Something interesting in the world of branding happened this week. A principal of a high school in New Orleans politely refused to accept free food from a local Chick-fil-A. His reasoning was that the company’s opinion of the LGBTQ community was out of alignment with the school’s own values, and that it would be disrespectful to his LGBTQ staff and faculty members to accept the gesture. When I read this, I realized that there’s a lot in this exchange that a high school and a fast food company can teach us about branding.
For those who don’t know…
Vox wrote a great article that sums up why Chick-fil-A and the LGBTQ community haven’t always been the best of friends. In short, the company’s owner, S. Truett Cathy, founded much of the company’s culture in her Baptist religious beliefs, and the family that owns the company has held those beliefs strong. In a few ways, those views clash with the views of LGBTQs, and the company/family have voiced/donated-to their opinions on the topic as well.
Now that we’re all in the loop.
Personally, I’m pro for the LGBTQ community. I’ve known some great people in that world, and despite not directly being involved in the community, it’s honestly always been a positive part of my life.
But here’s what’s interesting. Chick-fil-A is a good brand. I say this from experience. A brand is how it makes you think and feel, and at least for me, the majority of my experiences have been more than positive. And I’m not alone in that thinking. Just the day before, I read about a Chick-fil-A employee going into a manhole to save a woman’s phone, and last week I saw that Chick-fil-A has the slowest drive thru among all fast-food and it still doesn’t stop people from coming.
Honestly, these are bizarre things to hear about a brand. They’re interesting and awesome and memorable. And I say it has to do with their values.
It’s a pretty-good brand.
Fine, there’s a stance I don’t agree with, and normally that’d probably be enough for me to say no. But Chick-fil-A consistently over-performs in the memorable department. And it’s in a way that people talk about. Most people don’t talk about companies, but they talk about Chick-fil-A. They talk about brand experience, and they even talk about quality – seriously, it’s a good chicken sandwich, and it’s consistent – and together that’s really all a brand can hope for.
On top of that, it reportedly pays its employees well, advises its franchisees to engage with their communities with fundraisers for schools and charities, and it even hosts local parties. Seriously, I took my daughters to a Daddy Daughter Party at my closest franchise, and the whole thing was super well-done.
As far as branding goes, they’d honestly be close to near-perfect if they didn’t have that one stigma. And arguably, they do everything they can to counter that stigma, and they do it pretty well. They definitely put more effort into it than most brands do, and that says something.
My serious guess is that the work ethic, the commitment to excellence, all of that is also coming from those original Baptist values. And religious views aside, it seems like that value-structure has kept the brand in a pretty good position.
Values matter.
I chose to get my Masters in Organizational Psychology instead of another Marketing degree because of this same train of thought. I liked how organizations chose to flow, and how that often made or break how well they did in the marketplace.
Who your organization is defines you, and that really is based on how you choose to interact with your employees and your customers. That’s Point-of-Purchase marketing, it’s Place AND Product in the four Ps (Product, Price, Place, Promotion). Again, it’s marketing 101, but we still often forget how profound it is on the end result – the customer experience!
And you know who else has values…
A high school in New Orleans.
It took a high school in New Orleans to remind me that values are for all organizations, and they don’t always mesh well. My grade schools had values – we’d read them aloud once a week like the Pledge of Allegiance – but I’m not sure anyone thought of them much past that. But this school takes them seriously, and I respect that a lot.
Who you are, how you think about your employees, your team, your business, your customers, your community, your market, your audience – all of that is part of your values, and is simultaneously part of your brand. But just as important to all of those is the opposite – how do your customers, your employees, your market, etc. think about your brand?
At the end, it’s the intersection of the two that makes the brand work. And it all really comes back to how well you’re committed to those values. How authentic you present them in the marketplace.
Do you know how they think of you?
Chick-fil-A gets how their audience thinks of them. They overcome it, they do a great job everywhere else they can, and they keep going.
But most brands don’t know where they stand in the marketplace. Maybe they have an idea, but it’s just a guess. And it’s probably biased, because don’t we all love our own brands just a little bit too much? I’ve heard a few great marketers tell me to build the brand and then protect the brand, and it seems that at least half of that is based on awareness and perception. And you can’t guess with those.
If you want to really build a brand that matters, you need to measure what matters when it comes to your audience perception. And that’s where research comes back in. I’ve had the chance to work on incredible projects where we gauged how our brands resonated around the country, around the world, and around our own backyards as well. And it works! Because we built incredible roadmaps for engaging with our customers, and created amazing ads that hit exactly where the customers thought the brand lacked.
So that’s why I love this stuff. I love hearing how brands arrive at challenges, overcome challenges, keep going from challenges, and truly live their brands. An authentic brand is a real brand, and a real brand based on strong values that matter to the audience is going to perform well. You’ve just gotta know the parts you don’t know yet, first. And that’s why I love Research!