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Best Buy Employees Deliver a Strong Brand. So Can You.

Written by: Dan Day

Article Overview: "It's not about the stuff. It's about the people."

Best Buy Employees Deliver a Strong Brand. So Can You.

Have you seen Best Buy’s recent television commercials?

They feature real, live “blue shirts”—employees of the consumer electronics retailer—talking about their personal experiences with customers. The employees volunteered their stories, which were subsequently caught on film by director Errol Morris for ad agency BBDO.

One spot showed an employee helping a blind man learn how to use his home-theater system. Another recreated how a store employee "saved a marriage" by mediating the buying decision with newlyweds looking for one computer, her arguing for a Mac and him a PC.

No sales pitches, no prices, not even any exclamation points! This is a strong example of a company that understands what a brand is and isn’t.

Is: The relationships built between employees and customers.

Isn’t: The latest iThing, a sale, cool logo or fancy packaging.

As companies struggle to find ways to build relationships with customers in order to grow—or simply maintain—their business in this wobbly economy, Best Buy’s Chief Marketing Officer Barry Judge realized the inspiration for his branding strategy was literally surrounding him, in the form of employees.

In the commercials, “we try to demonstrate how it’s our people (not the stuff) that make the difference,” Judge said.

The company is on to something.

The Gallup Organization has found that 80 percent of the market value of the average S&P 500 company is made up of intangible assets like brand, customer base, innovation and talent of its employees.

This is what separates one brand from its competitors, regardless of industry. No two businesses have the exact same blend of individual styles, generations and cultures spread amongst their employee population. This unique mix becomes a differentiation that can’t be duplicated, the DNA of a given brand. That differentiation can be used to strengthen the connection to customers.

Companies with “engaged workgroups”—employees who understand and believe in the brand they work for—have several advantages over those with less-aligned employees. Gallup’s research shows the “engaged” organizations grow two-and-a-half times faster, are 12 percent more profitable and 18 percent more productive (revenue per employee).

Traditional consumer marketing methods—special promotions, points-based loyalty programs—have grown old and consumers are skeptical of them. Conversely, by growing a brand through a stronger bond between employee and customer, indications are the overall business grows as well. Consumers turn toward value and brands they can trust in tough economic times, making relationships critical to every business in every situation today.

Additionally, from a cost-effectiveness standpoint, this kind of marketing strategy leverages investments a company has already made—its employees.

In its commercials, Best Buy declares: “Here are our employees, and we’re proud of them. We don’t need models or actors to help us connect with you, our customers. That’s not genuine. These are real people who can really help you. We care about them and we care about you.”

The company is personifying its brand, in the form of people who need people to succeed, who want to build relationships.

The best brands do three things well:

- Help employees understand and become aligned to their brand;
- Teach employees how to communicate the brand message effectively; and
- Empower employees to represent their brand in the marketplaces they serve.

Strong brands show us that employees have the ability to impact customers and lead them toward buying more, buying more often and buying differently. In fact, many more employees in an organization are capable of this than was traditionally assumed; it’s not just for the sales team anymore—especially in these challenging economic times.

It’s about more than customer service, which is necessary but passive and reactive. It’s about proactively earning the right to develop more insight into and deeper relationships with customers. This level of engagement is simply not possible through most marketer-to-customer methods, but comes alive when the message is delivered through employees at every possible customer encounter.

Best Buy gets that consumers may be psychologically moving back to simpler times, when the local grocer or pharmacist called them by name when they walked through the front door. They wouldn’t shop anywhere else, even if the price were a little lower. If you think younger generations can’t relate to this type of relationship-based selling, consider Facebook, where people work doggedly to build their personal brands, one relationship at a time.

Related Articles
  What’s Hot in B2B Marketing?
  How to Tell if Your Employees 'Get' Your Brand
  Your Brand is More than a Logo or a Tagline
  Companies are Investing in a New Kind of Customer Service.
  Motivate Your Team by Creating Brand Champions

Article Tags: ad agency, bbdo, best buy, blind man, blue shirts, branding strategy, chief marketing, consumer electronics retailer, cool logo, customer base, differentiation, employee population, exclamation points, gallup organization, home theater system, intangible assets, newlyweds, personal experiences, television commercials, unique mix



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