Brand Ability in the Consumer Conversation

Trying to achieve authenticity in consumer interactions has never been easy. The fact is, our primary goal is to sell—to move products off of shelves with as much frequency and margin as is acceptable. But the other fact that we can’t ignore is that we’re marketing to people—people who don’t want to feel “sold.” So with this in mind, where do brands fit into our conversations?

Directing communications at people is a limiting proposition. Instead, the dialogue should be between people, especially since brand engagement is increasingly found in a single instant and often when communicating with a single person. The engagement occurs as a result of influencing the consumer’s culture in the media where the customer chooses to receive content.

This is where interactivity comes into play. Interactive content is at the core of creating fully integrated brand experiences that harbor authentic consumer conversations. As brands seek more influence in these arenas, they can leverage the creativity inherent to interactivity to produce informational media, advertising, and digital content that shapes brand communities.

Whether through social media or smartphones, the mass introduction of these interactive experiences is changing the voices of our content channels. That’s why all marketing disciplines and all brand interactions must come together and develop a thread of continuity for the brand. This complete effort enables the most efficient level of brand engagement and makes the brand’s abilities most visible.

The brand experience is optimized through integrated marketing that marries consumer conversations with brand engagement. Placing the message across a variety of overlapping channels in this way improves the product range, availability, and promotional offers to fully maximize the interactions between brand and consumer. No matter the form the message takes, the brand-consumer interaction is where brand performance lives.

High brand performance empowers sustainable consumer loyalty. Of course, this loyalty enables brands to make better decisions at a more rapid rate to improve sales, profit and value. We are in control of these efforts to execute creative approaches that connect on intellectual and emotional levels. This ensures that our consumer conversations are more interactive, entertaining and measurable—and that is the point where brand visibility translates to influence.