The Brand Identity Crisis
Here’s a scenario I see playing out in companies every single day: A CEO invests thousands of dollars in a trendy, engaging Instagram presence. Their website exudes luxury and sophistication. But when customers walk through their doors, they encounter something that feels high-end yet oddly old-fashioned.
What’s happening here isn’t a lack of effort or investment—it’s a complete disconnection between how the brand shows up across different touchpoints. While the CEO thinks they’re creating a comprehensive brand experience, their customers are getting something entirely different: confusion.
The hidden cost of this inconsistency? Your customers don’t buy. They can’t figure out who you are, what you do for them, or whether they can trust you to deliver on your promises. And here’s the brutal truth: they won’t spend time trying to figure it out.
The Multi-Channel Confusion
The inconsistency starts with something most CEOs think they’re handling well: using different marketing channels and platforms. But here’s what actually happens in practice.
You show up on Instagram in this really fun, trendy way. Your customers go to your website, and it’s very high-end and luxurious. They walk in your door, and it’s high-end, luxurious, and maybe a bit dated at the same time. Now there’s no consistency across all of those areas, and it makes your customers confused.
The challenge compounds because your different teams are working on different things, often without a unifying strategic framework above them. Your social media team isn’t the same team that works on your website. It’s not the same team that designs and buys print advertising. It’s not the same team that handles publicity and public relations. And they aren’t the same team that sells to the customer.
That’s all well and good—until you realize there’s nothing sitting above all of these teams from a strategic standpoint to ensure there’s a unifying message, a unifying brand identity woven through what all of those teams are doing. Essentially, they’re running different messages, tones, styles, and approaches. It loses any form of continuity.
When Customers Can’t Figure You Out
It becomes very perplexing to your customers because they can’t figure out who your brand is. And here’s what you must understand: your customers will not spend much time trying to figure it out. If it’s confusing to them, they move on.
This confusion can happen at any point throughout the customer journey, making it so insidious. You can lose them before they ever even get started because they can’t figure out who you are or what you do for them. Building on what we discussed about the empathy gap, if they don’t see how you can help them, and they also don’t understand what you do and provide, then they’re gone.
But it’s equally devastating later in the customer journey when they’re just about ready to buy. What happens if they go to your website and are convinced that this is the right solution, but now everything looks and feels different? Now they’re confused. They’re unsure. Did they misunderstand?
It really does leave them with a gap—there’s the empathy gap of not understanding the customer, but there’s also a gap in making that transition from “I believe you can help me” to “I’m ready to push the button and buy.”
The Internal Confusion Factor
But you also have to be sure you’re not confusing your team. A confused team cannot sell to your ideal customers. They will distract your customers and send them down different paths because they’re all selling in a slightly different way. They’re not delivering value—they’re delivering mixed messages.
This concept can be very difficult for you as a CEO to grasp because you think everyone’s playing from the same set of plays. You think, “I have a playbook. I’ve given them all the same information.” But what they may be missing is a cohesive overarching strategy.
The Purple Problem
Let me give you the most basic example that drives this point home. Recently, my company was working to design a logo for a brand launch, and the client wanted it to incorporate purple as a big part of their brand identity.
Here’s the challenge: there are so many purples in the world. My opinion of purple is different than your opinion of purple, than the client’s opinion of purple, than what the designer thinks is purple. So if you just go with the blanket statement of “I want it to be purple,” every one of those individuals working on things in front of your client is going to be using a different purple.
You might say, “Well, of course, I will specify the purple.” But this is just a simplified way of demonstrating the larger message. Everybody has a different concept of purple. Do you want an eggplant color? Are you looking for a lavender color? Do you want something a little more pink? Do you like purple that leans blue?
If just the name of a color can throw everyone off in different directions, imagine how inconsistency in your marketing messages can happen even with the best intentions.
The Silent Exit
In a perfect world, confused customers would ask questions. But let’s face it—we don’t live in a perfect world. Most of the time, if someone doesn’t understand something, it’s very difficult for them to raise their hand and say, “This doesn’t make sense to me. Could you explain it to me?” They don’t want to admit they don’t get it because they may think, “Well, I should understand this.” So inevitably, they silently move on, and you never can recapture them. You’ve lost them.
The Strategic Umbrella Solution
The first practical step to fixing this inconsistency problem is taking a strategic view of marketing. Pulling back so you can look down on all your marketing. I love to think of it as creating a strategic umbrella because you’re not containing everything in a box—we don’t want to be in a box. But you’re having this umbrella that basically shades your brand from all the distractions and allows it to stand out and shine underneath without getting washed out in the sea of sameness or all the confusing messages out there.
We start with a strategic approach that’s integrated, meaning across all of the different kinds of marketing channels. And that is also customer-centric, meaning it’s about who your customer is and why they buy. If the hidden cost of inconsistent brand communications is that customers don’t buy, we have to build our brand communications around why they buy and how we provide solutions for them.
Painting the Picture for Your Team
Once you have established that strategic umbrella, you should ensure everyone is gathered under it and that all of their efforts are within that strategic direction for your brand.
Think about working with AI to write an email – you must provide specific parameters about style, tone, and approach. The same principle applies to your team. In essence, you have to paint the picture so they know what you need.
You also have to paint the picture for your brand’s team. You have to define that tone and style and give examples of it. Don’t leave everything to the imagination. Going back to our purple example, you have to fully define and provide examples so that you paint the picture for them and they can see and understand it the way you do.
The Cost of Confusion
The hidden cost of inconsistent brand communications isn’t just lost sales—it’s lost relationships, trust, and opportunities to connect with customers actively looking for solutions you provide. When your messaging is scattered across channels, you’re not just confusing customers but actively pushing them toward competitors.
In today’s marketplace, consistency isn’t a nice-to-have—it’s a competitive advantage. Customers are drowning in options and overwhelmed by choices. The brands that win are the ones that provide clarity, consistency, and confidence at every touchpoint.
Leave A Comment
You must be logged in to post a comment.