156: Denise Lee Yohn — Bringing Culture and Your Brand Together
Culture is who you are inside the company and brand is who you are out to the world. When the two are aligned, there’s a real power in your organization, but when they’re misaligned, that’s when the disconnect happens. Today’s show is all about how to get the two things in sync.
Denise Lee Yohn is a speaker, brand expert, and the author of What Great Brands Do: The Seven Brand-Building Principles that Separate the Best from the Rest. Today, Denise will be talking about her latest book, Fusion: How Integrating Brand and Culture Powers the World’s Greatest Companies on this week’s episode!
What’s the difference between brand image vs. brand identity? Your brand is not what you say it is, it is what you do and how you do it. A disconnect between your brand and your culture of any kind can lead you to not fulfilling your promises. If your internal message is disconnected from your external message, it’s going to create a problem down the line.
For example, Wells Fargo used to have a very wholesome brand image, but over the last few years, that image has been tarnished by bad internal practices. Employees felt pressured to fudge the numbers and open up fake accounts due to a misaligned company objective. However, when you’re aligned with how your organization thinks and acts on the inside, you’re creating a value between both your customers and your employees that is very difficult for competitors to undercut.
The truth is, customers are very skeptical and cynical. And in our modern age, it’s very easy to tell if what you’re saying on the outside is actually true for what your company believes on the inside. When you have an alignment in your company culture, you are able to recruit and retain people who believe in your cause.
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