Effective Brands: How do we engage the audience now?

Stories are how we make sense of things.

Anything else is just information.

Brand identity is not solely created by the organisation – it also rests in the hands of its audience, where the cumulative experiences of customers will ultimately define the brand (Aaker 2002, Bedbury 2002).

Engagement through a storytelling framework may be seen in the experience of MasterCard’s ‘Priceless’ campaign, which operates on the narrative ‘Tangible item/service: price, tangible item/service: price, tangible item/service: price, intangible item/concept: priceless: “The best things in life are free. For everything else, there’s MasterCard.”’ (Bedbury 2002, Wikipedia 2006: 9)

Implications for Branding

In the participatory culture, there is no captive audience to which organisations can deliver messages. Assaad and Carson (2006) contend that a key problem is that the tradition of marketing is built on interrupting people during their leisure time to deliver messages, annoying the very people they are trying to engage and creating a situation where “we have trained them to ignore us” (ibid). In effect, there are new ‘rules’ to play by, which are akin to the principles of entertainment rather than selling (Leonard 2006).

Viral and networking activity cannot be implemented in the ways of a traditional branding campaign, because it relies on the active participation of the audience to share it with their online community. A deeper connection is required between consumers and the brand, encouraging people to contribute content and form a community around ideas and interests. Ibeh, Luo and Dinnie (2005) find that established approaches to branding have been changed by the internet, and the tactics developed in response are now undergoing further change. Online strategies are no longer primarily about the website; a range of collaborative approaches are needed for building brand engagement. These elements include creating an online community that facilitates interactions among customers, enabling them to deepen their experiences and build a more personal connection with the brand (ibid). Engaging people with conversation rather than delivering information is a more effective strategy, because “although there is no demand for messages, there is a tremendous demand for good conversation” (Levine et al 2000, p 95).

A brand is essentially a relationship and strong brands “establish a relationship that is grounded in brand narrative” (Denning 2005, p 106). Aaker (2002) finds that people can respond to a brand in the same manner they relate to another person, and with this comes expectations around behaviour, voice, character and personality. The human experience is brought to life through stories, which are an influential tool because they can communicate identity, transmit values, foster collaboration and share knowledge (Denning 2005). They form the foundation of good conversation and the emotional connection that effective brand building requires. Bedbury (2002) determines that this connection is the most powerful and lasting engagement that a brand can have with a customer. To instigate the conversation, Winsor (2004) encourages organisations to go beyond telling their own stories by listening to and understanding their customers’ stories, thereby being more human and increasing their relevancy to the community (ibid).

Although credit cards are functionally about transactions, the campaign has created an emotional connection with the public (Bedbury 2002). In response to the initial campaign, MasterCard’s vice president for global marketing received daily letters and emails from people worldwide suggesting their own ‘priceless’ moments (ibid). In its nine year history, the campaign has seen numerous tribute and parody commercials created by individuals and circulated via email and over the web. MasterCard acknowledges that “We can’t manage what happens out there...it has taken on a life of its own” (MasterCard Worldwide’s executive vice president and chief marketing officer, in Elliot 2006), and in 2006 ran a competition inviting consumers to make their own advertisements of their ‘priceless’ moments (MasterCard 2006).

This example demonstrates what can occur when people genuinely engage in a brand and its narrative: the audience joins in communicating the story. Through online social networks the audience has the ability to spread brand material, and it has the media creation tools to make its own content. This phenomenon is being variously labelled as ‘participation marketing’, (Elliott 2006), co-creation (Winsor 2006), open source marketing and citizen marketing (Holtz 2006: 1).

Along with the benefits, there are downsides to engaging with participatory media, largely due to the lack of control that a brand has over its communication. These risks can occur whether or not the organisation has initiated the communication, because the audience are also producers, consumers and distributors of content. Risks can be mitigated through understanding how to both engage and respond through participatory media, which will be explored in the examples from practice and in the starting points for creating a participation strategy.