Service Brands Archives - Beg to Differ

Jun

Would you want this place on your Visa bill?

Over the next weeks, Beg to Differ will be presenting some examples of brand names that are just bad – for a number of reasons. Today’s example is something we spotted over the weekend…

The Hav-A-Nap Motel

This bad brand – which, yes, also has a web site – is one that a friend pointed out to me in the Eastern part of metro Toronto, and it’s a classic. It’s one of those unintentional landmarks that everyone seems to know about (but no one will admit being a customer of).

And actually, while I usually criticize brand names that are un-helpful, this bad name is actually a customer service because it’s so bad. That is, because the name is so tone-deaf and slimy sounding, most respectable consumers will know better than to stay there.

This review from an Italian visitor on Trip Advisor pretty well sums up the experience I’d expect to have from any motel called the “Hav A Nap”:

Sorry for my english… It was a very terrible experience… the room was very dirty, the bedsheets were full of spots (I think there were spots of previous sexual performances…), the bedcover had holes by cigarette… I left my cup of coffee in the room and when I came back I have found also mouse’s excrements… It was very very cheap, but I slept all dressed because of the disgust…

Funny, but when you don’t have enough energy to spell “HAVE” correctly, it’s not surprising that you don’t sweat little details like laundry, customer satisfaction, or human health for that matter.

Enough said.

I’d love to get more of your favourite bad brand names, so please leave them in the comments!

Nov

Favourite blog posts of 2009: October & November

By Dennis Van Staalduinen | Agency Brands, Analysis & review, Brand Names, Brand Standards, Brand Value, Branding Advice, Branding Mistakes, Consumer Behaviour, Consumer product brands, Humour, Media Brands, Message & Positioning, Positioning, Product Portfolio, Rebranding, Retail Brands, Service Brands, Social Media, Tag Lines, Technology Brands

What if restaurants charged like creative agencies? The other side

October 9, 2009

The branding business: we haven’t have a lot of posts about this topic area… yet. But we felt we needed to respond to a viral video which lampooned clients for not “getting” the value of the work creative agencies do. After all, it takes two to tango – or quibble over a giant invoice.

More on the biz: when branding, look outside;

How to name a chicken sandwich: thoughts for branders

October 19, 2009

Brand naming: When KFC launched a new chicken sandwich with a name developed by Brandvelope, we took the opportunity to toot our own horn a bit and talk about the process of naming a brand. And the results: our biggest single day tally of visitors as branders came by for a taste of what we do.

More on names:Sorry Shakespeare: names matter; brandscape – a chicken or egg?

American Airlines meets Mr. X – a tragic tale of brand failure

November 9, 2009

“Whole brand” thinking: This short post on the failure of a giant corporation to understand effective customer engagement in the social media era marked the first time a SlideShare deck of ours reached 2000 hits – and climbing (in response to a tip from Alison Gresik).

More on this:Toronto Web site fail; Human in five steps; the perils of too much choice; one immutable law

Green eggs & spam: a Twitter poem

November 19th, 2009

Social media: Funny to talk about this one as a greatest hit – because we wrote it in the middle of the current “faves” series – and it’s really still going with more than 100 RTs to date. Basically, we wondered a) what @SamEyeEm would be like on Twitter, and b) what Dr. Seuss might think about the new “ReTweet” feature on Twitter.

More on this topic: Twiterloo; branding explained in Twitterese; “Social Media” needs a new name.

More in this series:

Tuesday: Beg to Differ highlights from June & July
Wednesday: Beg to Differ highlights from August & September.
Thursday: Beg to Differ highlights from October & November (this post).

Oh, and another reminder: please sign up for e-mail updates (on the right) or our RSS feed, so you keep track of our future posts.

Nov

Brand builders: how to be human in five easy steps

By Dennis Van Staalduinen | Analysis & review, Brand Value, Branding Advice, Branding Mistakes, Service Brands, Social Media

1 Comment

Humans beat dinosaurs every time.

Yesterday, our post about how American Airlines fired Mr. X – an employee who had the gall to (gasp) engage with a customer – generated a fair bit of engagement of its own. We were also shocked and pleased that our accompanying PowerPoint deck was chosen as one of the features on the SlideShare home page, with more than 950 views and climbing. “Wow,” we thought: “People are actually paying attention! Crap!”

How not to do it: the American Airlines approach to humanzing communications (image from www.dinosaurlive.com)

Why I said “Crap”

Because even though I’d spent an hour and a half yesterday morning putting the deck together, there were a few things I left off at the end – some important stuff about the difference between a) treating people and social media like a lumbering corporate dinosaur (American Airlines, that’s you), or b) like human beings (the un-American Airlines approach).

So we added a few thoughts to the deck, along with 5 simple steps you can follow to make your brand more friendly to humans. Please read on.

Surprised when corporations don’t act human? Don’t be!

Sadly, rumours of mass extinction have been greatly exaggerated: American Airlines isn’t the last dinosaur.

Thousands of others are lurking out there, hiding in hierarchical “Lost Valleys” around the corporate landscape. They’re scary, and they still have big teeth if you get close to them. And they roar, stomp, intimidate, and generally pretend with their pea-sized brains that they can throttle and control communications the same way they did (or thought they could) in the Jurassic era.

But the world has changed.

The new boss has arrived (and it’s us).

And the new masters of the planet have opposable thumbs. And emotions. And big brains. They talk to each other; they form families and tribes.

And they don’t even try to control the message.

Instead, they listen, and build the conversation in ways that are real, helpful, and yes human. Want evidence? You’re reading this aren’t you?

How to humanize your brand in five easy steps:

1) Don’t pretend to be perfect.

You’re lying. We know, because we’re human too. So don’t even bother faking it.

2) Listen (critically) to critics.

They usually see you better than you do. Then conscript the helpful critics as team-mates, or call them out if they’re just snipers.

3) Speak Human.

Because here’s a secret: nobody ever understood “Corporate-ese” in the first place. Just use normal people-friendly words, a helpful tone, and don’t brag about your big accomplishments / hard drives / pointy teeth. If it’s true, other people will say it. If it’s not, you’re just a roaring fossil.

4) Encourage your people to speak Human

But remember that many of your employees think that roaring and stomping is the only way to behave. Gently work with them to show a better way. Give them access to the right tools to speak to customers, and teach them to find the opportunities and boundaries for themselves (oh, and share that learning with everyone).

5) To clobber your competitors, be more human

And this is the great part: all this touchy-feely human stuff is the best way to win in the battle of the brands! So go on big guy: listen harder; be more lethally generous (thanks again Shel Israel); earn some Whuffie (thanks Tara Hunt) and build real human relationships with your customers, influencers, staff, and yes, even the competition.

And if you’re an airline but you’re not American Airlines, congratulations: you’re already ahead!

Click here to see the whole PowerPoint deck on SlideShare

Sep

Mortal peril: the unholy temptation of descriptive names

By Dennis Van Staalduinen | Brand Names, Branding Advice, Government Brands, Humour, Media Brands, Product Portfolio, Service Brands, Technology Brands

2 Comments

My family and I walk by this tiny church on our way to the grocery store all the time. And while I’d always noticed the odd architecture of the place, it was only recently that I took a second look and was struck by the name.

Cathedral2

Big promise + tiny package = big let-down

Now I know that a “cathedral” is technically where the bishop has his headquarters, so in the case of a little splinter denomination like this, this really is their cathedral. But for the neighbours, calling this a “cathedral” stretches the bounds of credibility. As a matter of fact, in referring to this building, I’d never use the term “cathedral” unless I wanted to make someone laugh. Cathedrals are massive, ornate, and architecturally significant features in a cityscape; this is just a little local church on a quiet side street.

But that’s just an example where the descriptive name doesn’t fit…

Why would you choose a descriptive name?

On the plus side, when such a name really does describe your product, you can expend less effort explaining it. So if your company is called “International Ball Bearings” and your competitors are “MMT Inc.” and “ACME Inc.” and your target happens to be in the market for ball bearings, you have a quick leg up on the others, even if they make the same product.

A descriptive name can also convey corporate seriousness and solidity. A company named “American Apparel” will have to go a long way to damage that respectable first impression: although give them credit for trying.

The downside

The problem is: what if all three companies mentioned above also made carriage bolts, and that’s what a customer was looking for? They’d probably assume International Ball Bearings wasn’t for them, right? So while a descriptive name communicates more information faster, it’s also much less flexible. You can’t sell toothpaste if your name is Canada Shipping Lines.

“Purely descriptive” is also a bad word in Trademark law, as it essentially means “cannot be protected”.

But there’s a time and a place for descriptiveness

In my naming work, I have often recommended descriptive names: Canada Business for example as a name for a government service for business. Descriptive product names are also appropriate for companies using a corporate ”master brand” model. Recently, Bell very wisely dumped its Sympatico and ExpressVU names in favour of “Bell Internet” and “Bell TV”. And the world breathed a sigh of relief.

The trick as always, is balance. So how do you achieve this? The easy answer is hire Brandvelope Consulting. But whatever you do, look at the brand in its complete context, and particularly how it fits into the bigger “brandscape” that your customers are facing.