Excerpted from StrateScapes – Volume 2, Number 2

Now that you’re all grown up, you can buy your toothpaste or your white T-shirts wherever you want. But you buy them at Target or Wal-Mart or the Gap … not because it’s on the right corner so much as the fact that you like what Target or Wal-Mart or the Gap is about — they give money to schools or kids’ charities, they champion the laid-back lifestyle … whatever they stand for, you identify with it.

No one’s saying you have to support charities to have a corporate soul. In fact, your reason for being around doesn’t even have to be likable.

So what does your company stand for? Your customers may never ask you this question outright, but they’re asking nevertheless, consciously or not. Associating ourselves with groups that represent our beliefs, values and ideals is something trend analysts say we’re doing more and more. And as you might expect, it’s hard for people to know whether your company’s values are the same as theirs if they don’t know what yours are. So if you want customer loyalty, get ready to bare your soul.

No Heart, No Soul, No Sale

Competing in this new atmosphere of corporate existentialism means you’d better have something a lot more meaningful than profits to hold up as your company’s reason for existing. Something like, “to alleviate pain and disease” (Johnson & Johnson), “preserving and improving human life” (Merck) or “making our customers’ lives better” (Wal-Mart). And in this ballgame, actions speak louder than words. You must not only have more in your master plan than turning a profit, but you also better put your money where your mouth is.

Marketing futurist Faith Popcorn is one trendwatcher who says today’s consumers “don’t buy simply because of coupons, jingles or even a lower price. To succeed tomorrow,” she predicts, “businesses need to … have far-ranging impacts on communities and individuals.”

This is about much more than brand identity. Which celebrities wear your clothes, how your corporate tagline is worded … these are only part of the picture. But it doesn’t stop at your “lifestyle philosophy” (“irreverent, fun-loving, witty” for Joe Boxer or “trendy, radical, glamorous, self-centered, youthful, American” for Tommy Hilfiger), an idea Icon magazine held up in its June 1999 issue as the driving force behind today’s successful brands.

Yes, your corporate soul is what you stand for. But what you stand for must consist of much more than a string of adjectives that conjure up an image of the models in your ads.

No Charity Required

Faith Popcorn’s advice to businesses includes a lot about “caring and sharing principles,” which on its face can sound like so much goodie-two-shoes blather. McDonald’s Ronald McDonald House and Wal-Mart’s high-profile support of Children’s Miracle Network are great examples of allegiance to a core ideology. But if you’re wondering where you’re going to find millions to give away — not to mention a cause that hasn’t been snatched up by some corporate giant — understand that no one’s saying you have to support charities to have a corporate soul.

In fact, in their book Built to Last, James Collins and Jerry Porras go so far as to assert that your company’s reason for being around doesn’t even have to be likable. “The critical issue is not whether a company has the ‘right’ core ideology,” they say, “… but rather whether it has a core ideology.”

They point to Phillip Morris, one of the “visionary companies” they define as having stood the test of time by adhering to a single, well-defined purpose. In Phillip Morris’ case, that purpose understandably has nothing to do with helping sick kids or saving the environment. Instead, it’s “defending the right to personal freedom of choice.” A fierce credo every smoker can relate to — and a motto that’s subliminally chanted in everything Phillip Morris does, from brand advertising (“You’ve come a long way, baby”) to handing out boxes of cigarettes with employee paychecks.

Does soul equal loyalty? So you need to get a soul. But what does all this have to do with relationship marketing? Quite a lot. “Many clients can’t answer us when we ask, ‘What’s the one thing about your company that your customers identify with most?’” says Lane Ware, CCG’s Senior Vice President, Strategic Consulting and Account Management. “That makes building relationships with those customers a much bigger task than it has to be.” Don’t make your marketing agency create your relationship marketing initiatives out of thin air. Loyalty programs rely heavily on a unique selling proposition, but on a deeper level they are rooted in why your customers are listening to you in the first place. Knowing this is smashingly useful when we sit down to figure out, for instance, what your cardholder magazine should delve into next year — or whether you should be sending e-mail instead of a magazine. If you can’t describe what your company stands for, recognize that this is where we need to start. Then everything else in relationship marketing will fall into place.

Soul Searching

When you set out to give your company a soul, your first impulse is probably to read what successful companies like Wal-Mart hold up as their reasons for being. Or to take what you know about your customers and turn it into an ideology they’ll associate with. But Collins and Porras say this would be your first mistake.

Six pearls of wisdom your company must understand about formulating a core ideology:

It can’t be copied or contrived. “Core ideology does not come from mimicking the values of other companies — even highly visionary companies …” Collins and Porras explain, “and it does not come from what values would be most pragmatic, most popular or most profitable.” It must come from the gut, a heartfelt conviction in why your company exists and how it should be run.

It doesn’t have to be unique. Don’t confuse core ideology with marketing strategies or tactics. Your corporate soul isn’t a selling proposition, and it may say very little about why your product is better than the next company’s. In fact, your core ideology may be very similar to those of other companies, even your competitors. “Many companies could share Hewlett-Packard’s purpose of making a contribution to society via electronic equipment for the advancement of science and the welfare of humanity,” note Collins and Porras. “The primary role of purpose is to guide and inspire, not necessarily to differentiate.”

It can’t be about profit alone. Don’t be fooled by the myth that says you can’t make a profit if you exist to make a difference in the world. You can do both. While some successful companies mention profit in their core ideologies, they refer to it as a means of adhering to their core values. Hewlett-Packard’s core ideology centers on “contribution and responsibility” to its industries and the communities in which it operates, but it also includes a quest for “Profit and growth as a means to make all of the other values and objectives possible.”

It can’t change. Things like product lines and marketing strategies must evolve continually to keep your company ahead of competitors and consumer buying trends. But your core ideology must be timeless — principles you would “strive to live to for a hundred years, regardless of changes in the external environment,” say Collins and Porras. Walt Disney’s goal was “to bring happiness to millions,” and despite tough financial times and criticism of the violence in its movies, Disney continues to do this long after Walt’s death.

It can be an afterthought. “Not all visionary companies began life with a well-articulated core ideology,” Collins and Porras point out. Companies including HP and Motorola didn’t nail down their ideologies until well after the initial startup phase, often a decade or more after their founding. And while most of the visionary companies in Built to Last articulated their core ideologies well before they became big companies, there are numerous late bloomers. Phillip Morris didn’t have a core ideology until its 100th birthday.

It must have employee buy-in. No matter how well it’s written, what it contains or how loudly you shout it out to the public, your reason for being is moot if your employees don’t live it, breathe it and sleep it. Some companies are so fanatical about this that they’ve been compared to cults. Nordstrom gets its employees to write stories about heroic customer service by fellow Nordies, such as warming up a customer’s car while they finished their shopping. At Disney, employees are called “cast members,” a job is a “part” and being on duty is being “on stage.”

But even companies that aren’t this radical about core ideology have three practices in common: They hire only people who fit in with the company’s values and beliefs; they train their employees about the company’s core purpose and values; and they reward employees who adhere to and advance those principles, reinforcing a sense of belonging to something special.

It is this tenacious, pervasive devotion to well-defined purpose and values that has proven again and again to lead companies to long-term success.

STRATESCAPES and STRATESCAPES SUPPLEMENTS are published by Customer Communications Group, Inc., a full-service agency specializing in relationship marketing and customer communications. Our comprehensive, turnkey services include data analysis, customer segmentation, strategic consulting, account management, creative execution, print production and multimedia solutions.

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