The Key to Driving Brand Preference: Genuinely Care  

13 May 2025 Reading Time: 4 minutes

by June Holder:

Our small group was gathered in a circle. We had just completed an hour-long walk in the snowy woods behind Walking Mountains Science Center in Avon, Colorado. Tayler, our nature guide, had asked each group member to share what they liked best about the experience. She then asked a question that shook my world.

“Did you feel cared for?”

Right there, standing in the snow, Tayler led us to the center of the universe.

The Heart of the Matter

Brand preference can be a powerful determinant of whether a customer chooses your product/service or someone else’s.

A positive perception is a key factor in creating preference for your brand.  Customers want to be assured that an organization understands, values, and will be successful at meeting their needs. In essence, they want to feel cared for.

Over time, brand preference can deepen into brand loyalty. Achieving the level of trust associated with brand loyalty requires a consistent and continuous supply of positive experiences. Even further, the intention of creating positive experiences must also be clear.

Communications can provide the bridge, proof, and reinforcement of that intention.

Doing the “right things” isn’t enough. Organizations need to understand their customers well enough to be able to tell them in just the right way that they are important. Both of these components – doing and telling – need to be in sync. One without the other is nearly a guarantee of failure.

The message and actions need to continuously reinforce positive perception.

Chewy is a company with the mission of being “the most trusted and convenient destination for pet parents and partners, everywhere.” Chewy doesn’t just sell products. Every action, every message, reflects their heart-centered intention. Chewy customers receive “handwritten” holiday cards, highly personalized messages of support, even handcrafted paintings of their pets. They’ve been known to send flowers to bereaved pet owners. Every social post from Chewy’s corporate  profile reflects a love of pets in total alignment with their customers.

By continuously communicating in multiple formats, Chewy has built a reservoir of positive experiences that help to strengthen their brand. There is a mountain of evidence documenting their good intentions, much of it shared by customers in personal stories. By being authentic and staying the course, Chewy has created momentum to overcome slip-ups that would cause lesser companies to spiral downward. Should they ever have an issue, their reputation would support their potential for a full recovery.

Every Touchpoint Matters

Corporate messaging needs to align with a company’s value and values. Every touchpoint has the potential to support or change the narrative. This poses a significant challenge for many reasons.

Before social media, corporations were able to control their message channels to a large degree, with communications professionals determining where, when, and how to show up. As social media emerged, many large organizations initially prohibited employees from posting about the company. Over time, it became clear that containment was impossible. Companies jumped on the bandwagon to encourage employees to share positive experiences. What they didn’t grasp was that employees who had negative experiences were far more worked up, and far more likely to share their thoughts, than those who had positive or neutral experiences.

The same dynamics apply to customers.\

Many organizations have responded to the risk of negative social posts by ramping up the volume and frequency on positive messaging. The resulting flood of content has turned social channels into crowded, noisy, exhausting experiences of total blah-blah-blah.

To counteract this, many companies engage and position individuals to help rise above the din. These leading voices may include company leaders, paid or “encouraged” influencers, or other people with a following that can help cut through to a target audience. Among the reasons why this approach is used – spokespeople help to humanize a corporate message. Beneath it all, they are being positioned to create a sense of caring.

What Goes Up …

While individuals can be powerful messengers, when a brand becomes linked with an individual both parties take on a huge amount of risk. Even the greatest due diligence can be insufficient when every action is scrutinized, and past mistakes can surface in a moment’s time. When brands fail, the individuals can get pulled into the vortex that is created. When individuals fall from grace, the impact ripples with lightning speed across any brands they represent.

Even worse – customers can be pulled into the crossfire.

We’re seeing this play out in real time right now. As Tesla drivers find themselves in the frightening situation of becoming targets as a result of the actions of the company’s owner and lead voice, their purchasing decision has become weaponized. In a dramatic pivot from feeling cared for to feeling blindsided, Tesla customers are suddenly finding themselves entrenched in a PR nightmare with political underpinnings. While the situation is still in early stages, it’s a safe bet that there will be a significant amount of reputation repair needed by the organization over the coming years.

Getting Personal: A safer bet? Not necessarily.

Personalized messaging offers the luxury of focusing on the target customer, rather than the bearer of the message. When done well, personalization enables meaningful messages at meaningful moments. The objective is to make customers feel understood, supported, and appreciated enough to drive desired results.

But much like an overzealous suitor, personalization can overstep.

As a communications professional, I’m aware of how much data is being churned behind the scenes. I know if I abandon an online shopping cart, I will receive a text prompting me to complete my transaction, even if I hadn’t provided my phone number while I was engaging with the interface. If it rains or snows or gets hot or cold outside, I will surely receive promotions based on geotargeting and behavioral science. If I search for something, a ripple of other items that have been identified by some data source as being relevant will appear online.

While I know that a vast amount of data about me is available to the businesses that target me, when too much information about me is presented in a promotional message it just feels creepy. Even more so when the algorithm is based on incorrect information, which seems to be increasingly the case.

The Power of Humanity

So how exactly can communicators create the experience of care that will connect with customers?

It comes down to finesse. Thoughtfulness. Respect. Qualities that AI hasn’t mastered (yet). Taking a moment to think about what someone on the receiving end of a message or campaign will experience. Truly understanding the role that the product/service can play in supporting the customer. Considering the situation from the perspective of, “What will be most helpful here?” rather than, “How can we get this customer to do what we want?”

And above all, asking the question, “Did you feel cared for?”

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June Holder is a communications strategist and storyteller with extensive experience in identifying business challenges and opportunities, crafting and deploying integrated communications strategies, and delivering innovative solutions that produce lasting results. June is a #WeLeadComms honoree and is based in Atlanta.

Written by: Editor