Brands and businesses may be paying a hefty price for not properly locking down their messaging. New research from insights tech firm FocusVision and strategic marketing firm InnerView Group warns that when the brand story is not consistent from marketing to customer-facing employees, the cost could be upwards of $10MM annually, according to almost a third (28 percent) of marketers surveyed. A further 24 percent expect the penalty to be between $6-$10MM in lost revenue.
“Our study confirms that businesses with a consistent brand story are seeing tangible revenue growth, which is outpacing the perceived ‘cost’ of those lacking consistency. It also validated that regular customer research was a discriminating factor between the companies reporting brand consistency and those that do not,” said Zoe Dowling. Ph.D., SVP of research at FocusVision, in a news release. “With 62 percent of respondents estimating the value of a consistent brand message to be more than $10 million annually, this is something marketers can’t afford to ignore.”
Key findings of the research:
Consistency is hard to maintain downstream
There are indications that the company’s brand story is not trickling down from the leadership ranks to the rest of the organization. Exploring the various “brand representatives” who have regular customer contact, the dilution appears to be greatest the further away you get from the C-suite. When asked how confident they were that various groups could tell the company’s brand story accurately and consistently, the findings show a waterfall of brand story dilution.
“In today’s Experience Economy, brands are evolving quickly—and so is their messaging,” said Christopher Wallace, president at InnerView Group, in a news release. “So, it’s essential that all groups across an organization can represent the brand and its story in the same manner to ensure that all customer touchpoints live up to the overall brand promise. It’s the front-line experience—that live interaction with a company—that is shaping how consumers view a brand more than ever.”
“But the ‘old way’ of equipping teams is no longer sufficient to achieve success,” Wallace added. “The training of the past does not enable people to tell a new story. The solution is not more training or better training. The opportunity is to look for something different than training altogether.”
Download the full report here.
The 10-minute study surveyed 250 senior professionals from mid and large-sized CPG companies (revenue $250M+) in marketing, customer experience or product development to understand their attitudes and company tactics on three topics: customer research, brand story/messaging and new go-to-market initiatives.
