Great minds have always been aware of the importance and fragility of reputation. Benjamin Franklin wrote “It takes many good deeds to build a good reputation and only one bad one to lose it”. Hundreds of years later, Warren Buffet noted “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and 5 minutes to ruin it”. Hard to argue with a Father of this Country and the Oracle of Omaha. So it should come as no surprise that a majority of companies view brand reputation as important. Let’s explore what that means.

Brand reputation is the image of the business that exists in buyers’ minds based on what they hear, see and experience relative to your brand. In truth it consists of 2 parts: an internal component and an external component. Internal elements are wholly within the control of a company. External elements are not. The internal element is Brand Messaging. The external component consists of all the other things buyers see, hear and experience that influence their perception of a brand.

Brand messaging includes a company’s logo, tagline, mission, values, vision, goals, and priorities. The effectiveness of Brand Messaging is gauged by resonance with buy needs and competitive differentiation. Brand Messaging is in effect the promises businesses make through the aforementioned elements as well as key marketing campaign assets and other marketing materials. It is important that these promises match what buyers seek.

Differentiation is the process that helps buyers distinguish your company from competitors and give them a compelling reason to select you. Sadly, only one in four stakeholders can discern differences between competing brands[1]. This means that unless you set your brand reputation apart, prospective customers won’t likely remember them or may even confuse them with competitors. Despite the low percentage, differentiation is not the most challenging of Brand Reputation elements.

Credibility is the most difficult element of brand reputation to evaluate if for no other reason than it relies entirely on how buyers view your brand. In the software industry, a business’s credibility depends largely on what users have to say about specific software products and services. Reviews lie at the heart of business credibility:

• 50% of B2B buyers consider Peer Reviews to be critical to the purchasing process.
• 92% of B2B buyers are more likely to purchase a product or service if they have read a trusted review about it.
• Online reviews can increase a company’s conversion rates by as much as 270%
• User Reviews are considered More Trustworthy & Influential than the vast majority of information sources[2]

· Reviews from industry peers can validate (or conversely invalidate) features and benefits referenced in marketing and sales collateral.

To evaluate your Credibility begin by looking at reviews on third-party websites. Comb through competitors’ company media profiles to find customer reviews. Explore any product reviews published by third-party media outlets. If you discover you do not have market credibility (i.e. no reviews), you should prioritize building an enterprise peer review program from scratch. The silver lining to that cloud is that if neither you or your competitors have an enterprise peer review program, you have an opportunity to be first to market and gain that all important competitive advantage.

This is Part 1 of our series on Enterprise Peer Review Programs. You can read Part 2: Enterprise Peer Review Programs: Ready or Not. Here They Come starting Thursday January 6, 2022.

Mathew Mandeltort
Co-Founder
ChefWorthy, LLC
www.ChefWorthy.pro
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[1] https://www.gartner.com/en/digital-markets/insights/brand-reputation-audit

[2] Trust Radius, 2021 B2B Buying Disconnect