A firm’s corporate identity refers to how clients recognize the firm, and how its partners and vendors perceive the firm. Corporate identity helps firms to bolster their credibility. Stockholders feel their investment is secure when the firm maintains consistent and constructive business identity. Developing a corporate identity is a process that takes time and involves various issues. It is important for firms to recognize issues that they will be dealing with when developing their corporate identities and create a plan for working through the issues.
Copycats
One of the issues in corporate identity is that of copycats. A successful business identity attracts copycats who think they can get instant success by copying the corporate image of the successful firm. Developing a successful marketing image for marketing your business is a process that can take years to complete. Less reputable firms can try to copy your corporate image and make business from you while damaging your reputation. To prevent copycats from stealing your business identity, have your business-marketing image trademarked with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. A trademark allows you to have legal preference over images that make up your business identity and allows you to sue companies that copy your image in court.
Scandals
A strong business identity can help your company overcome public scandals. In some cases, public scandals can arise out of issues that you have no control over including customers who misuse your products and sue you for damages. While the customer may be in the wrong, such an issue will still damage your corporate image. Companies that maintain strong corporate identities can deflect issues or scandals that would cause more damage to companies that do not have reputable corporate identities.
Communication
Companies maintain strong corporate identities through consistent communication. Such firms have central sources for all information released to the public. For many companies, the marketing department is the main source of information released to the public. Such firms maintain consistent corporate identities by funneling press releases, interview requests for personnel and advertising messages through their marketing departments. Companies that fail to release corporate information through a central release point will send out several messages from different departments that may offer conflicting information, which can damage their corporate image.
Employee Retention
Strong and positive corporate information helps to motivate company employees. A negative corporate image can lead to an increase in employee turnover. Part of a company’s corporate identity is the opinion its employees carry with them when out in their communities. Corporate information should first be relayed to employees. Company personnel should not hear information in the news first or from external sources before hearing it from the company.
It is important to maintain your firm’s corporate image, especially once you have created a professional brand image. This means that you should not attempt to change company logos and colors without a solid reason because this can confuse your clients. In addition, the exact color, size and form of your company trademark should be maintained each time it is used.
