William McEwen: The Power of an Emotional Connection

The Power of an Emotional Connection
by William J. McEwen, Global Practice Leader, Brand Management - Gallup
adapted and excerpted from the book Married to the Brand, which will be published in November, 2005 by Gallup Press

For over sixty years, Gallup has been listening to consumers talk about brands. We've heard them talk with considerable passion about certain special brands - the ones with which they've formed strong personal connections. And in these millions of consumer interviews we've also heard about initial relationships that started out well, but then turned sour.

There's a distinctive sound to a happy brand marriage. And there's a distinctive structure to the connection that's forged between consumers and the brands they buy and use. That connection is fundamentally rooted in both emotional and rational considerations.

What we've learned from digging into our consumer conversations and our worldwide database will surprise some company managers, while perhaps reinforcing what others have believed but haven't been able to document. We've learned:

Consumers' emotions aren't merely warm and squishy concepts suitable mainly for greeting cards and Hollywood movies. Emotional connections are powerful and profitable. Emotional bonds represent critical bellwether indicators of a wide variety of future "hard number" business outcomes. Whether a company is marketing hamburgers or microprocessors, there's an impressive financial return that results from emotionally engaging consumers - and there's a substantial cost that results from disengaging them.
There's a crucial difference between a customer and an engaged customer. Gaining customers should never be a company's objective; building customer engagement should be. Management should be held accountable for building engagement, and not simply for increasing sales volume. Sales increases may not be profitable; engagement growth, in contrast, is.
In most cases, customer "satisfaction" surveys, CRM systems and customer "loyalty" programs haven't increased the numbers of healthy brand marriages. It's not because companies won't spend the money, and it's not because companies don't care. Rather, it's because most of these programs have either missed or ignored what it actually takes to create and sustain a "brand marriage" relationship. Bribes alone won't assure an enduring brand relationship. They merely increase the cost of doing business.
What attracts a first-time buyer is often quite different from what it takes to turn that prospect into a fully engaged customer. Dating is different from marriage. Yet both involve essential emotional connections that must be understood if they're ever going to be managed.
Whenever people are involved in servicing, selling and supporting customers, the impact of this "fifth P" typically overwhelms the impact of any of the other 4 Ps. In those situations, great products - regardless of how attractive and well-constructed they might be - aren't enough to support an enduring brand relationship. Same for low prices, great advertising, stunning packaging, or even superb locations. It's never a single factor; it's the total brand experience that determines the enduring health of a brand marriage. Failure on any one of these factors jeopardizes the relationship. And the "people" component is almost always the toughest to get right.
Most companies have strong brand relationships with only a small minority of their customers. Even great brands usually have brand marriage relationships with only about half of their customers - and they probably don't even know which ones they are. Unless they can find out, they can't build more of them.
Every time a customer comes in contact with a company - with its products, stores, people, ads, or with the stories that appear in blogs and in the newspaper - the brand relationship can be enhanced. Or it can be diminished. Brand marriages aren't static; they continue to evolve. And every change, whether up or down, has an economic consequence.
Brand relationship management isn't just a marketing challenge, nor is it a challenge that can be met solely through operational, product-development, or information technology enhancements. Successful marriage management requires a passionate and empowered C-level champion, company-wide commitment and aligned efforts that extend across company silos.
Top-down corporate solutions to brand marriage management may offer great efficiencies - but they won't work unless they move beyond the boardroom to impact the individual customer interface. That's where brand marriages are either sustained or destroyed.

Gallup's research underscores what some others have noted: "satisfaction" is a rather poor measure of the strength of a customer relationship, and it's an inappropriate goal to set for company managers. "Good" performance won't deliver brand passion. And yet, as Jim Collins pointed out in his book Good to Great, too many companies have become content with pursuing "good" - the enemy of great. Marriages require more; loving involves a whole lot more than liking.

Consumers' emotions can be reliably and meaningfully measured. Customer engagement can be quantified and, more to the point, it can be managed. Companies can enhance their customer connections. It's certainly not easy. But it's not really optional; it's imperative.

William J. McEwen is Global Practice Leader, Brand Management at The Gallup Organization. He consults with major global clients on brand management issues, and leads a team responsible for setting Gallup's global standards for assessing brand equity and managing brand communications. Prior to joining Gallup, he held senior research and account management positions at several major advertising agencies including McCann-Erickson, FCB and D'Arcy. He received his Ph.D. from Michigan State University, and was a tenured faculty member in Communication Sciences at the University of Connecticut. He is headquartered in Irvine CA, but is currently on assignment in Gallup's Sydney office.