Selling the Brand Inside: The Importance of Marketing to Your Employees
Selling the Brand Inside Marketing to your employees is just as important as marketing to your customers. Internal marketing helps employees become educated on and connected to the products or services they are trying to sell. The lack of a connection between the employee and the brand can cause employees to undermine expectations set by advertising. On the other hand, when employees care about the brand, they tend to be more motivated to work harder with more loyalty. In “Selling the Brand Inside”, Colin Mitchell describes the three principles of marketing that aid leaders to instill a better understanding and passion of their brand to their employees. CHOOSE YOUR MOMENT. In order to achieve the most productive outcome, leaders must choose a moment when employees can be the most receptive to an internal marketing campaign. A turning point, when employees are looking for leadership and guidance, could be an ideal moment for such a change. The coming of a new leader can also be an opportune time for change since employees tend to be open and ready for new ideas and concepts with new leadership. Leaders must also know when it may be time to scale back the internal marketing campaign. The author of the article describes how employees at Sears became overwhelmed with the internal marketing campaign after six years and employees began to get frustrated. Changing to a more low-key and customary internal marketing plan revitalized the employees. LINK INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL MARKETING. Employees should hear the same message that is sent to the consumers. This enables employees to deliver on customer expectations while helping to push the company to achieve goals that they may not have been able to do before. It is important that employees focus on the same values as advertising, so as not to confuse either the customer or the employee. This can be achieved only if the external advertising targets both the employees and consumers. BRING THE BRAND ALIVE FOR