So now, we come full circle. We, as a culture, have begun to awaken and realize that without a reason for being, we will end up in a lost, pointless existence. Now, everything has shifted. We want more—more than just “stuff” for the sake of having it. We want more than the emotional high of associating our personal worth with the brands we choose. We want less jargon and more for our money. We want to save the trees, save the planet, save the children, and educate the poor, and we want a product that does what it claims it will do. Or we’re out.

This is an exciting time for those who prefer telling the truth. It’s encouraging that we are all demanding more from the products and offerings we spend our money on. It restores a little faith in human nature. But it will also increase the demands on the business owners to pay attention to their customers.

It’s the one thing (other than stable cash flow) that businesses long for—loyalty from buyers and from their staff. Some would say that it is nearly impossible for a business to hold a person’s attention and trust. What would cause this? Too much clutter and too many distractions? The unraveling of moral fiber in our culture? What?

Here is an interesting fact. Gallup says, “Many employees are highly motivated when joining a company but then become increasingly disillusioned.” That sounds quite similar to how a consumer looses interest in a product or service.

It seems clear that, in the beginning, the employee or buyer is pleased they have made the right choice for themselves, but some how there expectations are not met.  The source is easy to find the solution simple in understand, but challenging to execute.

If a company truly understands themselves and their offerings and then has the discipline to represent it correctly, in both hiring and communicating with potential buyers, there will be little disappointment. The company will have accurately explained what the person is about to experience and the person will then have the exact experience they expected, hopefully an even better experience than they expected. It’s likely the decision maker will feel more committed to the business, and loyalty will be built, as it always has been, with one trustworthy action after another.

The difficulty really lies in defining the true values and principals that naturally propel a company forward and aligning the company according to those guidelines. But once you’ve done that, it all becomes straightforward, your business and marketing strategy as well as how you relate to your staff and buyers.

We may have all been better off without the invention of the “Brand”. It’s truly unfortunate that the term “Brand” became so fashionable. It’s caused a bit of confusion. The thing we call brand is understood in its simplest form as the outward expression of a business—the image its consumers, partners, and competitors come to identify with any given business. But in the last sixty years, it has become so much more. It’s become an entity that exists somewhat on it’s own and has subsequently become separated from the business itself.

An indicator of this phenomenon is that we’ve come to the place where there are typically different strategies developed, one for a business and another for its brand. And they may not overlap all that much. “Brand” has even become a unique economic asset in the valuation of a total business. It continues to entice the already emotional stock market to behave even more emotionally, and we’ve all seen how branding has unscrupulously influenced the uninformed consumer.