Brand Biology Survival by Customer Perception

Think of a bird.

Let me rephrase that when you read the word “Bird” what are the first three bird species that comes to mind?

Most people wouldn't choose (penguin- chicken and an ostrich) in one set. There is a neurological reason for that, it has to do with not just the way we as humans think but with how do we categorize information cognitively.

The human brain - Includes your brand’s audience brains - tend to take mental shortcuts known as cognitive heuristics.

In concept they are simple, efficient rules, hard-coded by evolutionary processes or learned, which have been proposed to explain how people make decisions, come to judgments, and solve problems, typically when facing complex problems or incomplete information.

Brands are victims to both the overwhelming amount of data produced and heuristics of customers minds.

Both of these factors are very difficult to control that the only way to for a brand to survive and eventually evolve is to understand both phenomenons and to create an evolution ability characteristics in order to survive such a tough environment

Organizing information and raw data are not an exception  in his book the organized mind Daniel Levitin asks the question How are categories formed in our brains?

There are three ways in which we categories information and by extension perceive such data based on former heuristics those three categories are

• Based on mere appearance
  when we read or hear words like ( Car, trees, fish, books) we have a visual description of what that is with degrees of variance.
  
• Based on functionality
  if we look at a tool box the tools inside doesn't look the same yet all of them serve a common function they fix things .
  
• Based on concept
  the wallet not everything inside a wallet is looking the same or serve the same function by conceptually they are things you need while you are physically outside your home

Remember the types of bird question? As it turns out that penguins, chicken and ostrich doesn't fit our perception of what a bird is according to these three basis.They don't fly, not covered with flying feathers and don't really fit our concept of flying creatures. 

So what does this all means for brands? 

Based on appearance

From the caves of France to the tombs of Egypt visual storytelling was a vital element of human heritage

Nearly 70 % of all the sensory receptors of the whole body is in the eyes. Back in 2004 there was an article from the University of Cambridge titled seeing things part of the team conclusion was that “The visual appearance of products plays a significant role in determining consumer response” & “product appearance influences commercial success and consumer quality-of-life.”

So it’s no wonder to find that visual mediums gaining global traction considering that Pinterest has 150 million active uses, Instagram has 600 million active user and YouTube has 1000 million active users.

Brands doesn’t just need to be present in such mediums they have to tell meaningful stories that will enhance users experience of life through adding visual value to the brand.

Based on functionality

Functionality in branding can fall into 2 categories that functionally of the brand itself as what is the function of the product or the service that the brand offers, how does a brand demonstrate functionality through different tools.

One of the brands that demonstrate usefulness in itself is Google, other than being a

Verb, according to the useful brand report the brand is viewed as “useful because it  connects users to what they need to know, the way they want that information. Google scores particularly high relative to its peers for being quick, easy to use”.

Other demonstration of functionality is the functionality through tools and platforms,  @Hiltonsuggests Is a twitter handle with a bio that says:

“Exploring a new city & looking for insider tips? We're here to help! We're @HiltonNewsroom tweeps sharing our favorite travel suggestions.” 

The idea is that this twitter handle offers expertise on travel and travel tips to travelers whether they are Hilton residence or not. The brand is not converting or making sales or selling offers and discounts on this account, this handle serves one function only providing travel advice to travels.

Another F&B brand is using Snapchat as a customer service feedback medium, if customers have a complain about your plate, food is not hot enough, and other restaurant related complains. That goes directly to snapchat.

Snapchat depends on ephemeral content and because of this dynamic the tool serves the function of the ultimate customer service tool.

Complaints answered within one day and at the same time doesn't live on the restaurant reputation forever like a shipwreck survivor who has only one story to tell.

Based on conceptual perception 

At the core of it. the idea of branding is a conceptual idea.

There is a core concept that the brand stands for, this concept is crystallized, revived and asserted every step of the brands journey by all means available and necessary.  

The revolution of the digital world made it possible for brands to leverage that sense of belonging to the core idea of the brand, creating communities and thought leaders that embrace, enhance and amplify this core idea. In other words creating digital tribes.

Sports brands for example are not just about the sports. It’s about the concepts that the sport represent (competition, victory, hometown, nostalgic attachments).

Some brands evoke that conceptually on specific campaigns not the whole branding strategy Like the dodge campaign (God Made A Farmer). 

Red Bull is not about the energy drink, yes we can argue that this is the ultimate goal is to increase brand equity and sales yet what the brand promotes is the sense of adventure the challenge of human limits.

Final Thoughts  

According to the T3 report 87% of the brands were not seen as being “very useful”,

62% of the brands fell in the middle of the bell curve and were seen as undifferentiated, 88% of consumers do not rely heavily on advertising to inform their decisions.

Keeping in mind that companies introduce 30,000 products every year, but 70% to 90% of them don’t stay on store shelves for more than 12 months.

One of the things that these facts suggest is that brands needs to get out of the egocentricity of how great, innovative or revolutionary the brand is.

And get into their customer's mind through their behavioral and cognitive patterns not just to influence but to enhance the human experience.

References:

http://bit.ly/1NcoGP6

http://bit.ly/2rDqpKK

http://bit.ly/2sFjXTq

http://bit.ly/2sdCsNv

http://bit.ly/1Uk1C5h

http://bit.ly/2mquoYF

http://bit.ly/2snQElC

http://bit.ly/2rCQpGh

http://bit.ly/2sKI5no

Who Cares about twitter anyways? (5 different ways to use twitter)

The first and most valid question you could have reading the headline of this articles is.

Who cares?

I mean, that in the most literal sense of the word, who cares about twitter? Who is using it and are your target audience using the platform?

Since that this is both vital and valid question we will first go through some data and numbers of who is using twitter and how is twitter being used?

Then we will go through the list of 5 different ways to use twitter (other than a micro blogging platform) to benefit your Dubai based business both in the MENA region and globally.

Let’s look at the numbers shall we..

In the most recent report http://bit.ly/2coDD4d the state of social media marketing 2016, Marketing profs published the following states about twitter:

  A-     Twitter came in the second place right behind Facebook as the social platform that marketers use in both B2B and B2C focused markets.

  B-      Twitter came third as the paid social media platform right after Facebook and Google ads (technically we can considered it second since Google ads is not a social media platform ) .

  C-      In terms of number of worldwide social network users Twitter came with a sizable number of audience of 320 million users.

(That was right behind Instagram aka Facebook’s gallery sidekick, which came with 400 million users).

Now you might be thinking this is only on a global level which is great for branding reasons like building an online reputation or brand online existence or even gaining global online traction and traffic yet how will that benefit a Dubai based business targeting the MENA region ?

Well let’s look at regional numbers shall we?

According to the Arab social media report published last year http://bit.ly/1Ux2M93  there are some interesting facts about twitter:

  A-     39% of the Arab users access twitter on a daily basis.

  B-      In terms of subscription KSA and UAE were the highest countries from the Arab region with (53% and 51% respectively) .

  C-      In terms of accessing Twitter through an app, the highest were UAE and Bahrain (45% and 40%, respectively).

There is a very important point that needs to be addressed here before we go further, these numbers and stats are not to stay drop everything and implement a radical paradigm shift to both your business and to your marketing plans toward twitter based campaigns, yet these facts show that twitter as a platform has both regional and global influence that needs to be addressed and added to your marketing tool kit.

And here are 5 different ways you can harvest the power of social media through twitter for your business.

  1-      Customer service tool.( monitor your own handle or handles)

        If you are wondering should I have an online presence or not?, or if you are       wondering should I interact with negative comments or not?

Your customers are not.

They are both online and active,

According to the Microsoft’s 2016 Global State of Customer Service Report 55% of consumers’ customer service interactions now begin online rather than on the phone or in person. This percentage jumps to 65% for consumers ages 18 – 34.

 That is why brands responsiveness on twitter has increased from 14hrs to 9hrs in 2014.

Some of the tactics that you can use to enhance the customer service side of your brand.

A-     Monitor your brand twitter handle and set up an alarm for quicker respond.

B-      Monitor your brands services and products as your customers might not be aware of your twitter handle , yet they might have experienced your products and services.

C-      If you have the funding  for it set up a situation room for your twitter accounts (https://www.quora.com/Which-companies-have-physical-social-media-listening-centers)

  2-      Competition monitoring.( adding competitors)

Some of the tactics that you can implement to monitor both your market and your competition are:

    B- Monitor Key words that relates to your industry in general.

    c- Monitor trends and new buzz campaigns even especially if it’s not yours.

  3-      Establish thought leadership in your field.

Facebook has mark zugerburg, Apple Had Steve jobs, Microsoft has Satya Nadella who do you have?

In other words who is the face behind your band and how is that face interacting with the public. Twitter can help humazing your brand and engage in creating your brand identify here is how:

A-     Set up an account for your brand ambassadors and your brands leadership team.

B-      Engage in twitter chats and twitter conversations.

C-      Link back to your Brands account from the bio of your ambassadors and your thought leaders account.

  4-      Social listening and Market analysis tool.

Twitter lists is an option that your brand can benefit from , lists gives your brand the option of social listening option to a specific need or your market potential needs and letting your target audience know that you are listening , monitoring and interacting. Here are a couple of lists that you can create:

A-     List of a market need either actual or potential.

B-      List of key words that relates to your market.

C-      List of other partner markets for example of you are in hospitality you might need to listen to (referrals programs- customer service complaints – tourism and destinations).

  5-      Creating a social buzz around a specific campaign.

The final and one of the strongest strengths of twitter is events, twitter feeds on that being a mico blogging website and the average lifetime of a tweet is about 18 minutes if you have an event for your brand you need to feed your tweet to the platform with the highest volume of tweets as you can here are some effective tactics that you can use to maximize your reach during an Event:

A-     Live video coverage during the event especially that now twitter allows longer videos .

B-      Create a hashtage dedicated to the event and drive traffic to it.

C-      Encourage conversations by having a showcase screens in the event with the live coverage of the conversations.

D-     Transfer the offline atmosphere and environment of your event online through creating a story telling narrative of the event duration.

Feel free to extend this conversation on twitter of course 

My handle is :@Fouad_khafaga 

Brand Biology (Define your species).

Brand Biology

“Brand is not what you say it is. It’s what they say it is.”

Marty Neumeier

Brand biology is a metaphorical term that I will be using during this series of articles, to refer to different types of elements, factors, cognitive phenomena, and components, that gives a brand life and help the brand survive in the different environment of the market.

Your brand biology is your customer’s categorization, your brand’s DNA is your audience perception, and your clients market is your future environment.  The target market defines your species and their thoughts shape your organisms.

There is more than one element to the idea of brand biology and customer categorization, in this article I will review two elements, the first is related to customer perception and the second is cognitive behavior.

Customer’s perception is manipulated and persuaded by factors like brand color, name, personal experience and campaigns.

In a paper that was published by California State Polytechnic University, titled the Effect of theForeign Brand on Consumer Perception.  The paper empirically examines the influence of brand names (foreign versus national) on consumer perception.

The results support the hypothesis that the national brand elicits more positive consumer perception than the foreign brands. In this study, consumer perception is operationalized by four constructs: attitude toward the brand, purchase intention, advertisement feeling, and attitude toward the advertisement.

This is important in terms of brand biology; just the awareness of your species as mentioned in this study affects your survival. In future articles we will look at your brand survival tactics, brand environment, brand biotic and abiotic.

The second element that affects the categorization of the brand is cognitive behavior, as humans we tend to create mental short cuts, especially in the age of the digital worlds the choices of any product or service could be overwhelming.

Within social psychology, cognitive miser is an umbrella theory of social cognition that brings together previous research on heuristics and attribution biases.

 The theory suggests that humans, valuing their mental processing resources, find different ways to save time and effort when negotiating the social world. The term cognitive miser was first introduced by Susan Fiske and Shelley Taylor in 1984.

 We tend to crate mental short cuts to ease the process of digesting, transforming and exploring data of any kind. The brain activity of categorizing data lies at the heart of cognitive economy. We treat things as being of a kind so we don’t waste neural processing cycles in details that are irrelevant to the core o the process itself.

When we go to the beach we don’t remember every grain of sand, when we look at the forest we don’t name every tree that we see.

And there is a very good evolutionary reason or this, it’s to prevent our brains from getting overwhelmed with data, making sure we don’t have too many brain tabs open at the same time or too many labeled products on the same shelf because too many choices are paralyzing in most cases.

The process of categorizing data in three main ways

the first one is the Gross or partial appearance which means if they look the same they are the same.
The second form of categorizing is functionality; appearance in this case is not the major concern if it can be used for writing it belongs to the writing tools section and sometimes we might call it a pen.
 Finally the third way of categorizing is conceptual and a perfect example of that is the tool box “If it fixes things it’s in the box”

In order for your brand biology to be compatible in such a harsh environment, in order or your kind to survive, the brand must master the skills necessary to stand out among your species.

First Study the industry before entering the market, understand the audience reactions to the existing, past and future products and services in your industry.  That will provide some needed input and insight into the customer’s perception.

Second define your species if your brand is serving an appearance, a function or a specific concept. Make sure you highlight those features build your campaigns based on how unique and authentic your brand is.

The elements of brand biology are many. Customer’s perception and audience cognitive behavior are two essential components of determining the DNA of your brand biology.