“Better than a thousand tastes.” “Anything can be happy.” “Sparrow’s nest coffee.”

Are these phrases, taglines, slogans, or riddles? Actually, they’re none of the above, but rather, the translated Chinese names of three brands you probably know: Subway, Pepsi and Nestle, respectively.

Choosing a name can make or break any brand experience. And as organizations look to expand globally, considering how your name comes to life in new markets—what it means, how it’s pronounced, and what it evokes—is key to connecting with new audiences around the world.

Chinese Brand Names

The Chinese language is character based, and because each character has its own meaning, every brand name can be interpreted as the sum of its parts. What’s more, some characters can have the same pronunciation but a drastically different meaning. Characters that are positive or neutral on their own can become negative when combined. Which means an elegant English or coined name can, if you’re not careful, become impossible to pronounce, confusing or even offensive to native Chinese speakers.

This is why most organizations pair their global name with a Chinese name that replicates its pronunciation to help Chinese consumers say and understand it.

And while a luxury brand may see Chinese consumers fight through pronunciation challenges to use its global name as a sign of a premium product or experience, more middle market brands risk rejection by not adapting their name for this market.

Thinking about translating your brand name into Chinese can feel overwhelming and complicated. At Prophet, with offices in Hong Kong and Shanghai, and the thought leadership of Tom Doctoroff, Chief Cultural Insights Officer and one of the world’s foremost experts on Chinese consumer behavior, we understand the dynamics at play when bringing names to China.

5 Tips When Localizing Your Brand Name in China

We’ve pulled together five tips to help organizations create a successful name and demonstrate relevance to Chinese consumers.

1.  Set the Stage – Identify Your Primary Dialect

You probably know that the Chinese language is highly complex, and perhaps better defined as a group of related languages, rather than one universal language.

Used in mainland China and Taiwan, Mandarin is the official language of China and overall, spoken by the most people, while Cantonese is spoken in Hong Kong and the Guangdong province. And while Mandarin and Cantonese share a written system of characters, how a character is pronounced comes down to where in China you are, and what dialect you are using.

Keep in mind, these are just two of the most popular dialects, but there are seven traditionally classified dialect groups, and hundreds of subgroups. But global brands usually focus on connecting with the largest population of consumers, which typically means accommodating Mandarin speakers first. However, conducting linguistic disaster checks are critical to ensure that a perfectly innocent name in Mandarin doesn’t invite ridicule in Cantonese—or any other prevalent dialects in your target market.

You might be wondering—how do I engage with Mandarin or Cantonese without being able to read the language? For English speakers, we often see a Romanized version of Chinese using pinyin, which is the official way to spell and pronounce Chinese characters using the English alphabet. But these sounds can have radically different meanings depending on which characters are being used. Take, for example, ‘yōu’ – characters you can use for this pinyin include: 优 (excellent); 悠 (tradition); or 佑 (bless).

2. Consider Your Options – What Type of Name Does Your Brand Require?

With thousands of Chinese characters, many with multiple meanings, adapting your name for China is a tricky business. There are two main factors to consider here; the phonetic link to your global name (how much they sound alike), and your evocative link (how much the Chinese name conveys the story of the original name). Some brands prioritize one of the other, but many do both.

Strong Phonetic / Weak Evocative Link

A strong phonetic/weak evocative link replicates the sound of the English name using Chinese characters as closely as possible, without mimicking the literal meaning. Adidas, or 阿迪达斯 in Chinese characters, and Ādídásī in pinyin, is a strictly phonetic transliteration. This strategy makes sense for the sportswear company, since it’s a namesake brand (after founder Adolf Dassler), and carries significant equity. While the literal translation doesn’t have a meaningful definition, it is recognizable and consistent with the global brand.

Weak Phonetic / Strong Evocative Link

In some cases, phonetic similarity may not be as important to the brand. For example, Marriott, 万豪 or wàn háo, does not sound the same as its English name, but can be translated to “million” and “grand,” evoking a feeling of luxury and style that reflects its global brand equities.

Strong Phonetic / Strong Evocative Link

Many believe that a best-in-class name brings both a phonetic similarity and strong evocative meaning to bear. Coca-Cola is frequently brought up as the gold standard, and for good reason. Before standardizing their Chinese name, Coca-Cola was transliterated at the local level by shop owners in many ways, having a different literal meaning from one shop to the next (“bite the wax tadpole” is the most infamous). In 1928, Coca-Cola trademarked their official Chinese name, 可口可樂 or kě kǒu kě lè, which can be translated as “makes mouths happy” or sometimes “yummy” and “joy”. They now have a close aural approximation, and one that lends a positive association.

3. What Do You Want Your Name to Say About Your Brand?

While the English name of a brand lends international credibility, “Your Chinese name can be an opportunity to create thematic resonance,” Doctoroff says. “The need to elevate the proposition through the brand name is important both for memorability’s sake, but also to give a sense of what the role of the brand in the consumer’s life is.”

For this reason, many businesses choose to transliterate their names to be aspirational articulations of the brand’s higher purpose and its reason for being, rather than a direct translation of the goods or services. Transliterations often rely on images and metaphors, as well as benefit-oriented language, around benefits like “happiness” and “prosperity”.

For example, take the shampoo brand, Head & Shoulders, which becomes 海飞丝(hǎi fēi sī), translating to “flying silk of the sea.”

The exception? Those iconic brands who not only own a word, but an image. Apple is translated directly to 苹果, (píngguŏ). “Because of its iconic stature, the pervasive use of the apple in its visual iconography, and the fact that ‘apple’ is a real word name, it makes sense for it to be translated, rather than transliterated,” says Doctoroff.

4. Recognize that Your Name Can’t Communicate Everything

It may be tempting to load your Chinese name with many characters to augment your brand’s storytelling. It’s an issue we struggle with in English naming—why can’t my name convey everything about my business or offer? But just as they are in English, considerations like succinctness, memorability and ease of pronunciation are still key in Chinese. Consider the simplicity of BMW, 宝马 (bǎo mǎ), which literally means “precious horse”. It’s meaningful—
and not overly complicated.

As ever, a name is one part of your brand’s overall strategy. When LinkedIn officially entered China with a new Chinese name, 领英 (lǐng yīng), meaning “leadership” and “elite”, they focused on a series of localization moves through press releases, partner endorsements and China-specific offerings. This allowed them to communicate the name change, while activating their value proposition and demonstrating their commitment to the Chinese market.

5. Consider Your Own Brand

One name you may not have considered translating? Your own. While it is common for professionals that frequently conduct business in China to create phonetic adaptations of their names to help Chinese colleagues pronounce them, you can also take this opportunity to create a memorable name that communicates something about your personal brand.

Doctoroff, for example, is known exclusively in China as 唐锐涛 or Tang Rui Tao. The first character points to the Tang Dynasty, the second means ‘sharp’ and the third, ‘a big wave’. Through his name, Tom signals his respect for Chinese language and culture, and conveys his own value proposition to his colleagues and partners.

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Companies that sell directly to other businesses have long debated the importance of a distinct brand strategy. And many still argue it’s a waste of money and effort: They say customers base their purchases on functional decisions like cost, quality and availability, not the emotional pull of brands. We couldn’t disagree more: With major forces like globalization and digital commerce upending markets, we’ve got a front-row seat to the many ways business-to-business (B2B) branding is more critical than ever.

How B2B Branding Differs from B2C

Of course, B2B markets are distinctly different from those that sell to consumers. The buying cycle is usually longer, the requirements are better defined, more people are involved and the stakes are typically higher. These are functional decisions: On the surface, there’s no comparison between American Airlines buying $12 billion worth of jets from Boeing, for example, to a kid shelling out 89 cents for a bag of Skittles.

But the truth is, there’s a difference between rational and functional buying. B2B transactions are typically heavily weighed and considered purchases. Functional requirements must be met. But there are higher-order elements in play as well. While attributes like competitive pricing, delivery and technical support drive sales, there’s much more to your customer’s decision.

“When you’re easier to do business with, your customers feel it. It makes their work more efficient and predictable. They are more confident and less anxious. They see you as a partner to their business and an ally in their struggles.”

Mike Fleming

These higher-order traits also drive buying decisions and are much harder for competitors to replicate. When you’re easier to do business with, your customers feel it. It makes their work more efficient and predictable. They are more confident and less anxious. They see you as a partner to their business and an ally in their struggles. When you bring your customers fresh insights and ideas, they feel that, too. They come to you more often not just to buy products, but to help solve problems.

This is precisely the power of brands. Instead of just relying on superstar account executives to carry this message one meeting at a time, the strongest B2B companies create brands that do it for them.

How to Build a Successful B2B Brand

Smart branding makes it easier for the marketing, sales, product and technology teams to do their real work: Develop and provide solutions that help customers grow. For this reason, we’ve outlined some of the most important considerations:

Use Brand Stories to Reinforce Business Strategies

Look closely at the fastest-growing B2B businesses, and you’ll see they are all propelled by a brand story that supports their business strategy. These brands, like Salesforce and XPO Logistics, have defined their business around the benefits they provide to customers, not the products and services they offer. They intentionally link brand and strategy in a way that makes it easier to move into–and even create–new categories. The brand is purpose-built for the company’s mission and also for the commercial opportunities they see coming.

Yes, B2B brands need a story. Your customers want to know what you believe, what you can do, and where you can go with them. For inspiration, spend a little time watching the masterful ways Getty Images is injecting its mission into new products, or Adobe’s award-winning story of creating lost masterpieces.

Remember Your Brand is Experience and Experience is Your Brand

Experiences, not messages, define brands. You can have the most compelling brand message in your category, but it doesn’t matter if the experience isn’t reinforcing it. For B2B businesses, it’s increasingly important to start with the experience your customers want as you define your brand.

The strongest B2B brands build highly relevant and hard-to-replicate experiences. From the first impressions they make in the relationship building and early evaluation phase, how they integrate with their customer’s business, the expertise and problem-solving they bring, it is all connected back to their brand.

Are the employees designing products, services and customer touchpoints all starting with a shared understanding of the brand, and what makes it relevant and distinct to customers? The strongest B2B brands have achieved their positions by ensuring that everyone understands the brand attributes and how those traits show up throughout the experience. Every interaction, at each step of the purchase process and beyond, makes it clear that they are not just vendors, but partners. Companies like American Express and MailChimp are succeeding because they take this partnership so seriously, creating steady streams of content and interaction that inspire and inform experiences.

Your Brand Goes Far Beyond Customers

While a strong brand identity helps B2B companies grow faster than generic competitors, it can also cement relationships and connections with other key audiences.

Employees and prospective employees also benefit from stronger brands. Increasingly, people care about the story of who they work for and expect a clear purpose and strategy. They want leadership to articulate that brand and create a team they believe in. Brands play such an essential part in making sure a company’s talent is engaged that many companies are now defining an “employer brand” that works in concert with the “customer brand,” treating it as two sides of the same coin. The businesses that use their brand as a storytelling vessel for current and prospective talent are winning the intensifying recruiting wars.

“The businesses that use their brand as a storytelling vessel for current and prospective talent are winning the intensifying recruiting wars.”

Mike Fleming

It’s no surprise that the largest and most competitive B2B companies, like IBM, Microsoft, Cisco, GE and UPS, continue to invest so carefully in branding campaigns: Their workforces are enormous and recruiting and retention are essential to maintaining their edge.

Wall Street is another critical audience, and well-defined B2B brands can give investors and analysts a view into the business that financial statements and forward-looking guidance alone cannot. How do you want analysts to value your business’ growth prospects? What peers do you want to use as benchmarks? Strong B2B brands have found out how to connect their story with investors in a way that is both credible and compelling. When UnitedHealth Group wanted to shift how investors viewed their business, from a carrier to full-scale health services, it changed the narrative.

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Lost in Translation

In today’s economy, nothing matters more than a “customer first” mindset. But even the most customer-obsessed companies falter when they fail to translate their global purpose into localized efforts. Take, for example, Marks & Spencer, who announced earlier this year that they would halt online sales in China – just 2 years after also closing down their brick and mortar stores in the market – due to disappointing sales because they failed to adapt to the tastes of Chinese consumers.

The importance of localization seems so evident that it’s hard to explain why so many companies undervalue it. To some extent, the tendency to value globalization over localization stems from the historical emphasis brands have placed on centralization and consistency. But, while a certain degree of consistency is critical for all brands and does bring substantial business efficiencies, brands that tend to be most successful are those that manage to balance the desire for global standards with the need for local flexibility. Brands that are dynamic and ‘living’ versus static and confined.

It’s a strategy that is becoming increasingly important for global companies. “Localization of your brand proposition is ever more important in today’s digitalized world, where consumers expect to be able to cherry-pick and create their personalized value ecosystem,” says Akira Mitsumasu, VP of products, planning and services at Japan Airlines. “Having local knowledge and understanding of how to fit into that value ecosystem is essential to stay relevant.”

How localization fuels relevance

At Prophet, we have identified this obsessive focus on customers and their needs as one of the key pillars of building brand relevance and driving growth. Our research shows that the strongest brands around the world are those that manage to be relentlessly relevant. Everything these brands invest in, create and bring to market is designed to meet important needs in people’s lives. That’s what makes them indispensable.

When we look at companies that perform well on our Brand Relevance Index, including Nike, Amazon and Samsung, we can see how they use localization as a strategic opportunity for brands. Done right, it provides a potential lever for growth in an era of escalating disruption. It creates more relevance to more people in more markets.

“If you want to be customer-centric, you have to localize,” Li Run, Senior brand director at TCL, recently told us. “Only by understanding consumer needs and providing products and services that meet their local needs and values, can a brand achieve the deepest level of connection – getting beyond acceptance and towards being loved by local consumers.”

While localization is a strategic opportunity for brands everywhere, it is particularly critical in Asia. Growth here is expected to continue to drive the global economy for years to come. As multinationals seek growth in Asia’s diverse economies, localizing their brand and marketing is emerging as a core strategic component.

But it isn’t easy. “Very often when a company comes to Asia with growth plans, it first needs to develop an authentic narrative for the Chinese market,” says Charles Ferguson, Group Chief Commercial Officer at Tricor. “But the mindset and behavior of the Chinese can be very different.”

“Only by understanding consumer needs and providing products and services that meet their local needs and values, can a brand achieve the deepest level of connection – getting beyond acceptance and towards being loved by local consumers.”

Multinationals aren’t the only ones wrestling to find the best approach. More Asian brands are looking beyond their domestic markets for the next wave of growth, and localization will be vital if they are to replicate success at home in other regions.

This is a significant challenge in a part of the world where brand-building is still in its relative infancy. In the consumer electronics industry in China, for example, Oppo and Vivo have been successful with their strategy of investing colossal sums in celebrity endorsements and product placement. But that is unlikely to be sustainable as they expand into new markets. As a result, One Plus (in which Oppo is an investor) have taken a new approach for the Indian smartphone market, using guerilla retail and messaging around ‘the speed you need’ which resonates with Indian consumers desire for technical excellence. This has helped them capture share in the premium tier.

Unlock the power of localization

While localization has the potential to increase brand relevance and accelerate growth, the best approach will look different for every company and every market. Here are the four essential questions senior management and marketers need to ask:

Do I need to localize my brand?

Very often the culture, value system or competitive landscape mean that the benefits you want to stand for are not relevant or even have different meaning. For example, investment company T. Rowe Price uses the tagline “Invest with Confidence” around the world. But the meaning of confidence varies: In Japan, people feel confident when reassured everything is as it should be, while in Hong Kong, confidence comes from access to exclusive information. So how the company communicates and delivers on the same brand promise is tailored in these markets.

Who should I localize for?

In an ideal world, companies might localize certain aspects in all markets, but that’s often not practical. Prioritizing which specific markets, and which consumer segments within those markets, warrant a localized approach is vital. But, are you clear on who you are targeting in different regions? Do you fully understand the attitudinal differences across markets and the implications for your brand? Developing a robust fact-base about the consumer to identify any potential differences is critical.

Budweiser is one example of a global brand that has managed to use a similar brand positioning but targeting a different audience in a way that fits their lifestyle. Their target in China is younger and more premium, so they have devised fresh retail and digital activations tailored to this audience to draw them into the brand experience beyond the product itself.

To what extent do I localize?

There are so many elements that make up your brand strategy and marketing mix. It is hard for companies to know how much change is right. Should you alter your brand promise, product names and logos, the product itself, distribution channels, or simply modify the messaging or visuals? The key is to identify the levers that most impact relevance in the category and market.

At Marriott, for example, the brand’s foundations – its positioning, promise and values – “must be globally consistent,” says Mike Fulkerson, VP, brand and marketing, Asia Pacific. “Keeping those foundational elements is important to meeting the needs of consumers around the world. We are most focused on localizing how we communicate the brands as well as more specific elements of the guest experience, such as food and beverage.”

How can I deliver?

Finally, it’s important to be realistic about the capabilities you have both in-house and through your network of partners, to bring a localized strategy to life in an authentic way. “Having a management team that understands the value of both cultures is very important,” says John Kim, CEO at Burger King Japan. “Look for people with sensitivity, as well as personal depth and maturity, people who can listen and comprehend the ‘why’ behind what people are saying and to decode the underlying values.”

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Ever notice how some brands become part of our daily life so seamlessly that we don’t even think about them until something goes awry, like when Waze fails to detect massive roadwork, or Netflix suggests you might enjoy “Fuller House”?

At Prophet, we know that’s because these brands represent more than a product or service we buy–they’re an integral part of our lives: It’s what we call relentlessly relevant brands. Achieving this level of relevance is no easy feat given the current state of brand-building. For one thing, customers are more in control than ever, and their expectations of brands continue to rise. Technology, from mobile to wearables to Internet-embedded homes, further disrupt those expectations, allowing people to perceive and interact with brands in new ways. Brands that aren’t evolving get lost in the shuffle.

What are Relentlessly Relevant Brands?

Relentlessly relevant brands engage, surprise and connect. They are genuinely modern, finding new ways to delight and deliver. They push themselves to earn and re-earn customers’ loyalty—and they continually redefine what’s possible.

These brands have barreled through passive exposure to come to life, actively participating with customers. They use technology to be more human, creating new experiences to engage with people in ways that enrich their lives. Nike, for example, was once a brand built on bright products, colorful ads and legendary athletes. Today, it’s an ecosystem of dynamic ‘living’ experiences, like the Nike+ community, an ever-expanding universe that includes expert coaching from Nike pros, personal connections to millions of other athletes, training clubs, and valuable partnerships with the likes of Apple, Headspace and ClassPass.

The result is that Nike is one of the few brands with relevance that knows no boundaries, scoring high on our Prophet Brand Relevance Index^TM in every market we track.

How Do You Build Brand Relevance?

Building a relentlessly relevant brand starts with three essential commitments. First, brands must find a strategic purpose that creates shared value. It’s the only way to inspire people, both internally and externally. Next, companies need to engage customers through living brand experiences. And finally, brands need to be powered from the inside out through culture, capabilities, and engagement.

Let’s take a deeper look at the qualities relentlessly relevant brands have.

They Know Their Real Reason-To-Be

These brands know who they are, moving beyond positioning and into purpose. They are centered on a strategic purpose that creates shared value. This brand purpose is the fundamental binding agent between assets and aspirations of the business and customers’ motivations.

Starbucks, of course, sells coffee. But people love it for its bigger ambition, which is to inspire and nurture the human spirit, one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time.

LEGO has long been a favorite of children for its delightfully consistent little bricks and has integrated those imaginative properties into physical retail, digital enterprises and full-length films. But all of its efforts speak to the purpose that provides so much value to parents: LEGO is inspiring and developing the builders of tomorrow.

It’s not that these brands don’t have a positioning. They do. But what gives them life is that instead of seeing positioning as a static definition of benefit, they understand purpose as fluid and participatory. They know that it’s the people drinking their coffee and building with their toys who make them what they are, and this shared purpose creates common ground. It gives customers and employees permission to build relationships that go beyond the next transaction.

That ignites innovation and growth, and also allows the company to inspire, attract and retain the best talent.

They Create Hyper-Personalized Experiences

Brands that are relentlessly relevant are those that enlarge the universe and engage customers in a living brand experience. That means constant, real-time engagement between customers and brand stewards, giving companies the ability to anticipate, adapt and respond in the context of customers’ lives. It’s what allows brands to create offers that are hyper-personalized, to leverage data in a way that extends experiences and relationships within customers’ lives and to combine human empathy with tech-enabled intelligence. As a result, every interaction delivers a greater business impact.

What makes these experiences so powerful is that they are based on the understanding that the days of either/or are behind us. These experiences are sprinting full speed into and/both. They understand that what they offer people needs to embrace the head and the heart, intelligence and emotion, data and story, and strategy and empathy.

Think of the way Disney keeps making visits to its properties more magical, by using technology to help guests unlock hotel rooms, make a playdate with Snow White, or even pay for a turkey leg. Or Spotify’s uncanny ability to follow you into an Uber, work with Tinder and Bumble to help you find better dates and cranks out playlists made up of songs you’ve never listened to but instantly love.

Customers are fiercely loyal to these experiences: When Samsung faced the massive recall of its Galaxy Note, pundits expected customers to defect in droves. The brand’s mobile phones have come back stronger than ever, precisely because people love the way they perform across devices, including smartwatches, tablets and increasingly, virtual reality.

They’re Powered From the Inside

Relentlessly relevant brands aren’t managed by a marketing team. They are powered through a company’s culture, capabilities and engagement. Because leadership is in alignment, they can catalyze change, motivate and empower employees throughout the organization to create a self-generating business, balancing customer needs and corporate goals.

Relentlessly relevant brands can drive change and quickly turn new ideas into reality. They empower the diversity of thought, customer centricity, collaboration and agility.

Chick-fil-A, for example, is a fast-growing chain of restaurants built around a culture devoted to delivering delicious food with grace, and it strives to have a positive impact on everyone it comes in contact with. It’s no surprise that on our Brand Relevance Index^TM, it scores high for trustworthiness, consistency and having a better product than competitors. From its innovative corporate test chefs, highly-engaged franchisees and hard-working hourly employees, heartfelt hospitality is as meaningful a menu item as its tasty chicken.

Southwest Airlines, the only airline to rank in the Top 50 of our U.S. Index, also recognizes that delivering outstanding customer experiences has to be a company-wide commitment. To deliver on its promise, which it sees as serving passengers with warmth, friendliness, individual pride and a sense of humor, starts with a commitment to treat its employees the same way. From ticket agents to baggage handlers to pilots, customers have come to expect a personal connection they don’t get from other carriers.

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When brand executives come to us with what they think is a positioning problem these days, we typically have an entirely different diagnosis. Usually, it’s a purpose problem.

Positioning around a functional or emotional benefit isn’t enough anymore, with purpose instead emerging as the heartbeat of modern brands and as a key ingredient in what makes a brand become — and stay — relevant. Brands with purpose stand for something beyond their product or service, and consumers know it. These are brands that can always answer two questions: What do we believe? And why do we exist?

Purpose has become one of the best ways to inspire people, both internally and externally. And it’s essential to creating shared value. Brands with purpose don’t just transact with people; they deliver something more, an intangible element that becomes part of an ongoing relationship.

By The Numbers

Industry research backs this assertion up, including a recent study that found that brands with a strong sense of purpose grow at rate 2x that of those that don’t. Our own Prophet Brand Relevance Index shows time and time again that components connected to how consumers interpret brand purpose propel “meaningful” brands to the top, led by the likes of Amazon, Netflix and Apple. Brands like Pinterest are beloved, while others lacking a strategic purpose may be used but lack relevance. Facebook, for instance, doesn’t even crack the top 100 in our latest ranking.

Consumers can name many coffee brands, but they know Starbucks. When they lace up their sneakers or use Nike+ to track their morning run, they believe Nike is hoping to inspire the athlete inside them.

This sense of purpose isn’t just about winning with customers. It’s the No. 1 reason millennials choose to work for a given employer, studies have found — sometimes even trumping salary. It is then through a clear purpose that companies can attract and retain exceptional talent. It’s also essential to appeal to potential partners and is the foundation for creating a meaningful experience.

Of course, this is not to say that purpose is the only thing that builds relevance, or that it immediately translates to higher sales. Brands must do many things right to succeed. But it’s increasingly clear that the brands that fare the best and are the most differentiated from their competition are those with a crystallized strategic purpose.

How To Find True Purpose

It’s important to point out that brand purpose can, and often should, be different than a corporate mission. Unilever, for example, has staked its claim on sustainability and has supported that through its portfolio of brands. But Axe’s purpose is to help guys look, feel and smell their best, while Dove strives to turn beauty into a source of confidence, not anxiety.

Some brands are lucky enough to have been based on purpose from the very beginning. Parents can buy many types of toys, but their favorites are likely Fisher-Price because they share the belief that play is learning, or LEGO, which sees all children as the builders of tomorrow. Others, such as Ford, GE and Bank of America, have reshaped their purpose to hold more meaning for today’s audiences.

Centering your brand on a strategic purpose isn’t easy, but the intersection of a few lenses can put you well on your way to achieving this goal:

• Societal impact — where does the world need help and you can make a difference?
• Major capabilities — what are you good at beyond the products and services provided?
• Passion point — what is your organization most passionate about?

The first step when examining these issues is to ask the question that goes to the heart of a brand’s sense of itself: What do we believe? It’s the value closest to the center of an enterprise, one so fiercely held that it sets it apart from peers. Many companies believe in being good corporate citizens. Only State Farm believes in being a good neighbor.

Put in simpler terms, how does your brand see the world? What makes that viewpoint different?

Examining Tough Questions

The second question marketers need to answer is harder: Why does our brand exist?

This comes bundled with a few other points, such as what tensions do we want to do address? What experiences do our customers love or couldn’t live without? What do our employees think we do best? A purpose is only valid if it’s known, shared and prized by everyone within and around the enterprise — from potential employees to core customers to investors.

Answering this second question is a logical leap from the first. Bank of America, for example, believes in the power of meaningful connections. Its reason for existing is connecting individuals, families and businesses to make their financial lives better. GE’s core belief is that with imagination, anything is possible. It exists to use that imagination to invent the next industrial era, one that will build, move, power and cure.

“How does your brand see the world? What makes that viewpoint different?”

Answering this second question also delves into the ways your organization delivers on promises. A commitment to purpose, once crystallized and communicated to all parts of the organization, is what inspires a steadily evolving array of services and products.

Following Through

Once the answers to those two questions have been synthesized and articulated into a clear and succinct brand purpose, that purpose needs to be infused in several ways throughout the organization. The smallest details matter, but so do high-level strategies. In 2014, CVS stunned many observers with its decision to stop selling tobacco products. It told customers it needed to do this to better deliver on its purpose of striving “to improve the quality of human life.”

In hindsight, the retailer had to make that call in order for employees, customers and business partners to take its commitment seriously.

Finally, it’s essential to continually validate your brand’s purpose. While purpose reflects deep and enduring values that shouldn’t change much over time, it’s still essential to track the purpose of competitors. Without finding new ways to engage customers through living brand experiences, competitors can hijack your purpose and take customers with them. Is the purpose still clear and evident in every way? Are there new ways it can be conveyed more meaningfully?

Preserving Relevance

By the same token, brands need to continually take the pulse of core consumers and stakeholders, monitoring shifts in the way they interpret purpose. Many concerns about sustainability, for example, have evolved to be as much about people as the planet, expanding the purpose to address issues of fair trade and human rights.

Great care must be paid to delivering on brand purpose. Ingredient scandals are destructive for all food brands, for example, but they’re crippling for those positioned as especially healthy. And while Volkswagen has bounced back from #dieselgate, the damage was precisely because the fraud involved faked emissions results, negating its purpose of environmentally-sound engines. Consumers virtually always dislike bad corporate behavior, but they’re especially fierce in punishing what they perceive as brand hypocrisy.

This article was originally published on marketingdive.com.

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Ever notice how some brands become part of our daily life so seamlessly that we don’t even think about them until something goes awry, like when Waze fails to detect massive roadwork, or Netflix suggests you might enjoy “Fuller House”?

At Prophet, we know that’s because these brands represent more than a product or service we buy–they’re an integral part of our lives: It’s what we call relentlessly relevant brands. Achieving this level of relevance is no easy feat given the current state of brand-building. For one thing, customers are more in control than ever, and their expectations of brands continue to rise. Technology, from mobile to wearables to Internet-embedded homes, further disrupt those expectations, allowing people to perceive and interact with brands in new ways. Brands that aren’t evolving get lost in the shuffle.

What are Relentlessly Relevant Brands?

Relentlessly relevant brands engage, surprise and connect. They are genuinely modern, finding new ways to delight and deliver. They push themselves to earn and re-earn customers’ loyalty—and they continually redefine what’s possible.

These brands have barreled through passive exposure to come to life, actively participating with customers. They use technology to be more human, creating new experiences to engage with people in ways that enrich their lives. Nike, for example, was once a brand built on bright products, colorful ads and legendary athletes. Today, it’s an ecosystem of dynamic ‘living’ experiences, like the Nike+ community, an ever-expanding universe that includes expert coaching from Nike pros, personal connections to millions of other athletes, training clubs, and valuable partnerships with the likes of Apple, Headspace and ClassPass.

The result is that Nike is one of the few brands with relevance that knows no boundaries, scoring high on our Prophet Brand Relevance Index^TM in every market we track.

How Do You Build Brand Relevance?

Building a relentlessly relevant brand starts with three essential commitments. First, brands must find a strategic purpose that creates shared value. It’s the only way to inspire people, both internally and externally. Next, companies need to engage customers through living brand experiences. And finally, brands need to be powered from the inside out through culture, capabilities, and engagement.

Let’s take a deeper look at the qualities relentlessly relevant brands have.

They Know Their Real Reason-To-Be

These brands know who they are, moving beyond positioning and into purpose. They are centered on a strategic purpose that creates shared value. This brand purpose is the fundamental binding agent between assets and aspirations of the business and customers’ motivations.

Starbucks, of course, sells coffee. But people love it for its bigger ambition, which is to inspire and nurture the human spirit, one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time.

LEGO has long been a favorite of children for its delightfully consistent little bricks and has integrated those imaginative properties into physical retail, digital enterprises and full-length films. But all of its efforts speak to the purpose that provides so much value to parents: LEGO is inspiring and developing the builders of tomorrow.

It’s not that these brands don’t have a positioning. They do. But what gives them life is that instead of seeing positioning as a static definition of benefit, they understand purpose as fluid and participatory. They know that it’s the people drinking their coffee and building with their toys who make them what they are, and this shared purpose creates common ground. It gives customers and employees permission to build relationships that go beyond the next transaction.

That ignites innovation and growth, and also allows the company to inspire, attract and retain the best talent.

They Create Hyper-Personalized Experiences

Brands that are relentlessly relevant are those that enlarge the universe and engage customers in a living brand experience. That means constant, real-time engagement between customers and brand stewards, giving companies the ability to anticipate, adapt and respond in the context of customers’ lives. It’s what allows brands to create offers that are hyper-personalized, to leverage data in a way that extends experiences and relationships within customers’ lives and to combine human empathy with tech-enabled intelligence. As a result, every interaction delivers greater business impact.

What makes these experiences so powerful is that they are based on the understanding that the days of either/or are behind us. These experiences are sprinting full speed into and/both. They understand that what they offer people needs to embrace the head and the heart, intelligence and emotion, data and story, and strategy and empathy.

“What gives them life is that instead of seeing positioning as a static definition of benefit, they understand purpose as fluid and participatory.”

Think of the way Disney keeps making visits to its properties more magical, by using technology to help guests unlock hotel rooms, make a playdate with Snow White, or even pay for a turkey leg. Or Spotify’s uncanny ability to follow you into an Uber, work with Tinder and Bumble to help you find better dates, and cranks out playlists made up of songs you’ve never listened to but instantly love.

Customers are fiercely loyal to these experiences: When Samsung faced the massive recall of its Galaxy Note, pundits expected customers to defect in droves. The brand’s mobile phones have come back stronger than ever, precisely because people love the way they perform across devices, including smart watches, tablets and increasingly, virtual reality.

They’re Powered From the Inside

Relentlessly relevant brands aren’t managed by a marketing team. They are powered through a company’s culture, capabilities and engagement. Because leadership is in alignment, they can catalyze change, motivate and empower employees throughout the organization to create a self-generating business, balancing customer needs and corporate goals.

Relentlessly relevant brands can drive change and quickly turn new ideas into reality. They empower diversity of thought, customer centricity, collaboration and agility.

Chick-fil-A, for example, is a fast-growing chain of restaurants built around a culture devoted to delivering delicious food with grace, and it strives to have a positive impact on everyone it comes in contact with. It’s no surprise that on our Brand Relevance Index^TM, it scores high for trustworthiness, consistency and having a better product than competitors. From its innovative corporate test chefs, highly-engaged franchisees and hard-working hourly employees, heartfelt hospitality is as meaningful a menu item as its tasty chicken.

Southwest Airlines, the only airline to rank in the Top 50 of our U.S. Index, also recognizes that delivering outstanding customer experiences has to be a companywide commitment. To deliver on its promise, which it sees as serving passengers with warmth, friendliness, individual pride and a sense of humor, starts with a commitment to treat its employees the same way. From ticket agents to baggage handlers to pilots, customers have come to expect a personal connection they don’t get from other carriers.

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