People Buy People: Invest in Your Brand Ambassadors

Clearly in today’s skeptical environment, people buy people long before they buy products or services.”
~Richard Weylman, Business Consultant

Imagine a prospective consumer approaching your mobile marketing booth at a sporting event. He has never heard of your brand or product before but he is curious. After seeing your branded messaging and experiencing the interactive elements, and perhaps even sampling the product, he would like more information so he approaches one of your brand ambassadors…

This is when you need to know that you have educated, happy, quality staff out in the field representing your brand. Sometimes agencies broker out brand ambassador (BA) staffing and do not get involved in their training. This creates knowledge gaps and unneeded layers of interference between your branded message and the people who will deliver this message. If you are familiar with the child’s game called “telephone” then you understand how easy it is for misunderstandings to occur.

When you work with BEYOND Experiential you cut out the middle man, giving you on-demand control and knowledge that your branded message will be delivered by an experienced and knowledgeable staff. We are there with you through every element of your mobile branding activation from start to finish and we work directly with your staff of tour teams. We are even out on the field to provide personal one-on-one training and support to our bonded and trained staff of experienced BA’s. You want to make sure that the people delivering your branded message are the type of people your consumer will relate to, and that they have the knowledge to back up your message. Our 100% support policy guarantees that we will do all we can to ensure your branded message is represented and delivered to your standards.

Your brand ambassadors are sometimes your first point of contact between your brand or product and a potential consumer.  That potential consumer is more likely to “buy” the brand ambassador’s enthusiasm, knowledge, and personality before he even thinks of buying your product. When your BA’s are well educated and supported, when they feel a sense of ownership, they will deliver your message with pride and exuberance. We at BEYOND Experiential understand this and we strive to train your BA’s in the proper representation of your brand along with an educated overview of your brand or product so that your team can provide great basic customer service in person on behalf of your brand right there out on the field. Support is the other key factor here, making sure your team is educated is only half of it. Making sure they are taken care of out there is the final piece.

This is a very important factor to consider when booking travel and accommodation arrangements for your traveling team; and if you are working through an agency it would be in your best interest to ensure that the people representing Your brand are supported to your standards. Not to suggest splurging on four-star resorts, but try to find a smart balance between location and accommodation quality. As a rule avoid a “day-of fly-in-fly-out” situation that would have your team arriving in the early hours, working a full time day including set-up and break-down, and then leaving that same  night; the savings to expense will poorly reflect on the physical performance of your team, which will be forever associated with your brand. After all, a well rested and well supported team is a happy team. But this is also smart business sense in several other ways, as one example; in a busy city like New York, even a few blocks further away from your mobile marketing activation can mean up to an hour or more in traffic which can cause costly delays, including the loss of public use permits. And, keep in mind that staying in a different section of the city could add even longer commute time plus toll fees. So, though it might be tempting to book that cheap hotel in Queens when your team needs to be in Times Square at 8am with a huge truck, trust us it isn’t worth it. We’ve been there.

Many companies find that with the few bucks they saved when they booked their team in a cheap hotel further away, in the end they were left with an exhausted and resentful team who was the only communication between the brand and the consumer. You can imagine the lackluster experience this presented that agency’s client’s brand, can you imagine how much potential business may have been lost because of this oversight? This is a hard lesson learned, and worse yet sometimes there are so many layers that the brand’s own company has no idea how poorly they are being represented by their BA’s due to a lack of support from the agency. Sadly, we’ve seen it time and time again. We get it because we’ve been there too; when you are in the office working with an out-of-house agency, the last thing on your mind is the level of support your BA’s will receive while they are out in the field. Surprisingly more often than not, this factor isn’t even covered in lesser contracts. With BEYOND Experiential you can rest assured that our vetted and professional team will be out there, happily delivering your brand’s message direct to your target market.