Imagine Your Brand is a Story

A book called 'Innovation from the Inside Out' had the following thought:

"People want to communicate through your brand, not with your brand."

It struck me how much this was like story telling. If you tell a story and fill it completely with detail to make sure people see it just the way you do, people will be bored and won't listen. But if you can create a story that they can see, and which captures your imagination it will be told and retold (sometimes for centuries). But it also needs to be a story that people want to share, passing it on to others because it offers a lesson or other value in an interesting way.

Is this where companies, professional service firms and others sometimes go wrong? They control their brand and image in a way that suits them, not the way that suits their customers. More widely, their processes and points of contact with their clients are normally organised for the benefit of the firm.

There must be important competitive advantages in this one point. What ways are there for clients to communicate through your firm (and its brand) rather than with it?