As a connoisseur of Marketing Wisdom – why else would you be reading this – you’re well aware of the oft-touted virtues of an established brand. Perhaps the greatest of which is customer loyalty. However in this day of cut-throat competition, and rapidly diminishing “first to market” advantage, companies in ultra competitive markets may question whether “customer loyalty” is a dated concept.

I started to write “back in the good old days” but that’s a relative concept if there ever was one. So let’s say, back in the salad days of branding; the 1930’s to the 1970’s, a brand’s consistent appearance in the media could create a preference that verged on fratricidal. I’m thinking of the Ford trucks with decals in the back window showing a Calvin (of Calvin & Hobbes) look-alike urinating on a Chevy logo. Not to be outdone, I’ve seen plenty of Chevy trucks with Calvin mistreating a Ford logo.

When I was stationed overseas, a pack of Marlboroughs was thought to attract favorable attention from various frauleins, jeune filles and birds…at least those on the prowl for an American tourist.

Some brands carried such clout that they became adjectives of quality; Cadillac comes to mind. And that’s actually a pretty good example of the point of the title of the blog: A Good Brand Buys You Forgiveness.

In the case of Cadillac, I don’t mean the “goodness” of the brand to be the product, but the goodwill engendered by decades of marketing the brand as the category leader. It’s no secret that GM’s prize nameplate had fallen on hard times in the 80’s and 90’s as faster, sleeker, and more technologically sophisticated cars – first from Europe and then Japan – ate away at Cadillac’s quality reputation and enviable market position.

Then a few bright folks at GM decided that they could best beat the imports by borrowing from them. Zut Alors!  Ach De Leiber Gott! Cadillac has begun to recapture some of its élan and its market share. My point is that without that wellspring of goodwill established by years of diligent brand-building, Cadillac might not have been able to crawl out of the grave.

Everybody knows the story of “new” Coke so I won’t retell it, except to say that a passionately loyal brand/fan base allowed the heavy breathers in Atlanta to mess with the secret formula, brag about doing it, humiliate themselves in front of their arch rival Pepsi Cola, and – when the dust settled – emerge with the dominant market share. Since then Pepsi has had to turn to juice, water, and restaurants to compete.

Harley Davidson – a company that has been on the rocks more times Johnny Walker Black – has survived and thrived thanks to their iconic status. Though, in their case, I would hazard that their brand was built less by advertising and more by the perceived “rebel” lifestyle of its core customer base – bikers. So strong is this image that the sight of plutocrats like Malcolm Forbes on a hog couldn’t dent it.

A recent benefactor of the principle that entrenched goodwill makes a brand resilient (if not death-proof) is Starbucks. Like a lot of successful brands, the wounds that caused Starbucks to fall to Earth were largely self-inflicted and, as a consequence, the company has abruptly retreated from its goal of world domination in order recapture both its profitability and corporate soul. However, when the company very publicly announced it was closing 600 stores, there was an outpouring of angst across the country resulting in the spontaneous creation of numerous petitions protesting the closures.

You cynics seating the back row may be nodding your heads and muttering that it’s all part of Howard Shultz’s master plan. If that’s true, more power to him. Whether the closures are a bluff, or corporate triage, Starbucks has demonstrated to McDonalds, Dunkin Donuts and any others who covet the latte crowd, the strength of their customer loyalty and, quite possibly, how that loyalty will restore the company’s fortunes.

One thing that we hear from many businesses is that “all new our business comes from referrals, so we don’t have to do any marketing.” I love it. Businesses just emerge, like mushrooms over night, and somehow clients are drawn to them. Would that it were true…or even possible.

The old axiom of “Build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door” only holds true once the world learns of your creation. The “learning of the creation” part is…marketing. All of these businesses fortunate enough to exist on referrals alone, not only marketing at the time of their inception – they market all the time. It’s merely that they don’t think of it as marketing.

Some examples to spur discussion…

I’ll bet my nonexistent pension*  that all of these non-marketing businesses mailed letters, made countless visits and telephones calls, joined tip clubs, and did whatever else they could think of to inform the “world” when they first hung out their shingle. In which case, they owe their status as “non-marketers” to…effective marketing.

As an aside: in the event that someone out there walked out of a previous business situation with enough clients to start their own business and they continue to survive on the strength of those original relationships without the benefit of any additional marketing, I would say that you’re living on borrowed time. Consider what your situation would be if one of your current employees decides to start their own business the same way you started yours.

How many owners of business play golf and – thanks to the vast numbers and proximity of potential clients on golf courses – claim related expenses as deductions for business promotion. No, I’m not calling them out for a tax dodge, I’m merely pointing out that golf is an excellent marketing opportunity. You’re relatively isolated for about four hours with little to talk about but the weather, the opposite sex, the state of the world and business.

Many companies who claim to do no advertising will still run a half-dozen ads a year supporting some worthy charity, civic event, school fundraiser, youth sports team, etc. If you live in a semi-rural area as I do, it’s not long before you run into the same logos and company names. While the mere sight of someone’s business ID may not necessarily incline you to do business with them, the familiarity developed through repeated exposure certainly greases the skids when you encounter them in person…”Say, I’ve heard of you.”

Appearances at civic events such as those sponsored by the local chamber of commerce, Rotary meetings (and to be fair, Kiwanis, Lions, Elks, Odd Fellows, etc.), media events, fund raisers all count as “showing the flag.” In a county the size of the one where I practice my trade, I can count on seeing 30 people that I know at any event that attracts more than 50 attendees.

Public Relations, while being its own discipline, counts as part of an overall marketing effort. Virtually any “ink” that your business in the media gets counts as marketing. The possible exceptions being news that you’re closing your doors or that the FBI recently broke them down.

Do you take your clients to lunch, send Holiday presents and/or remember their birthdays? All of these are marketing.

Do you have a website? If it’s been executed with an eye towards Search Engine Optimization it is most definitely a marketing tool. If not, if the Home page is a kaleidoscope of Flash, or it hasn’t been updated since Netscape with the dominant search engine then you really aren’t marketing…at least on the Internet.

*despite my advanced age I have kids young enough that  I expect to be working right up the moment I ascend to meet the Lord.

Among other things, aspiring to Marketing Wisdom means not forgetting hard-learned lessons, which even the best marketers do when they’re in the thick of the battle. As someone who makes a living by providing marketing wisdom to others, I’m no different.

For example, the economy is down so we’ve redoubled our own marketing efforts. Since this is something a recommend, I guess that means we take our own medicine. However, in our zeal to influence potential customers, we’ve been concentrating on telling them all the great things we can do for them and in so doing we forget to mention the greatest value-add of all…namely, the direct connection between effective marketing and increasing profits.

In our own marketing, we use the slogan “Profit from our know-how™” because we want folks to make the connection between hiring us to assist them with their marketing and the idea that our assistance will help them make more money than they might otherwise without using us as a resource.

Now I know the connection between marketing and profits as well as I know my Social Security number, yet sometimes under the pressure of new business meeting, or even a casual encounter, I will forget the number one benefit that we offer, and instead I’ll talk about services.

I bring this up not to indulge in some mea culpa, but to explore a challenge we face in our marketplace, namely the great number of people who don’t understand what marketing means to them and their business.

Sure, most people in business associate marketing with sales or advertising or public relations which by and large are tasks that they feel competent to do themselves, or tasks that they feel are discretionary as in, “if we have extra money we’ll run some ads. Either that or take the Office Manager to lunch.”

Last week I wrote that the relationship of marketing to business is akin to that of fuel for a car, e.g., you can’t get anywhere without it. That’s not a bad metaphor except that fuel is a commodity and as such is sold on price. As with gasoline, many business people think that marketing related services from any source will produce equal results. That means that desktop publishing, clip art, media that promise to design ads or spots for free are all akin to having an oil well in your back yard. No need to go elsewhere for fuel.

However, few of these proudly self-sufficient marketers, or those who avail themselves of free services offered by the newspapers, radio stations or cable TV stop to consider the very strong possibility that they could get better marketing from a specialist than they will get from some media with a vested interest in keeping their expenses to a minimum.

Few will argue that a specialist in pretty much anything is apt to be superior to an amateur. That’s why most folks don’t do their own dentistry. Yet when it comes to marketing, a great many folks are content with DIY or “free” because they’ve never taken the time to compare what they’re getting with the potentially greater results they’d likely to experience working with a pro.