When it comes to showcasing the best of your brand, customers want to see more than complementary colors, sharp logos, and pithy messaging about products and services. All that’s important, of course, but in an environment where consumers have myriad choices for anything they could ever need or want to purchase, they’re looking for one thing that sets their preferred brands apart from the rest: corporate values.
Research shows that, these days, 77 percent of customers want to buy from brands that share their values, and 55 percent of consumers believe companies can play a bigger role than governments in creating a better future.
What does that mean for companies? It means that, whatever your company values may be — from customer-centric principles to community outreach to political causes — it’s to your advantage to ensure every aspect of your marketing showcases those values. When choosing whom to purchase from, customers want take into account what causes and principles their various brand options support. By showcasing your corporate values, you empower customers to make those informed decisions — and when potential buyers see your values align with theirs, you encourage them to choose you.
So, how do you ensure every aspect of your brand communication highlights key corporate values?
Broadcast Corporate Values via Multichannel Marketing
Multichannel marketing enables brands to meet customers—and potential customers—wherever they are, interacting with future buyers digitally and in print, via flyers, brochures, social media ads, emails, and more.
While you might think of special offers, sales, new product launches, and the like to be the primary fodder for a multichannel marketing campaign, these are also a great opportunity to showcase company values in a way that reaches as wide an audience as possible.
Just made a significant donation to a global charity or organized a company-wide volunteer day for a local nonprofit? Let your followers know! A press release is a good start, but don’t hesitate to share your impact via social media marketing, email newsletter, and more. These materials, distributed through different channels, can work together to give potential customers a deep look into why this initiative is important to your company, how it was executed, and what kind of impact it had on the community, ultimately helping them see how dedicated your brand is to its values—and how closely those values align with theirs.
Don’t Overlook the In-Store Experience
If your brand operates in brick-and-mortar locations, then the in-store experience is another key piece of the multichannel marketing strategy and another valuable opportunity to showcase your values.
Are the proceeds from certain products donated to charity? Add shelf-talkers letting shoppers know where their dollars will do the most good! Are you raising funds for autism awareness month in April or domestic violence awareness month in October? Announce that to passersby with a window cling or other grand-format signage, and then showcase the specific organizations you’re supporting with point-of-sale signage that provides even more information about the initiative — and how customers can get involved.
Point-of-sale marketing is a powerful way to enhance the customer experience — and when you use it to showcase your corporate values, it can go even further in building customer loyalty.
Ensure Consistent Value Messaging from Location to Location
For multi-location businesses targeting clients across various cities, regions, or even countries, it can be challenging to ensure every local marketer is producing and distributing consistent brand materials. Through-channel marketing automation (TCMA) empowers these businesses to maintain brand integrity across the board, and it can be used to ensure corporate values are being communicated consistently, as well.
National marketers could ask every local marketer to create their own value-centric messaging, but then they’d be required to review every piece of collateral to ensure that custom messaging meets brand guidelines. After all, if values are being communicated differently by different local marketers, customers (or would-be customers) may start to question the brand’s authenticity, ethics, and integrity.
To ensure consistent messaging — and minimize micromanaging — consider leveraging a TCMA platform to create a repository for pre-approved collateral and give local reps easy access to campaign management resources such as print production, fulfillment and digital marketing support. That way, they can showcase the brand in its best light as they communicate corporate values — both global and local initiatives — to every customer.
Ready to Showcase Your Corporate Values?
If your company has yet to begin incorporating corporate values into its brand strategy, it may be time to consider refreshing—or even overhauling—its branding to do just that. Revamping your branding to showcase corporate principles can work wonders for attracting and retaining value-conscious customers. This may seem like a tall order, but a trusted marketing management partner can make the process much easier.
At OneTouchPoint, we make it easy to maintain brand integrity through our U.Connect platform, no matter how many cooks are in the kitchen; and we ease the burden of procurement and distribution, whether you’re planning a values-based multichannel marketing campaign or a full rebrand.
Learn more about how we support our clients’ most important print and online marketing initiatives, and when you’re ready, we invite you to contact us or request a quote on your next project. Our experts will provide insight and ideas to deliver phenomenal results at a great price.