Monica Cost works to help companies and entrepreneurs build their brands. She provides insight into brand building in her book, The Things I Used to Do to Sneeze.
During the National Urban League Conference, Cost moderated a panel discussion on the importance of brand building. She also revealed how companies can be damaged by “brand busters.” Brand busters are mistakes that business owners can make that can destroy their reputations.
Cost spoke with rolling out and provided tips on how business owners can rebuild their reputation.
How can companies use social media to brand themselves in business?
You have to be authentic and understand who you are. Social media is a great way to build your brand. You should only tweet, Instagram and Facebook things that relate to who are with your brand. But you have to utilize social media in a way that will not tarnish your brand. What you post will be out there forever.
Some businesses make terrible mistakes that can work against their brand. How can business owners bounce back?
Some people make mistakes with their brand and I call them “brand busters.” When you have a brand buster, it takes about 50 unique interactions in order to recover. The goal is to not be discouraged by the brand buster. You have to dig in, find out what went wrong, apologize if you need to and make efforts to not let it happen again.
