What Ozzie Guillen can teach you about Branding!
The Power of One…just one comment, can cause such harm to a brand. Whether that brand is one’s personal brand, an organization’s brand, a city’s brand The Power of One in a community can have such a huge impact with their words…positive or negative.
Currently under fire is the Florida Marlin’s manager, Ozzie Guillen, for his comment regarding Fidel Castro. Ozzie with 27 years in the MLB both as a player, and now as a manager has developed a personal brand of being a hot head with no filter. Race, sexual orientation or dissing a White House invite after the White Sox World Series win, Ozzie plays no favorites. And now he’s offended the Miami Cuban-American community with his proclamation of “I love and respect Fidel Castro”. Sure he included another statement that clarified his meaning, but the harm was already done.
Now the Florida Marlins respond by suspending a manager who they brought to Miami to take advantage of his South American and Hispanic ties hoping he’d help fill the seats of their expensive new stadium with their expensive new players. It was a gamble the organization was willing to take. After all what a better way to build your ties with the Cuban community than bringing in Guillen. Well, now he’s negatively impacted their brand and they must scurry to protect their brand.
And what about the MLB organization or the city of Miami, how will they steer this attack on their brands? I think they bigger issue Ozzie himself must overcome is how to ingratiate himself with the Cuban- American community. It only remains to be seen how the rest of the story will unfold. Personal, organizational or community brands can be negatively affected by the power of one.
What are you doing to build your brand by overcoming or taking advantage of the ‘power of one’? With people having access to media through social media (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Google+, etc) their ‘power’ becomes even more powerful should the post go viral. Are you listening to your customers to hear what they’re saying? Are you responding to the Power of One in a manner that the rest of the community respects? Or are you ignoring negative comments hoping they’ll go away?
Seven things you should be doing to enhance or protect your brand:
- Recognize today’s marketplace of consumers all have a voice.
- Determine what social communities your customers frequent & be there too.
- Don’t make the mistake of believing your customers alone are responsible for building your brand. Have a brand strategy & execution plan that everyone within the organization supports and rallies behind.
- Have a Social Media Brand Strategy in place…what are you trying to achieve & how will you go about it? Remember just because you have baseball bat doesn’t mean you know how or when to use it!
- The wait & see attitude means you’re reactive vs proactive…by then it’s too late.
- Have a plan in place to defuse negative comments before they get ignited by your community.
- Have a plan in place to take advantage of positive comments and build your brand organically.
The Power of One is here to stay. Get moving and protect or enhance your brand today!
April 13, 2012 @ 7:11 am
Well said! Organizations can no longer ignore the fact they need to invest in a proactive plan just to survive in today’s world.
April 13, 2012 @ 3:13 pm
I mostly agree with this — a single comment can be devastating for a company/individual if you’ve managed to reach the level of nuclear faux pas.
The trick, in my opinion, is this: Like a warrior, a company seeking to build its brand must neither seek nor run from danger.
Tact and common sense are important, as well as not acting on self-destructive impulse in communication. However, those on the cutting edge can expect at least some blood to be drawn from time to time, and to accumulate a few battle scars as they boldly go where no one else has. Don’t be afraid to thoughtfully present a controversial opinion and stir up some “drama’ as a healthy debate ensues.
So yes, absolutely. Instead of ignoring negative comments and/or neglecting the community, I think those seeking to build a powerful and resilient brand should provide the opportunity to bring the battle to an appropriate location within their website, and to proactively join the discussion. This transmutes the energies into a mutually beneficial dialog that will help to sculpt the brand further moving forward.