Balanced Brand: How to Balance the Stakeholder Forces That Can Make or Break Your Business - Hardcover

by John Foley (Author), Julie Kendrick (Author)

Companies usually assume if their sales are good, then their brand and reputation must be strong. But all too often, they don't have a clear understanding of the values that drive brand and reputation and actually sustain long-term profitability and growth. This leaves companies vulnerable to dangerous backlash between corporate values, and those of their stakeholders: customers, employees, shareholders, media, government, and community. Even well-known and seemingly successful brands and reputations have suffered from this backlash (e.g. Nike and overseas sweatshops, Wal-Mart and unfair employment practices, McDonald's and obesity issues.) Every stakeholder applies their personal and professional values to judge the performance of a company. Branding expert John Foley has developed the BalancedBrand System, which helps companies assess corporate values, identify potential flashpoints, and align values to build a stronger brand and reputation. BalancedBrand identifies and helps manage the forces that will change the way business does business. Foley and co-author Julie Kendrick have created new tools that build and protect brands and reputations.

Front Jacket

More than 62 million people watched the presidential debates. Amazingly half the country selectively heard one message while the other half heard something completely different. What made the difference were the personal values people used to filter and interpret what they saw and heard. Values are what drive behavior in politics, commerce, and your business.

Successful companies often assume that if sales are good, then their branding must be effective. They often pay little attention to what actually sustains their brand and reputation, leaving them vulnerable to dangerous backlash if a rift develops between their values and those of their stakeholders.

Every stakeholder--customers, employees, shareholders, and community members--plays a role in the overall success of a company. When corporate values are out of alignment with stakeholder values, trouble is right around the corner. In this groundbreaking book, branding expert John Foley shows how to understand and effectively respond to the needs of each stakeholder group, emphasizing reputation in balance with brand to avoid damaging misalignment between them. Balanced Brand provides tools for identifying potential backlash flashpoints and for designing internal and external communication strategies for projecting appropriate values.

This important resource is based on years of research, including interviews with senior managers who struggle with the challenges of foreign competition, outsourcing, and the relentless cycle of reducing costs while adding value to compete in a global market. The book delivers the systems and tools to assess and align corporate values with stakeholder values. Using these guidelines, companies will have a new way to manage stakeholders that results in building and protecting a strong brand and a strong reputation. The competitive advantages created by Balanced Brand can help any company--no matter how large or small--succeed.

Author Biography

John Foley is the founder of the brand agency The Foley Group. His agency has been providing strategic brand planning, advertising, and public relations since 1986 for organizations including Ameriprise Financial, Cargill, Caterpillar, Coca-Cola USA, Hazelden, Lawson, 3M, Tiffany & Co., United Healthcare, and the University of Minnesota.
In addition, he is Chief Executive Officer of BALANCEDBRAND LLC, which provides values-based brand and reputation consultation in the United States and the United Kingdom. Foley is currently on the boards of the Carlson Brand Enterprise at the University of Minnesota, the Minnesota chapter of American Association of Advertising Agencies, the Design Institute, and the Reputation Institute.

Julie Kendrick is a business writer with expertise in the area of motivation and performance improvement. Her client list includes Fortune 100 companies in the areas of automotive manufacturing, pharmaceutical and medical device manufacturing, and telecommunications.