Untapped Brand Ambassadors

As the world continues to recover from the pandemic, meeting your consumers’ expectations in meaningful and intentional ways will help you prepare as the market recovers. Keeping customers happy is the key to any successful business, but many forget that giving the same attention to employees and vendor partners is just as essential.

Employees often have a more intimate experience with your brand culture than your consumers, and it’s not uncommon for employees to be a part of your target market. Your team’s morale can have a direct impact on your customer experience, especially for prospects. Fostering a good company culture that values employees and respects their role in the customer experience is a factor that is easy to overlook. Make sure you’re communicating with your internal teams and listening to their expectations. Employees, even when they are not in your target market, have family and friends who are. They can often be your most vocal brand ambassadors.

Partners and vendors are another untapped area for many brands. They not only witness the inner workings of your business, but also help build your business. A healthy vendor partnership reaps the same rewards as a healthy customer relationship. If they understand their role and feel respected in how they interact with you, not only will your vendors help you produce results, but they share those proud moments to other clients, prospects and family. Vendor relationships are often viewed from the closed perspective of “I am paying you for a service” and the chance to build strong rapport and share your brand values may be put to the side. Paying on time, repeat business and sharing results – good and bad – can help you tap into one of the strongest sources for evangelizing your brand. Vendor partners often are unintentional brand ambassadors, but extremely influential.

Just like your mom always said, “Kindness starts at home.” Your brand experience should begin with your employees and vendors while also meeting the expectations of your market. By changing your perspective to include a full 360-degree view of your brand experience, you can tap into a new level of word-of-mouth marketing while also building long-lasting employee and vendor relationships.