Lock in customer loyalty by making-and keeping-a breakthrough brand promise that your competitors can't touch

Companies like American Girl, Best Buy, Washington Mutual, and TiVo came out of nowhere to virtually own their respective markets. How did they scoop their bigger and wealthier competition? It wasn't through a fat marketing budget. It was because they kept their promises...and not just any promises, but dangerously ambitious promises. In fact, these companies overpromised to lure customers in-and then overdelivered to keep them.

Rick Barrera, a respected marketing consultant and business lecturer, has studied these word-of-mouth-driven successes and concluded that they are masters of what he calls TouchPoint Branding-the art of making sure that every point of contact between a company and its customers is well executed and fulfills an over-the-top brand promise.

Barrera explains how TouchPoint Branding's three major components-Product TouchPoints, System TouchPoints, and Human TouchPoints-can create dramatic market differentiation. The companies featured in the book start with an extraordinary product (like the Hummer), supported by smoothly running systems (like the Sumerset Houseboats Web site), and add satisfying human contact (like the service at an American Girl store).

It's an old cliché in business that smart companies underpromise and overdeliver. But in today's crowded market, that's not enough. Barrera's insights and case studies can help any company overpromise...and still overdeliver.