If you and I have had the opportunity to speak for any time at all, then you know that I am not a trained safety and compliance professional. It’s something I admit to without hesitation. That said, my passion for safe, responsibly-sourced promotional and consumer products comes from my work as an end-user with responsibility for a reasonably-sized corporate enterprise program. The corporation I worked for is a tire manufacturer with premium product positioning and a worldwide footprint. What the company didn’t need from promotional products was to be held liable for product failure in an instance where it didn’t even manufacture the product. In my role, I took my fiduciary responsibility, to the company and to our customers, seriously. The last thing I wanted personally was to be the reason that my internal marketing clients ran, with their hair on fire, to purchase gift cards to incentivize consumers instead of relying on promotional products because they felt as if could no longer trust them to safely deliver the message. Needless to say, the bar was set high for that Top 50 distributor who supplied the bulk of the product to our company, and I believe the bar has understandably remained high for the one that does now.
Since you now know where I’m coming from, you’ll understand why I think helping protect your client’s brand should be woven into very fabric of your business relationship with them. Your job as a “brand protector” is to alert them to potential risks inherent in sourcing from dangerous product categories. It is incumbent upon you to keep them abreast of recent recalls in categories they are interested in sourcing, and direct them away from risk and the potential expense and loss of goodwill from product failures. The phrase “value-added selling” has been over-used and may be a little frayed at the edges, but I can’t think of a better value a trusted vendor partner can provide than helping guard a client’s hard-earned reputation.
You’ve also probably noticed that the client you are helping protect is likely getting younger. As more and more Millennials become corporate purchasers and managers of marketing budgets, the more they bring their unique personal sensibilities into conversations with you. In some instances, this might mean their idea of being protected from risk may be a little different than what you have in mind. When forming and building relationships with a new generation of buyers, make sure to listen a lot, and spend time getting to know them so that you can know and understand the things that are important to them personally. Once you have a clear understanding of not only their business goals, but also their unique perspective on what is important to them as individuals and as buyers of promotional products, you’ll be able to make suggestions and help guide them in a way that is both safe and fruitful for you both.
Morning Consult, a brand intelligence company that combines exclusive survey research data with social media, news, and economic data, recently conducted a survey on what drives the purchasing habits of Millennials. Just like the companies this generation wants to work for, they expect to purchase from companies that take a stand for corporate responsibility. In an introduction to the report, Michael Ramlet, the founder and CEO of Morning Consult, mentions the focus on value. “Crucially, Millennials expect more from brands. From the shoes they wear to the coffee they Instagram, brand choices are increasingly used to project values in public and online, elevating the need for brands themselves to be value-conscious”. For far too many in the promo industry, the words “value” and “cheap” are almost interchangeable. Have you been bringing “value-add” or just representing the “cheapest price” to your clients lately?
The survey is an interesting read, and you should note that there are some conflicting results. For example, it finds that you can not assume that every Millennial is cause-aware. Just 25% of Millennials say they’ll buy goods or services from companies that they know have labor practices they don’t support. At the same time, only 29% say they avoid buying from companies with different political positions from their own, a bit of a dichotomy.
As the report says, “support for civil and gay rights are the least controversial political positions brands can take”. A brand that proclaims its support for civil rights is 56% net positive, gay rights positive 31%, while gun control elicits an 18% positive reaction. We’ve seen what the results of a manufacturer taking a particular stand on gun control can be, with the NRA blowing up YETI coolers and then YETI calling the NRA statements “inaccurate” on their Facebook page saying they had not severed ties with them by policy, just simply eliminated old discounts for both the NRA and other organizations.
The survey also ranks key words that your Millennial client may find important over some others when describing product value and I have to admit, there were some that surprised me. The top words or phrases Millennials associate with the brands they like are “well-priced given the quality,” “reliable,” “high quality,” “trustworthy,” and “loyal to customers”. All of those appeared in the survey ahead of “fair-minded,” “ethical,” “moral,” and “transparent”. It scares me a little that “safe” didn’t make the list at all, how about you?
Jeff Jacobs has been an expert in building brands and brand stewardship for 40 years, working in commercial television, Hollywood film and home video, publishing, and promotional brand merchandise. He’s a staunch advocate of consumer product safety and has a deep passion and belief regarding the issues surrounding compliance and corporate social responsibility. He retired as executive director of Quality Certification Alliance, the only non-profit dedicated to helping suppliers provide safe and compliant promotional products. Before that, he was director of brand merchandise for Michelin. You can find him volunteering as a Guardian ad Litem, traveling the world with his lovely wife, or enjoying a cigar at his favorite local cigar shop. Connect with Jeff on Twitter, LinkedIn, or Instagram, or reach out to him at jacobs.jeffreyp@gmail.com.