Brands are not “good” or “bad”

There seems to be a bit of a trend springing up asking for “brands to be ethical” and talk about the “karma of brands”. It bothers me.

Brands are inanimate. They have no ethics, no morals. They are not in and of themselves good or bad. They are an intent.

It takes people to inhabit them.

Then brands have a pulse. They have ethics and morals. They can be good and bad. They can deliver their promises.

It’s the difference between a brand that is only an idea or a campaign (which it never is) and a brand that is the result of beliefs and actions (which it always is).

It’s an important distinction.

We see brands blamed for a lot these days. The BP brand is bad because it spilled oil; David Jones is bad because it allowed a young woman to be harassed; Apple is bad because it’s latest iPhone isn’t perfect; and on.

But what lies within those brands are people making choices about what to do and what not to do. And when a brand is “bad,” what you are really seeing is a failure to deliver a promise and a lack of strength in alignment, with gaps beginning to show as a result.

Those gaps can be relatively small (you haven’t solved my billing issue), or much bigger (you created the worst man-made environmental disaster in US history).

You (and all the people who work with and for you) are in control of the way your brand is perceived. It doesn’t happen in a vacuum.

If you have ethics and morals, if you are “good” (whatever that means within your brand), if you own what you promise and deliver on it every time – so will your brand.

See you next week.

Michel Hogan is a Brand Advocate. Through her work with Brandology here in Australia and in the United States, she helps organisations recognise who they are and align that with what they do and say, to build more authentic and sustainable brands. She also publishes the Brand thought leadership blog – Brand Alignment.