The Fast and the Furious

By: Nathalie Schooling

Are your delivery vehicles putting your brand on the fast lane to disaster?

There is so much more to the customer experience than a smile and a friendly greeting. The way your customer perceives your business or brand is affected by every part of their experience with it – from the appeal of your shop signage and the warmth of the welcome they get, to the attentiveness of your staff and, even, the ease of opening any product packaging involved.

So, when you consider how much money goes into building a brand, it still amazes me that so little is invested in protecting its value. Delivery vehicles are a prime example.

As mobile advertising boards, a vehicle fleet offers a unique opportunity to get your brand, product or service out on the street. But while painting your vehicles in bright colours will surely catch the eye of other motorists, there is the potential for this mobile marketing campaign to backfire – and end up doing more harm than good to your brand, and your bottom line.

That’s because there are few places where emotions run higher than on the roads of South Africa. Poor long-term city planning, combined with largely ineffective public transport systems, means there are a lot of drivers experiencing a lot of frustration – most with no way of blowing off the copious amount of steam that builds up when much of every rush hour is spent at boiling point behind the wheel.

Within this environment, a badly driven company vehicle can easily become a much-needed scapegoat on which frustrated drivers will unleash their anger. And if that vehicle carries your brand, you shouldn’t underestimate the damage that can result.

On the flipside, having vehicles on the road can be a massive brand-building boost. Not just as a result of the advertising they carry, but also because they can help foster a positive perception of your entire business, simply by being driven considerately.

The point is every employee in your business, including its drivers, should be an ambassador and customer experience champion. But until they include a brand building section in the South African commercial driver’s license test, educating your drivers about this customer experience element of their job description is entirely up to you.

And given the obvious ineffectiveness of the stick method in changing driver behaviour, maybe carrots are what are called for. Imagine, for instance, the difference it could make if your drivers knew they would be rewarded for compliments instead of disciplined for complaints. Or if they understood that their good driving habits can have a direct positive impact on the business’ bottom line – and that this could actually translate into a financial benefit for them at year end.

In the end, it’s not really important how businesses get their drivers to understand that they are brand ambassadors, it is just vital that they do. Not just because it will make the rest of us feel safer on the road, but also because it could make their customers feel a lot more positive about doing business with them. Which is a really logical way to drive profitability.