Way back before we started Hexanine, I commuted out of the city to a design firm in the Chicago burbs. My drive averaged 70 minutes each way, and gave me plenty of time for brainstorming and podcasts. But while motoring to the Kennedy Expressway, I saw things I might have missed if it weren’t for the gridlock. One of them was this van: (Photo taken with my old cellphone.)

In the 2+ years I made that drive, this homemade billboard of a van was parked on the same 3-block stretch (moving occasionally) right near the highway. That was almost 5 years ago. And guess what? It’s still there. That old van even has a spot on Google Maps street view. For those of you who don’t get the funny syntax English, the author of this vinyl lettered rage (applied to all sides of the vehicle!) doesn’t like American Family Insurance. It’s obvious to anyone who drives or walks past this Hate Van that for whatever reason (“Didn’t fix this Car!”) American Family did something to absolutely piss off the owner.

It would be easy to chalk this up to a one-time occurrence, or some crazy former custome—but this company must have done something pretty awful to motivate anyone to decorate their own vehicle with toxic hate messages. Even if it wasn’t a major catastrophe that led to this—if it was something as benign as a missed insurance payment—this Hate Van still stands as a testament to the evolving nature of brands. I say this because somewhere along the line, the game changed. Now, for any company—yours, mine, American Family’s—what people say about you matters deeply. Maybe it has always mattered. After all, a company that makes great products but falls down in customer service or employs nasty cashiers isn’t going to last. The technology we have today would only hasten that organization’s inevitable collapse.

With the adoption and accessibility of tools like Twitter, blogs, YouTube, etc. the once-silent masses can now speak up about the brands they love or hate. These other voices matter greatly in the global conversation about your organization. It’s simple for people to rat out a sleeping cable repair person, or to document their troubles with destroyed luggage. The communicative aspect of technology has brought this crucial company/user dynamic to the surface.

Marty Neumeier (author of The Brand Gap) affirms this when he says that your brand is “what they say it is”. All the PR, advertising, positive brand messages, celebrity endorsements, and pretty packaging are merely part of the equation—only one side of the coin. If people don’t have good feelings or positive things to say about your product or organization, large ad budgets and better spin doctoring aren’t going to cover it up. The era of one-way communication to your target market is gasping its last. What the rest of the world says and believes about you—that is your brand. The mental model someone has of your organization is just as crucial to your success as what the CEO says your mission statement is.

Of course, advertising, packaging, taglines, sponsorships, great messaging—they’re also essential. (If they weren’t, we wouldn’t be doing what we do.) But to focus on those and neglect things like helpful customer service, easy-to-complete web forms, human voices on the end of 800 numbers, organizational mandates to leave customers satisfied—those things can’t fall by the wayside. This dynamic forces those of us who are marketers and brand strategists to think deeply about all the ways a company touches its intended market.

So, if this bubbling cauldron of consumer opinion feels like it’s about to boil over on you, let us give a few practical ideas on how to quash the problems before they balloon:

Identify your touchpoints and improve the weak ones
Assuming that your products or services are top notch, and your design, identity and marketing are beautiful, meaningful, and effective, we can think about other areas. (If not, please drop us a line so we can help.) In what other areas does your company interface with the target market? Minor investments of time and money here will potentially improve your brand cache down the road, but you need to approach this from a customer-centric, needs-based vantage point. Can your hold music be less grating? Will your customer service people be trained well enough to work without canned scripts? Are the delivery people courteous and chatty with the those on their regular routes? Perhaps offering gift certificates or store credits for improvement suggestions will build better sync between customer expectations and what you deliver. Of course, none of this will work without a company culture that gives those inside the organization the power to make improvements on the fly. Soliciting feedback or acquiring suggestions without the commitment to implement change will actually harm your brand image more than if you had done nothing—so make sure that there is sign-off at all necessary levels.

Open the dialogue
If people are talking about you, wouldn’t you like to have a chance to join the discussion? Not just to quash the negative talk, but with the desire to help solve real problems. Better yet, you can initiate some of the dialogue by admitting weaknesses and looking for help. It’s necessary to do this in a way that doesn’t feel fake or controlled too. You might try Twitter, message boards, and Facebook efforts, but social networking tools aren’t for everyone. Sometimes the hoopla is overblown on these silver bullet solutions, so it’s important to asses the true value of these for your organization, not just because everyone else is doing it. Also, consider other ways to allow your markets to talk to you. Chats, Q&A sessions, customer reps who actually have the authority to implement good feedback—all these will go a long way to making your star shine in the eyes of customers.

Make it right—quickly, cheaply and publicly
The takeaway for gapers near the Kennedy Expressway is going to be “American Family Insurance is bad, because they didn’t make it right.” Think about how much the Hate Van has probably cost American Family Insurance with five years of ongoing bad publicity. That number surely dwarfs what it would have cost to insure or assist that one livid customer. These kinds of decisions can’t be the sole purview of accountants—anoint some people with the power to make things right while keeping the organization’s brand promises in mind. One terrible brand interaction can turn someone into an enemy combatant, while a single bit of brand-aware kindness directed at a customer can give you an evangelist for life. These people are worth their weight in marketing gold.

Those are just some of the major ones. We’d love to hear your thoughts as well, so please add to the dialogue and comment below.

Two examples
To show that these actions don’t cost a lot, and they don’t happen in a vacuum, I’ll share a couple of quick moments that have earned my loyalty.

-JanSport: I own a classic, black JanSport backpack, and have had it since 1995. At some point in college, one of the straps broke, and invoking their lifetime warranty I sent the pack in for repair. Not only did they repair it (no problems in the decade since) but they also sent me a postcard letting me know that my backpack was having a fun time at “backpack camp” and would be home soon. They even improved its functionality by sewing the ends of the straps into loops—a feature that later packs had, but mine was missing. It’s a great, sturdy product, but it won’t last forever. When I do go shopping for a new pack, JanSport has earned enough of my loyalty that their packs will be the first ones I consider.

-Fossil Watches: I have a fantastic Fossil Atari watch with a cool animated Breakout background in it. These limited edition watches were designed in partnership with Legacy Engineering and they’re no longer available in retail stores. But when my battery died, I decided to take it into an official Fossil store for battery replacement. The people working there weren’t able to remove the unique watch back with standard tools, and obviously couldn’t replace the battery. So, they sent my watch to the repair center via UPS and had it done for me. For the inconvenience, they paid for shipping and the new battery installation. I paid nothing. There are lots of cool watches out there, but why wouldn’t I want one from a place that treats their customers so well? I didn’t even have to ask. All it took was a nice part-time salesperson in a mall, and a repair technician to waive the $15 charge.