EVERY INDIVIDUAL IS A BRAND
Every individual is a brand. Every employee represents a company. Companies pay Public Relations, marketing and advertising firms billions of dollars a year to influence consumers about their brand and ensure consumers have an affinity for the brand.
In the corporate world there is the merge of individual identities and corporate entities:
I live in the center of the world, New York City… and a recent event with Mcdonald’s has me compelled to blog about the importance of ensuring employees are properly trained (at the least) in order to ensure brands aren’t damaged:
Tuesday night had a burning desire for McDonald’s french fries. Walked into my local Upper West Side McDonald’s and ordered and paid….. and waited and waited and waited. After looking at my watch I realized 14 minutes had passed and complained. The employee behind the counter told me if I didn’t like it I could leave (Huh?). So I said OK, give me my money back and I don’t want to wait anymore. He said no refunds so keep waiting. After exactly 21 minutes I was handed my French fries (not exactly fast food)…. And complained to the manager who pretended not to hear me (and the 10 around me who were also complaining).
This brand was tremendously damaged in my mind – damaged by foolish employees (and as a business owner I’d fire both of these individuals for their behavior… as I am sure many others would.) Train your employees properly… or maybe you are wasting a lot of money on building brands.
Tags: 5W Public Relations, 5WPR, 5WPR CEO, Crisis PR, for immediate release, PR AGENCY, PR Firm, Pubilc Relations, Ronn Torossian
November 19th, 2007 at 8:11 pm
Will this cause you not to go to McDonald’s anymore or just not that location? It seems that McDonald’s is such a behemoth that each store could be seen as it’s own entity.