Place the right enablers in place.
Look at the physical work environment, technology, systems, and operations. What’s keeping people from living out the brand promise? Take away those barriers or add resources that help them deliver to customers or clients every day. The space also should flexibly adapt to different generational preferences, work styles, and approaches, making your people feel like they belong here and never forget to live internally what you foretell to your customers and hosts. 

BRANDING INFLUENCE STAFF

At the end of the day, branding saves you money, not costs you more. So while as a start up, the investment might seem laborious to make, in the long run, your brand will prove to be invaluable.
We welcome you to give us a call at +91 9823799189 anytime or fill in the convenient contact form so we can discuss whether we might enjoy working together.