Kirk W. McLaren is an Entrepreneur's Organization (EO) member in Washington, D.C. and CEO of Foresight CFO, a strategic financial management and accounting services firm that helps businesses achieve optimal growth. We asked Kirk to discuss the importance of investing in a cohesive brand. Here's what he shared.
In the movie Ghostbusters, Peter Venkman's classic line, ". . . dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria . . ." could also describe the unique challenges confronting today's retail world. Online retailers are moving into brick-and-mortar locations just as traditional businesses are moving online or shuttering operations.
As malls across America fail and big-box retailers such as JC Penney, Macy's and Sears close stores, e-commerce retailers are making the jump offline to open physical stores. What critical element have these digital upstarts mastered that formerly billion-dollar businesses missed? The value of branding, and how to meticulously translate a brand's feel into an experiential shopping extravaganza.
Successful e-commerce retailers―think Warby Parker, purveyor of on-trend eyeglasses with US$250 million in sales―become successful because they create a brand people want to be part of. Warby Parker's CEO, Neil Blumenthal, recently gave a speech at Harvard titled, "Retail is Not Dead; Mediocre Retail is Dead."
That, in a nutshell, is the elusive concept that modern retailers have grasped. In a matter of seconds, savvy consumers can pretty much buy anything they want at any moment they want from anywhere in the world they want. With omnichannel retail now a reality, what shoppers lack is the feeling that they're part of something, that what they're buying is in tune with their personal brand. Smart companies realize that if they build a brand that connects with their audience and ensure that it permeates everything they do, they'll attract customers with intrinsic loyalty who will not only buy their products but also promote them to others within their social circle who exhibit similar brand tendencies. And that fosters seismic brand growth.
Everything Warby Parker does, from their web presence to their brick-and-mortar stores, speaks directly to who they are as a brand. The CEOs wear sneakers, untucked button-downs and thick-framed, geek-chic Warby Parker glasses. Their offices are a mash-up of Mad Men-era ad agency and Ivy League reading room. This is exactly on-trend and in-line with their cyber brand. Warby Parker built its business online, and the brand resonates with its core audience. Everything about their online experience, including their social media posts, fosters the perception that wearing Warby Parker glasses will make you stylish, hip, chic and on-trend. And consumers are buying in.
Warby Parker and other retailers making the successful jump from cyberspace to brick-and-mortar understand the importance of investing in creating the tangible counterpart to their virtual persona. Warby Parker's retail locations are meticulously designed to reflect their brand's identity: clean, hip and chic―but welcoming. Modern consumers expect their in-person experience to match their online shopping experience. To accomplish this feat, companies must invest wisely to ensure that their brand permeates everything they do.
American Eagle, an historic mainstay in shopping malls across America, has created Aerie, a woman's lingerie and apparel brand that recently opened trendy pop-up stores focused on providing customers with unique experiential shopportunites. Aerie hosts yoga classes, spin classes, and other events directly aligned with its online brand. The company is using digital branding to enhance its brick-and-mortar shopping experience, and at the same time ensuring that real-life shopping experience matches consumers' cyber-bred expectations.
During these days of cats and dogs living together, online and physical shopping experiences must dovetail to enhance the customer's connection with your brand. Strategic financial planning to enable the necessary investments into marketing, design and brand strategy is crucial, because it empowers companies to invest in brand permeation endeavors that will result in exponential growth and rampant consumer loyalty.
