Are your brand values reflected consistently in all the content you share? If not, you might be alienating prospects and customers alike. Incorporating your values on topics relevant to your audience helps build an important connection with prospects and customers. According to the article, The New Science of Customer Emotions in Harvard Business Review, customers who are fully connected to a brand are 52% more valuable than those highly satisfied but not fully connected.
Your content is often the first interaction your potential customers have with your brand. Your content also keeps your existing customers engaged. Therefore, it’s important that your brand values are shared authentically and consistently to support building this emotional connection.
Understand the Importance of Brand Values
The core values of your brand have a direct connection to customer loyalty. There are several reasons for this. These values act as a compass, guiding you through your content creation, brand story, actions, behaviors, and business decisions. Managing a brand without the guidance of brand values often leaves customers confused and leads business decisions astray.
According to Consumer Goods Technology research, 82% of shoppers want to buy from brands aligned with their values.
If your brand values are inauthentic, inconsistent, or not aligned with your business practices, your business is losing out on growth opportunities and on long-term customer loyalty.
Follow these 3 Steps to Improve Your Connection Between Brand Values and Customer Loyalty
STEP 1: Define Your Brand Values
Your core brand values are the foundation of your business’s identity. They represent the beliefs and principles that guide your business’s actions, decisions, and how you show up and interact with your customers. These values are what differentiates your brand from your peers. They are non-negotiable.
In today’s culture, it’s more important than ever to be authentic with your brand values. Think about the brands you engage with and support. Consumers want brands with a human element, not an idealized version of perfection.
If you are looking for ideas as to what types of brand values have proven to be successful, you can find samples of core brand values at the bottom of this article by Brandfolder.
Step 2: Practice these 3 Key Aspects of Reflecting Brand Values in Your Content
Once you have fully defined your brand values, it’s critical that you incorporate them into your content in the following ways.
- Authenticity. Authenticity builds trust. Use words that are aligned with your brand and that have meaning for your business. Write your content message to a single customer profile to build stronger connections. Avoid being opportunistic by jumping into conversations outside your values, such as social causes when you have no history of talking about.
- Be clear. Connecting with your audience requires your content to be relatable and easy to understand.
- Consistency. You want your customers and prospects to have a similar experience across all fronts when they engage with your brand. Therefore, it’s important to ensure consistency across all platforms. This includes your website, social media, blogs, email marketing, print articles, and ads. Confusion is not your friend when it comes to building brand loyalty. Consistency is.
Step 3: Strengthen (and continue to be consistent)
After defining your brand values and using them in a consistent, clear, and authentic manner across platforms, it’s time to strengthen your brand values even more.
- Engage and listen to your audience. Listen to feedback from your audience to gain valuable insights into how your brand values are perceived. You can do this by monitoring social media, creating a survey, or simply talking with customers. Doing so allows you to adjust or fix issues by refining your content before there is a larger misperception or problem.
- Reward loyalty. By incorporating your brand values into your content, you’ll attract customers who are aligned with your brand. This plays towards creating a foundation of strength from the first interaction. It’s then up to you to continue nurturing relationships by following up with customers and showing appreciation such as through a rewards program. Like any relationship, appreciation goes a long way to extend the relationship.
Follow these steps in creating content that supports your brand values and you’ll enjoy the lasting benefits of sharing value-aligned content that attracts new customers, helps retain existing customers, and builds a sense of belonging, community, and connection. In other words, growing your business is also all about building relationships. And that’s a win for everyone involved.
About the author: Autumn Edmiston is the CEO and owner of the Edmiston Group. The Edmiston Group is a multifaceted Pittsburgh-based marketing consulting firm providing senior-level marketing management services to businesses and non-profit organizations on a short or long-term basis. Core areas of service are business development strategies, website creation and management, social media management, marketing, strategic planning, and public relations. The Edmiston Group has consistently delivered and implemented real-world, proven business marketing ideas and strategies for business.