Improv and making your brand values real

The Marketing Society blog links to an interesting short video by Rob Poynton from On Your Feet. In it, he describes a technique from improvisational theatre designed to help make brand values more authentic. It as the wonderful name, Fast Food Stanislavsky.

In the video, Rob talks about looking for real-life examples of the value in action – and the emphasis is on action – what people actually do that exhibits the value in question.

This is such a critical distinction.

Increasingly a customer's default position will be to treat what you say with at best cynicism and at worst it will be to think you are downright lying to get their business. Talk is cheap. It's what you do that matters.

This is obviously most visible in the service you provide, how you treat customers. But it is also important in how you communicate. If one of your values is openness/honesty/integrity then this has a direct impact on what and how you communicate (even through to your tone of voice).

The video is embedded below.