How to make learning about your brand FUN.

Every organization provides some level of employee education and training on their products and services. It often starts with onboarding, and hopefully continues at regular intervals. Unfortunately, we’ve learned branding isn’t often included as part of that training, unless someone is in the marketing or branding departments.

This seems a little counterintuitive, because most people in branding and marketing probably know your brand is more than your logo. For folks in other departments, the ones who may have more direct connection with customers and prospects, the logo is all they think of when they hear “brand”. They may not understand what the brand promise is, and how they play a critical role in delivering it. 

In talking with clients, we hear the lack of brand training often comes down to some combination of resources, lack of buy-in from the executive team, it’s not something that others outside the marketing department find interesting. Your brand is your most valuable asset, so it needs to be a top priority to make brand training interesting, or even better, make it FUN! Everybody knows it’s much easier to engage and educate people if they have fun in the process.

There are a lot of ways to do this. One company we know has monthly challenges between departments, and the winner gets to keep the “brand belt” (think WWE or boxing). Others are investing in technology that incorporates gamification and teambuilding, with friendly competition among product groups, departments, and regions. We think this is awesome! By using gaming as a training method, you are able to invoke people’s inner child, competitiveness, and reward their successes. It also can work for individual skill building, to give people incentives to “level-up” their knowledge. 

Whether on an individual or team basis, all of this activity is helpful when you need to find the brand champions among your teams, and when you need to show the impact or ROI of your training investment. Challenge the status quo, push for enterprise wide training, and make learning and living the brand fun for everyone! 

Schedule a time to chat if you’re interested in hearing and seeing how others are achieving success getting people engaged around their brand.