Who do you love? Integrating sustainability into brands

Some years ago I read a book by Kevin Roberts that explained the path of a product or company, through a brand and into a Lovemark.

Lovemarks: the Future Beyond Brands establishes that currently millions of products and services from all types of companies, in any region of the world grant already a great performance as expected from them. It also describes what are the features that a product or service should have to go beyond that and become an inspirational brand.

So, what is a Lovemark? They are those brands that transcend themselves to create a promise, fulfill it and go further consumer’s expectations. Are those that create intimate and emotional ties beyond reason and it is even possible to perceive them as relationships rather than transactions.

Which are their characteristics? The central element of a Lovemark is respect, because it is critical to generate rapprochement. Then comes the love element that is essential for building relationships. Integrated into this concept, there are three intangible assets.

• Mystery: is the story telling. The sum of the stories, symbols, the past, present and future.

• Sensuality: is the alert to the five senses through innovative and new flavors, textures, smells, colors and sound environments.

• Intimacy: is the element of empathy and closeness that manages to create loyalty. It’s the details that endure over time.

In this sense, and according to the experience of each person, thousands of brands could now be called Lovemarks. However, the current context of a globalized world full of dysfunctionalities and externalities with tremendous impacts on the environment and the development of societies, leads me to think that it is not possible to “love” a brand based solely on these items.

Is not only necessary, but ethically imperative to begin to include sustainability in its economic, social and environmental dimensions as one of the intangible assets that build a Lovemark out of a brand.

Why? Because it is only when this element is part of the essence of the brands, that companies will have made ​​that necessary and requested leap into a way of making really responsible and sustainable business, leaving aside the business as usual.

Thinking about this from a positive perspective, never before ethics, values​​, transparency and respect for human rights, workforce development, efficiency, innovation, environmental care, inclusion and development of communities among other fundamentals, had represented such a huge opportunity to ensure sustainability in essence but also to generate these intimate and emotional ties and relationships.

Relationships that expand beyond consumers achieving to reach a large variety of stakeholders such as employees, investors, media, civil society organizations, community and others.

Thus, today, companies face a huge challenge but also a huge opportunity to become Lovemarks.

Which companies are already on this path? What has been their strategy? How have they managed to differentiate from others?

Comments Off on Who do you love? Integrating sustainability into brands / 13 Apr 2013 por Monica Ducoing
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