As the lecture states: Brand = the promise, Reputation = delivery on that promise.
With so many people turning to others’ recommendations and reviews it is important to recognize your audience and monitor what they are saying about you to ensure you are delivering on your brand promise. And if you aren’t, you need to be able to address the issue and acknowledge the issue with you customers.
One blog I read is a perfect example of this. www.thebloggess.com The author is funny, quirky and has thousands of followers. She is a columnist for the Houston Chronicle, keeps her blog and writes a sex column. She recently wrote about the numerous pitches she gets from various Public Relations professionals and the response the sends when it is obvious they don’t research the type of writer she is or the audience she caters to. Specifically she targeted an email pitch she received from Chevy, and basically blasted them for not researching who she was and who they are as a company. While her blog is not a customer service network, she does have thousands of followers. To help remedy the situation the Chevy Director recognized the blog was negative against their brand and sent her the following email:
“I’m sorry we sent you that pitch. I’m embarrassed, too — not only because that’s not how we like for Chevrolet to represent itself or how we like to talk with people, but because I agree with you 100% that this kind of ”marketing” doesn’t work at all. It’s cheesy, it’s impersonal, and it belies a complete misunderstanding of how the social web works. Frankly, I’m glad you blasted us on your blog — because we had it coming for that pitch, and because I’m going to send your post to everyone in GM communications and marketing (not just Chevrolet) as a reminder and an instruction on how NOT to talk to people (whether they’re bloggers or Twitterers or not). We don’t usually talk with people that way, but on this occasion we did and it makes my entire program seem clueless; I want to make sure it doesn’t happen again. So in a weird way, thank you for the rather unpleasant medicine.”
A great example of monitoring what people are saying about your brand, identifying and acknowledging the situation and changes that need to be made, and working towards repairing your brand reputation.
