Episode 187 / Sarah Bogue / EY / Director of Brand, Marketing and Communications
Podcast: The Evolution of Brand Engagement
Sarah Bogue, Director of Brand, Marketing and Communications at EY, believes that the evolution of brand engagement can help businesses grow. She shared her insights on how to create an emotional connection with customers and employees, and how to use purpose to engage them. This is in the context of challenges of remote working, which has led to Sarah defining her Shiny New Object: the evolution of brand engagement.
In the past, brand engagement was all about getting likes and followers and sales. But now, after the pandemic, brands are focusing on their purpose and engaging people in that purpose. This is creating a more emotional connection with consumers and employees. So, how does Sarah see this actually working in practice?
Focus on the purpose of the brand and engage employees in that purpose.
Leaders should start by communicating the brand's purpose to employees. But, once they have awareness, you also need activities that help bring that purpose to life. This could include volunteering for brand-related causes, participating in company-wide brand initiatives, or sharing the brand's story with customers and prospects. By doing these things, leaders can help employees connect with the brand on a deeper level and become more engaged in its purpose.
Moreover, brand leaders should make sure that they are living and breathing the brand themselves. This means embodying the brand's values in their daily actions and decisions, and setting the example for others to follow. It also means being open to feedback and using it to improve the brand's direction. Doing this will create a strong connection between the brand and its employees, and help to create a more purpose-driven and engaged workforce.
In a remote world, the purpose of the brand is more important than ever.
Once you have a clear understanding of purpose, you can then begin to craft messages and content that will resonate with its target audience. It is also important to ensure that the brand’s purpose is reflected in its day-to-day operations, as this will help to create a more authentic and genuine connection with customers.
The brand’s purpose should be conveyed in a way that is easy for customers to understand and relate to. And it's not just about attracting customers. It's also about keeping employees engaged.
Before remote working became so prevalent, there might have been times when the human connections made in the office convinced people to stay in jobs they considered quitting. What will keep people working for your brand when they don’t have this network as readily available? Clear, true purpose that is relatable is key, according to Sarah.
Employee and brand engagement are interlinked and both vital to companies’ success.
There is a “war on talent” going on, with a recent EY survey showing that 43% of employees are considering leaving their current employer in the next 12 months. This isn’t shocking, based on the trend we’ve seen of people reconsidering their priorities post COVID. What’s interesting, however, is that people are more often considering changing jobs to find “something more exciting.” It’s not just about the pay, the status, or the benefits. It’s more about what the company stands for, and whether they’ll continue to stand for that when things are tough.
This is why outward brand engagement, where companies demonstrate how they stand by their values to their consumers, and inward employee engagement, where the values and mission of a brand are clear and engaging for its people, are merging and are more important than ever.
Listen to Sarah’s top tips for students and marketers, why she thinks engagement is crucial internally and externally, and her advice on how brands can get started on both, on the latest podcast episode here.
Transcript
The following gives you a good idea of what was said, but it’s not 100% accurate.
[Sarah Bogue]
And I think I'm really sort of if you can say falling in love again with brand engagement, we're suddenly seeing brand engagement in a different context. Right? What we're seeing now is kind of like being elevated to being much more around the purpose of the business.
[Tom Ollerton]
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Hello, and welcome to the Shiny New Object podcast. My name is Tom Ollerton. I'm the founder of Automated Creative and this is a weekly show where I have the pleasure and the privilege of interviewing one of our industry's leaders about their vision for the future. And this week is no different. I want to call with Sarah Bogue, who is director of Brand marketing and comms at EY, Denmark. So Sarah, for anyone who doesn't know who you are and what you do, can you give us a bit of an overview?
[Sarah Bogue]
I can try. I am in marketing and been mainly interested in brand, all aspects of brand my entire career. I have done B2C but have mainly been focusing on B2B and sort of the charity sector, working with high growth companies and also professional services as the main thing. I've sort of been around the spectrum. I've done everything from regular marketing to sort of employer brand to brand development, corporate brand and now I sort of have an overarching role of doing everything from brand marketing, communications, which is truly exciting, but tend to be projects which kind of needs a step change. That's what drives me.
[Tom Ollerton]
So in that interesting career, what have you learned? What advice would you give to a smart driven student who wanted to get ahead in our industry?
[Sarah Bogue]
I think absolutely that would be - be passionate about it. That is what's going to keep you going in your career when days are long, when ideas get rejected, when the pay might not be the best. I just believe that if you build your career on passion you will always find another way to succeed at any setback.
[Tom Ollerton]
So it's really lovely to hear you say that, but isn't passionate given?
[Sarah Bogue]
I'm not sure. I think there is a lot of when I speak to students nowadays. Whether that's kind of like through family or the kind of the ones I come into contact with through work or mentoring. I unfortunately also see a lot of people are still kind of like very focused on what is going to be a great career. What's going to look good in other people's eyes. What's going to make me earn lots of money and I just think that's very sort of like short term based. I really think we've much more got to get back to what are you passionate about? And I think that's why during lockdown so many people kind of like reconnected with what they're passionate about. And I think some of the job changes we're seeing is actually people completely going into a new field because they could suddenly realise, I'm spending so much time working, I want to do something I'm passionate about, but it should be a given. I agree on that.
[Tom Ollerton]
So I think it's really nice that you're saying, yeah, you should be passionate, interested about it, but you should let the passion drive you as opposed to just be like a sort of thing that trundles along in the background while you try and make yourself look good.
[Sarah Bogue]
Yeah.
[Tom Ollerton]
So that's advice for students. So what about just a straight marketing tip? What is your killer bit of advice that you share most often?
[Sarah Bogue]
Well, I think for me, if I look back on my own career, I had this amazing boss earlier on in my career and I think the one thing he gave me was to sort of like really the foundation for being curious and kind of like thinking in new ways. And he always used to say to me, can you do it another way? And I think that has sort of really helped me, leading me to one of my guiding principles, which I tried to pass on to my team members, which is what I try to say is, what will you do differently in this project or deliverable? Because I believe that if you keep it fresh, if you keep sort of just questioning yourself saying, can I do it better? Can I do it differently? And you get to test it sometimes in a very secure way, right? If you're talking about a bigger go to market marketing project or campaign and you just pick one thing, it might be there that I want to measure something differently or I want to try a new tactic. I think then you can innovate in a secure and safe way for a lot of people because I think there are many people who are so afraid of failure nowadays that you kind of got to encourage people to be curious, is there a better way of doing this?
[Tom Ollerton]
It really reminds me of a book which I can't remember the name, but they have this innovation principle called the adjacent possible, which is basically, I think living organisms do this, they just sort of try the next available thing. It's not like a huge leap, it's just like a slight change in the process of evolution and it's similar. I think what you're saying is, okay, so we're going to do a paid search campaign again, right? Yeah, we all know how that works, but what could we do differently, ever so slightly differently. And then over time you think, oh, where were we six months ago? Where were we twelve months ago? And you've actually taken these huge leaps that look like these huge innovative leaps. In fact, all you've really done is taken small steps. So I've forgotten all about that. So thanks for bringing that back.
[Sarah Bogue]
Yeah, because I think exactly, you're making the point there. Right. Because that is what happens when you're done and one year out or one and a half year out, you look back then when you accumulate all of those little changes and those tests and tries, and not all of them are going to be successes, but it was enough to move you even further within what you're trying to reach. So yeah, I've got to read that book. I haven't read it.
[Tom Ollerton]
Oh, it'll come to me, but I love the idea of striving for different and arriving at better because if you're like, I'm going to do it better every time, then you can make yourself miserable, but if you like low bars, I'm going to do it differently. Then through failing and winning, you'll arrive at better.
[Sarah Bogue]
Less pressure. Right. Instead of always saying to people, what are you going to do better? I think people will have this fear of failure then. Right. Whereas I think if you use different and it just kind of expands people's mindset a bit.
[Tom Ollerton]
This episode of the Shiny New Object podcast is brought to you in partnership with MADfest. Whether it's live in London or streamed online to the global marketing community, you can always expect a distinctive and daring blend of fast paced content, startup, innovation, pictures and unconventional entertainment from MADfest events. You'll find me causing trouble on stage recording live versions of this podcast and sharing a beer with the nicest and most influential people in marketing. Check it out at www.madfestlondon.com. So your shiny new object is the evolution of brand engagement. So I think I know what that means, but can you give the listeners of the podcast an overview of what that is and why it's your Shiny New Object?
[Sarah Bogue]
Absolutely. As I said, my career, I've sort of like been through different kind of brand positions and I think I'm really sort of, if you can say falling in love again with brand engagement. And I think a big part of it is what we're experiencing now past sort of like the pandemic. Is that why I think it's the evolution of brand engagement, is that we're suddenly seeing brand engagement in a different context, right? It used to be earlier on it was about how are you engaging your customers, how are you going to get more followers, how are you going to get sales more? All of these things. But what we're seeing now is now it's kind of like being elevated to being much more around the purpose of the business, right? That's the brand, that's where you're going, that's your guiding principle. And now it's really around engaging people in that purpose. And for me, that is much more of an emotional connection we're seeing for people now, both people who buy different brands, but also when you look at employees who are connecting to the purpose of their own business, that sort of brand engagement, that emotional connection is what I think makes it super exciting for people in brand. Like, what's going to happen now? Suddenly we're back, we're top of the agenda. Or definitely should be coming top of the agenda.
[Tom Ollerton]
So help me understand this a little better. So you talked about the time when likes arrived in advertising, no idea what it was. And it was all about getting likes and followers and it was like, oh God, that's really important. And we've obviously moved past that now. Are you saying that the evolution of brand engagement is when a brand has a true purpose, then that engages its followers in an emotional way? Have I got that right?
[Sarah Bogue]
Yeah, I think so. And then I think some of it comes from if we take like the whole pandemic and COVID. Right. I think what's sort of like happening is we all suddenly had to learn so much in such a short span of time, right? Like it was amazing to see how everyone around the world adjusted, like within days, weeks, we suddenly found new ways of doing things. But when we look at the sort of prolonged period of time that a lot of us had to work from home or work in a different way and so on, it also kind of suddenly makes us reevaluate everything. We start looking at our lives. And a bit like I said, somebody during COVID has discovered that knitting was their true calling and now that's what they want to go on and do. But I also think we suddenly, when we were stripped of everything, of all the busyness around us and so on, we also had an opportunity to kind of like really reconnect with what matters the most to me at this stage, at this stage in my life, where I am in my career, where I am as a partner, a spouse, a parent, whatever it is. And I think when you get those moments where you get to reconnect with that sense, I think purpose suddenly becomes so important for people. And then what happens is when we then start looking and things start speeding up, we're suddenly looking to where am I spending my time in the day while at work? And I think suddenly you started looking to your company and saying, okay, but what are we about, what is this company about? Is that doing something that I truly believe in? Is it doing something where I feel I am contributing and it gives me meaning. I think we really kind of needed to find that sense of meaning in all of this. And that's why I think it's becoming much more important because it's also becoming a deciding factor, is my belief, in the sort of whole war that is going on around talent at the moment. Right. It's dark stats we're seeing like at the moment there was just a big survey that came out where, E&Y actually did it, the Reimagining work survey, where there was like 43% are kind of considering saying I'm expecting to leave my current employer within the next twelve months. I don't think we've ever seen these high numbers. We talk about the great recognition and so on but I think a part of it is that we have now been working from home. We've had lots of people who changed job during the pandemic. And I think when you're joining a new company and you're not sort of like being in the office or whatever your work environment is, but the kind of like when you're there in person you're connecting with people, you kind of like get this team chemistry bonding, you're there for each other. That sort of whole team spirit. When you're kind of removing that and people are little satellites, right? We're connecting virtually which is much more difficult even on a kind of like a physical level. We don't have those like we don't mirror each other's body language in the same way and kind of like have that shared chemistry. I just think it becomes difficult to feel that sense of belonging being as strong because I think we all kind of like look back in our careers. There would have been moments where to be frank, the dream job was no longer a dream job but the team we worked with was such a great team that we stayed just a little bit longer just because of that. And I think when you take that equation out of it and you put people much more in remote working or hybrid working models as we're seeing now, where some time is spent at home and sometimes with the team, then suddenly it's different factors that becomes important. Then suddenly we're seeing there's much more focus on what's my package going to be like, where am I getting a better salary? Like it's also some quite stark stats around that 40% of employees globally are set to quit jobs and search for better pay. And I think once you start having those things combined with a trend that we see very much expressed in younger generations but I actually think for all of us is where we used to quit our job because we were unhappy, we were dissatisfied, we didn't like our boss. But I don't think that's where we are any longer. Now people are quitting their job because there is something more exciting out there. So I think if you look at it in real marketing terms, I kind of think we're going from a situation where we used to have kind of like a push in the sort of the workforce. Now it's kind of like much more pull, it's something pulling us because it's much more exciting. So I actually think that's what's creating this change and why purpose becomes much more important because now we have to feel that there is a greater meaning to it and purpose has been brought to the top for the mind of people because we got reminded of what really matters to us in past COVID.
[Tom Ollerton]
So it sounds like you're talking about employee engagement as opposed to brand engagement. So help me understand that.
[Sarah Bogue]
Exactly, yeah, and I think there is absolutely an overlap between the two because that's what happens right when you engage the people who work for you. Isn't that employee engagement? But this is where I think when you focus on the purpose of the company, of the brand, what do you stand for in the market? That for me is the difference in this. Whereas I think you can have people who are super motivated who love going to work, but it might be other deciding factors of why their engagement is really high. It may not necessarily be because of the brand or the purpose of the business. And I think that's where there's a slight distinction between the two of them. Does that make sense?
[Tom Ollerton]
Yes, it does. This is really stretching me to get my head around, it's brilliant. So I love the argument that in a remote world where we don't have the same camaraderie and physical closeness and all that kind of stuff, that the purpose of the brand, what it stands for, what its mission is, is really valuable. Now, I am jaded and skeptical about that because I've been in so many of those meetings and some of the companies that I've worked for where it's been like, right, this is a slide that has our mission, this is a slide that has our purpose, this is a slide that has our values. And it's like, yeah, cool, all right. So our value is like being honest or something. And you're like cool, right? Yeah, okay. And it's almost like a company song. Like someone has written a company song, no one's ever going to listen to it or sing it or god forbid, put it on a playlist. Right, but that's my cynical me. So help me understand how you get past that because what you're saying makes so much sense.
[Sarah Bogue]
And to be frank, I don't think you're cynical. I think what you're expressing is exactly I think it was the who was it? It was like the Journal of Brand Management or something like that that came out with this stats saying actually 40% of employees struggle to describe what their organization brand is or how they think that customers feel about their organization being different. And that is exactly it. Right. I think we've kind of forgotten and like you're saying is that thing wasn't it just a slide we all saw on day one when we joined and that was it. But I think what's happening now is that people are noticing, not people, sorry, companies, businesses are noticing that you can't get away. You have got to truly mean it. That's the difference I think we as consumers and therefore also as employees, we don't take the same bullshit anymore, right? It's not just a pretty advertising. We want to know, do you mean it's for real? Is it authentic? Is it kind of like your guiding principle? Are you still going to do it when it's going to cost you? I think we saw after the war in Ukraine and everyone kind of like pulling out of Russia and the sort of like the lash back from consumers and so on and even employees in some of the organizations, they expected companies to do the right thing. And I think that's what it really is like, I think companies have also realized we got to kind of get to the inner layer of the onion, right? What is our brand DNA. What is it that we are standing for? What is our purpose? What is it that we want to be known for? What is it that is guiding every decision we make every day? I think that's the first step and I think a lot of companies, I think the whole purpose driven organization, we've absolutely seen it booming over several years now. But I think the next layer is now. How do you then go from that kind of like establishing a clear purpose, which in my mind also becomes a very clear brand for a company often, from going from establishing that to then how do you get your own people and obviously also your customers and so on to understand this is what we stand for all the time. I think that is the journey that some companies are still struggling with. They are still struggling with how do I do it? And I think even in this when I say I love the evolution of brand engagement, I think there's still a vast potential for companies to get much better at it, right? To get much better at also understanding all of this, that is not just about how can you use your brand or you purpose of the business to attract and retain talent, but you kind of got to think one step further, how can you use it to engage and excite people? And those people hopefully will be your employees, but they might also be potential employees or alumni. They have previously worked for you, that go out and still advocate for you. And I think that's the journey that a lot of businesses are on currently going to that. How do we communicate it, how do we make every touch point, reflect what we truly stand for? And that I think is the journey that companies are on at the moment. I don't think very many really nailed it yet, to be quite frank. I think some still they talk about it and they get you this is our purpose and some are much better at living it, right? And we all know that we often see it with very entrepreneurial brands that's kind of grown big, but because they kind of like sprung out of that purpose because there was somebody who wanted to change something, they often have a very strong sense of purpose. That where employees and customers found it much easier to say. They are standing for this and they wouldn't put up with that. So I don't think you're skeptical. I just think it's the kind of changes we're seeing currently in the market and in business.
[Tom Ollerton]
Unfortunately, we've got to leave it there. So you've asked a lot of questions, certainly of me and the way I work for automated creative, and thank you for that, but I'm sure there's going to be other people who are going to want to get a lot deeper than this. So where would you like people to get in touch with you and what makes a great outreach message to you?
[Sarah Bogue]
Well, definitely like on LinkedIn, luckily there's not a lot of Sarah Bogues that should be fairly easy to find there. And I try to always be nice and kind of like respond to people, but I think if anyone knows me, I'm not the biggest fan of email. So anyone who opens with, I know you don't like email, so I sent you an IM instead, definitely got my thing, but it can be anything. I just think anyone who gets in touch with me, who is bold, who's got something curious to say, I think that's really what wins me over. But I would love to hear from someone else. Love to hear if somebody is seeing the evolution of brand engagement differently.
[Tom Ollerton]
Brilliant. That is a great brief for hopefully a lot of really useful messages. Sarah, thank you so much for your time.
[Sarah Bogue]
Thank you for having me.
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