Why Cult Branding is Important
When a person first hears the term Cult Branding, there are two basic responses. Understandably, some might be put off by the term “cult” which rightly has negative connotations. Second, if they are a marketer, they often get excited about the idea.
Who is a Cult Brand? Sure, there are some easy answers that might come to mind: Apple, Oprah, Harley-Davidson, and Star Trek, to name to a few. (Review a list of Cult Branding profiles here.) But these appear to be anomalies more than anything else.
The small business owner might say, “Yeah, that’s great for them, but I’m a little shop. I can’t create that kind of a customer loyalty.” A valid concern, but not necessarily true.
The chief-level marketer of a Fortune 500 company might say, “We’re a global brand with mass market appeal. We can’t just cater to a small group. We’ll lose market share.” A valid point, but again, not necessarily true.
The important take-away from Cult Branding, as the concept’s originator BJ Bueno often notes is that great brands serve their customers better than anyone else. Any business can learn the principles that Cult Brands live by and adopt whatever principles seem appropriate in their context.
As BJ explains, “We must recognize that brands don’t belong to marketers. Brands belong to the customer. The customer’s embrace is the only vote that counts, yet it is constantly ignored by strategies that place our products and services as the ‘goal’ rather than the means to satisfy our customer’s needs, wishes, and fantasies.”
Cult Brands actually uphold a higher level of integrity by focusing on the needs of those who support and grow their business: their best customers (or what we call, Brand Lovers).
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Cult branding makes your customer loyal towards your brand. It doesn’t matter if you run a small retail store or a fortune company. In India, customer has tendency to ask for extra discount from retailers- a kind of personal touch and usually they round off the total price. This personal touch is not with retail chain stores. So, a customer will prefer to go to local small retailer than those big stores. Take an example of Vodafone and Airtel. If I am using Vodafone from long and satisfied with the services, in that case I wont switch over to Airtel or any other mobile service provider unless Vodafone is not present in that region.