A Brand’s Love Story: How Customers Fall in Love with a Brand (1/5)
By Levina Kusumadjaja
Prologue
The customer journey shows the phases in a relationship between a brand and its customer. This journey shows the process that a customer goes through from his or her first interaction with the brand to eventually sticking with the brand. So, a customer journey can be seen as a customer’s relationship journey with the brand. Keep this in mind because we will keep using the relationship analogy throughout this article series as we unpack each stage of customer journey.
Understanding customer journey for a brand strategist is important because it helps a strategist see the importance of different roles and parts in the different stages of the relationship. It maps out who needs to do what at what stage and how the company can maximize the particular people, departments or parts of the product to communicate the brand to the customers based on the nature of each stage in the relationship. In these next 5 articles, we’re going to take a closer look at each stage of the relationship.
Chapter 1: Awareness
A customer’s journey with a brand begins with awareness. At this stage, the customer has just met with the brand. Maybe it’s their first time finding the brand on the internet, maybe they just passed the brand’s store as they took an afternoon stroll around the block. Previously, the customer doesn’t think about this brand at all, maybe they don’t even know the brand existed to begin with. It is this moment of encounter that suddenly makes the customers go: “Wow! What was that?”
Just like in an everyday setting, you meet many people on a daily basis. The idea of meeting someone for the first time is common, because you meet people for the first time everywhere you go. At the bus stop near your place, at the subway, at your favorite local coffee shop, at your office building... it is not groundbreaking to be seeing someone for the first time. But what will make that meeting impactful is when you notice their presence and you remember the encounter.
Take Wendy’s for example. Have you seen their social media accounts? They have done a phenomenal job at catching their customer’s attention. They are funny, they are shameless about telling everybody that they are better than other fast food chains, and they are great at making people hungry. Wendy’s masters social media like no fast food brands could, and this helps people remember and be aware of Wendy’s.
The goal of the awareness stage is to grab the customer’s attention. Customers interact or meet with so many brands on a daily basis, and they will have multiple brands in their minds all the time as their different needs arise throughout the day. So if the brand wants to be remembered by the customers, this brand needs to stand out. That’s why good branding wants to grab a customer’s attention. A good branding strategy will gradually or immediately eliminate other brands from the customer’s mind, so that customers will automatically think of a specific brand when they think of a specific need.
If a brand successfully places itself in the minds of customers, the brand has gained awareness.
Brands need to grab the customers’ attention because without awareness, customers can’t consider the brand. The brand can be the best brand in the world in their category, but if customers aren’t aware of the brand, the brand will remain the best kept secret in the world. So it starts here, the first meeting between a customer and a brand that creates awareness of the brand in the customer’s mind.
First stage complete. Next up - Chapter 2: Consideration.
Cheers!
Levina
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About the author:
Levina is a writer based in Indonesia. Because of Melinda Livsey, she recognized the power of brand strategy for every creative. She is sharing about her learnings as she goes to help creatives have fun in their growth and journey of building brands. Connect with her on LinkedIn and say hi!