Specsmanship skips over relevance and resonance…

Our goal in this article is to reverse some entrenched myths about brand outreach, consumer behavior and sound strategy, working to reorient thinking on the most effective deployment of your investments in marketing communication.

The status quo in marketing

All too often we find brands laser-focused on touting their “superior” specs: formulations, ingredients, sourcing, process, science, engineering and standards of performance, believing this forms the unshakeable foundation of their brand outreach path to fame and fortune.

• Afterall, doesn’t it make sense considering the steep investments in R&D, processes, better ingredients, superior formulation skills and novel manufacturing design. Thus, the theory goes once the world is made aware of this better tech, consumers will in turn respond by beating a path to the shelf or showroom and reward the hard work, high quality commitment with ever increasing sales.

• Isn’t it then vital to tell the world why your brand is better than the other choices? That you offer 25% more of the best ingredient than the closest competitor. Or that your sourcing standards are flying above everyone else?

Better mousetrap marketing has been a foundational paradigm of go-to-market thinking since the dawn of the mass media era in the early 1950’s. Companies showcase their deep commitments to build a compelling value proposition through their efforts to innovate, improve, engineer higher quality into products. It seems fundamental then, that brand communication must focus on telling stakeholders about the facts and details of these accomplishments.

Are you always reaching for product ‘betterness’?

The rinse-and-repeat environment that fosters this way of operating is woven into the institutional fabric of many brands and businesses.

• The regional potato chip brand that believes to beat the big guys they must be better by meticulously sourcing an improved strain of potatoes. They carefully curate a blend of frying oils to impart taste and texture without any greasy residue. In-house chefs work to test and combine the highest quality spices and flavoring ingredients for dusting the chips to assure the perfect taste notes. Their manufacturing technologists perfect a frying process to achieve the right texture and crunch. Surely this level of quality commitment and superior craftsmanship forms the foundation of a compelling story to capture the hearts and minds of chip lovers?

• The team of highly talented engineers and food scientists committed to inventing the future of more sustainable food, works tirelessly to develop a molecule that perfectly replicates the identical protein of a meat or dairy product. Their discovery delivers ideal, sought-after characteristics of a protein ingredient that is indistinguishable from its conventional counterpart, such that no taste or nutrition sacrifice is required in the finished product.

The new innovative process completely reinvents a legacy product category without any requirement to employ the living, resource-intensive, carbon emissions contributing impacts of an animal-derived version. It’s an incredible leap forward to fully satisfy the consumer’s preoccupation with taste and eating experience, yet is sustainable, cost comparable while it also de-risks the supply chain. Surely this bio-technology achievement story well-told to consumers, investors and retailers will draw people like a magnet to the new, better solution.

• The pet food company that knows dogs and cats require high quality proteins to assure their health, wellbeing and quality of life, so their nutritionists and scientists devote considerable energy to formulating food that utilizes the very best in class animal-derived protein ingredients, fruits, veg and botanicals. The formulation meticulously combines this cornucopia of better ingredients into a nutrient dense feast for fido and fifi.

Their supply chain experts scour the globe for the best sources to secure ‘human grade’ food ingredients that will deliver on the foundational ‘better’ nutrition story. Manufacturing works to optimize the process by improving cooking techniques designed to preserve the nutrient quality of the finished food in a shelf stable or refrigerated form. Of course, once pet parents know of these details, the decision to buy will follow.

• The auto brand known for its better engines that employs world-class engineers using higher quality parts to produce superior power that won’t break down over time.

• The running shoe company that devotes countless resources to understanding human anatomy, the mechanics and physics of athletic performance, building better shoes to help the wearer win races.

• The computer company that looks at machines as enablers of creative expression and reinvents designs to democratize technology forming an intuitive tool anyone can use.

The list goes on and on… That said, what if this isn’t the reason why your brand will be more successful. What if this incredible investment of time, talent, quality and infrastructure is actually table stakes to your victory. And second, that all this data and information works harder and more effectively with consumers as post-purchase confirmation of why their decision was a good one.

Best-in-class product creation is a must-do

Yes, you need to make the very best product

Yes, you need to employ the highest quality ingredients

Yes, you need to refine and improve manufacturing processes

Yes, you need the best people

Yes, you need to continuously innovate and improve.

However, this is not the path to successful brand communication that helps you achieve leaps in sustainable business growth.

Our point is while authentic best-in-class products are integral to your marketplace growth, there is a difference between providing top quality solutions and effective, engaging brand communication. If you consider how consumers think and behave you see that fact-based, analytical selling is not the path to consumer behavior victory on brand preference and purchase.

Facts don’t change minds

The brand that gets closest to the consumer wins. That means embracing their humanity.

It also means acknowledging that consumers are feeling creatures who think and not thinking creatures who feel. Facts and features serve to feed our need for confirmation bias after purchase that we’ve made the right decision. The experience with your product is rewarded by its performance because you’ve labored to produce the very best product. However, when it comes to effective outreach communication…that’s something else entirely.

Heart-felt connection

Moving as close to the consumer as possible means putting your brand in league with them on their journey. It’s forging an emotional connection founded on trust and integrity, where the consumer understands and wants to join your brand mission, purpose and deeper meaning. Ultimately, they see through your integrity and actions you have their best interests at heart.

• Your ability to form a relationship with consumers is not based on the stats and specs of your product formulation. Relevant brand engagement operates on a higher plane of context much like the heartfelt bonds that form between people we care about.

The neuroscience informed path to purchase

The steps to taking action on a purchase decision look different when you know how the brain’s Limbic System informs our actions. Emotion is at work here. It is how we feel about a brand that guides our decisions, not rational analysis of factual arguments. Simply stated, humans are not analytical, fact-based decision-making machines.

Sound strategy: different beats better

Most of what we see in legacy marketing outreach is a belief that “better” is the winning approach. Except that’s not bank-able strategy to start with. Uniqueness and differentiation comprise the basis of beneficial strategy, not being better. Better is tantamount to saying you’re the same as the other choice, only better. This is a zero-sum and unwinnable game of one-upmanship that operates to commoditize your business. Parsing degrees of better-ness isn’t as powerful as “only” and uniquely different.

When you know emotion rather than analytical arguments form the basis of successful communication, how will that change your messaging approach? This isn’t an indictment of your efforts to make the best product. It’s a given you must never dilute your quality commitments. However, when it comes to brand communication, the most effective outreach is based on emotional drivers, not specsmanship.

If this article has you thinking about improving brand communication and you have questions, use the link below to ask them. We promise to respond quickly.

Looking for more food for thought? Subscribe to the Emerging Trends Report.

Bob Wheatley is the CEO of Chicago-based Emergent. Traditional brand marketing often sidesteps more human qualities that can help consumers form an emotional bond. Yet brands yearn for authentic engagement, trust and a lasting relationship with their customers. For more information, contact [email protected] and follow on Twitter @BobWheatley.

Absence of trust creates uncertainty…

What trails consumer decisions like an ever-present shadow and has profound influence on the path to purchase? Fear and risk aversion. Fear is a pervasive if unwanted participant in brand growth outcomes, one that requires a closer look. How does fear manifest?

• Fear of making a bad decision
• Fear of disappointment
• Fear of loss (or loss of control)
• Fear of disruption or change
• Fear of rejection
• Fear of the unknown or unfamiliar

This is the number one barrier to consumer buying decisions and actions for any emerging brand or product. If consumers are unsure and perceive there’s any risk involved in purchase, they invariably opt out. Why? Disappointment is an emotion people universally seek to avoid. More often than not, marketing strategies assume the consumer is primed and ready to buy as soon as “consideration” is activated through an awareness building tactic.

That approach, however, fails to account for the reality of how people think-then-behave and what’s required to intentionally displace fear with trust.

• This article is about moving past fear to embrace trust and the steps brands must undertake to earn consumer faith and belief to unleash growth and business expansion.

Why is this challenge gaining traction?

Fear breeds anxiety and uncertainty, and what do consumers treasure above all things? Certainty. Perceptions of risk are persistent and exist systemically around: what is unknown, relationships with other people, income/careers, politics and social protocols. Risk and its evil twin fear are omnipresent. In part because consumers are constantly reminded of unexpected consequences through the daily barrage of “who knew” information and negative opinions they encounter in social and digital media channels.

Origin of the anxiety build up – social media transforms passive readers into active makers

Indeed, the world was forever altered in 2007 with the game changing introduction of Apple’s iPhone and Facebook’s decision to open source their platform. This kicked off the rapid rise of social media channels as enablers of citizen journalists and soothsayers, while also unleashing armchair critics, public humiliation, ghosting, bad actor media, even turning dating rituals into an electronic catalog of human choices with often spurious selling propositions designed to trigger a risky swipe.

Big media with its legacy rules and standards of professionalism, lost control of the information age while an unintended consequence of this “always on” scrutiny spotlight emerged – increasing levels of anxiety about ourselves and the state of the world around us. People resent feeling they’re no longer in control or are potentially being manipulated.

This is the instrument that brought about a sea change in how brands are built. It presaged the modern era of brand higher purpose, meaning, beliefs and values – all human characteristics we admire, trust and respect. In sum the entire cultural shift has placed a premium on the importance of trust because the old-world paradigm of family social vigilance and the ‘village’ traditions of influence has evaporated. Trust-ology as we call it, is now a core pillar driving brand growth and evangelism, in response to correcting the growing impact of risk.

Fear as a marketing tactic

On the flip side some brands have appropriated fear as a strategy to advance their business goals by working to demonstrate various forms of loss people reap if they fail to use the promoted insurance, drug therapy, beauty product, career platform, safety device, et al. It can be a powerful tool because it hits on that sensitive nerve of deficit avoidance – whether its social, financial, physical or self-esteem. Of note, occasionally the negative sell will backfire.

Dr. James Richardson, the former Hartman Group researcher and “Cultural Anthropologist,” pens a Substack column entitled Homo Imaginari, where he published a revealing analysis on fear and the election. Here is an excerpt:

“We know that fear and humor are the primary drivers in consumer marketing, though consumer brands skew towards humor because their objective is to maximize reach in the target segment. Political ads tend to stoke fear as the critical emotional variable because fear aligns with imaginings of external threats to one’s niche lifestyle or beliefs. And fear motivates a smaller group to act immediately. Humor is more memorable than motivating.

Also, voting to protect yourself is vastly more compelling than voting to reform society (an abstraction).

The former has an immediate, albeit largely imagined, payoff. Not the latter. 

America’s current political system is polarized, yes, but it is the fear-based manipulation of tiny, extreme population segments that will continue to determine many races at many levels. 

This stoking of fear runs in parallel to the high baseline anxiety many of us feel due to the extreme lifestyle fragmentation all around us. If you don’t know what to say to your neighbor because you know they are gay or voluntarily childless or atheist, that mundane awkwardness exposes many of us to fear-based manipulation from bad faith media sources. When the world is genuinely confusing us, it takes little to push some into high anxiety right before election day.”

Humanization of brands helps break the grip of fear

Brands imbued with deeper meaning and values are worth more because they are trusted.

• They convey a deeper emotional thread
• They encourage a scaled community of believers
• They are more human like and thus more relate-able
• They are more culturally relevant and resonant

When honesty, integrity and operating in the consumer’s best interests are held high and canonized in brand values, trust breaks out. The impact of that is de-escalating risk, mitigating anxiety and removing barriers of hesitance on the path to purchase.

Importance of validation, verification and advocacy

Why is word of mouth the most powerful form of communication? Because people trust the voices of their peers. Important knowing brands cannot claim or invoke trust. Earning trust benefits from a brand’s ability to credibly verify their claims and commitments.

This is where outside third-party voices and respected experts can prove invaluable in authentication of what you want consumers to believe. Earned media plays a role here, too because it is widely seen as “reporting” information rather than promoting a brand’s self-interest.

Higher purpose commitments convey presence of a soul

Do brands and businesses have a soul? Fair question, and in many instances, it may be hard to detect. However, brands leaning into trust do so with more strength and power when it is the outcome of a belief system. We define this as a higher purpose and mission that operates beyond balance sheet considerations.

People want to be part of something greater than themselves, and smart brands are in a position to provide that deeper meaning. This soulful adventure makes a brand transcendent, inviting consumers to join the brand on its mission as advocates and ambassadors rather than just transactional customers. The corrosive conditions of risk and fear are in left the rearview mirror when the consumer’s welfare, growth and needs take precedence and people believe the brand has their best interests at heart.

This is the new world order for healthy brand growth. The primary benefit: risk melts away in the face of trust and belief. 

If this post struck a chord about optimizing trust and belief to activate a committed community of brand believers and evangelists, us the link below to ask questions and start an informal conversation. The impact on your growth could be transformational.

Looking for more food for thought? Subscribe to the Emerging Trends Report.

Bob Wheatley is the CEO of Chicago-based Emergent. Traditional brand marketing often sidesteps more human qualities that can help consumers form an emotional bond. Yet brands yearn for authentic engagement, trust and a lasting relationship with their customers. For more information, contact [email protected] and follow on Twitter @BobWheatley.

Is it time for a re-stage?

In 2021 and ’22, nearly every month in the food and environmental trades there was another announcement of a Series “pick the letter” closing as hundreds of millions in capital raise flooded the “start-up” march to glory on the road to solve the future of food.

• The philosophical underpinnings of this wave of new brands and businesses was based on a profound new, powerful understanding that the food system as we know it is a significant actor in the carbon emission contributions to global warming from agricultural sources.

New technologies promising exact replicas (bioidentical) of animal-based proteins with no taste or eating experience sacrifice operated like magnets, drawing private equity and VC funding right and left as investors labored to spread their risk across a broad swath of promising players. Their hope to land on some commercialization and scaling magic that would amply reward investors who searched for the next Golden Goose headed for the animal-free protein hall of fame.

It often felt like a crusade to save humanity by remaking where food comes from in ways never before imagined. Meanwhile the nascent plant-based meat proteins marketplace was further along its journey and about to explode as Beyond Meat unveiled its now famous claim of “Plant-Based Meat for Meat Lovers” to lure in a non-vegan, larger audience of early adopters. It was an audacious claim of decadent hamburger eating experience but crafted from plants. The other not-so-recognize-able ingredients in this highly processed product would later surface critically as a drag on its healthier premise.

The plant-based protein hype machine in full throat fomented a wave of channel expansion into fast food, mass grocery retail. Of note the rapid moves into mass distribution may have been il-advised when the core audiences of these behemoth retail outlets were populated with consumers driven more so by pocketbook issues than the loftier cries to reduce carbon emissions from food creation.

• When certain consumer cohorts are less enamored with the environmental goals, they can be more sensitive to the price premium “ouch” and less tolerant of any sacrifices in taste or texture of a food you’ve been in love with for most of their lives. Impact of this on repeat purchase velocity, a prime indicator of stickiness in the core value proposition, became self-evident.

Know thy market?

In a crusade to rapidly change the world’s eating habits, over-reach ensued with large cap CPGs, QSR restaurant chains and other patrons of the mass market love jumping on the plant-based bandwagon to either launch a subpar knock-off product or grab a new menu board item to wave in front of consumers in the midst of a media storm that trumpeted the rise of plant-based solutions as ‘better for you’ – with a side order of less taxing to the environment.

All well and good and yes, the number of consumers who care about sustainability has been rising for years. Still important to consider the core user base for these premium food choices is found in higher income, higher education household zip codes where people are more intrinsically inclined to support the global warming story — while looking past the price premium and not-quite-the-same eating experience. Had the early category moves been more respectful of channel and audience selection, some of the inevitable over-the-cliff fiasco on sales volume draw down might have been avoided.

An eco-system of Confirmation Bias inhabitants drives the future-food ship

The near zero Federal funds rate pushed dollars on the hunt for an investment home in new directions. This coincided with a ramp up in media attention to global warming impacts, and the role agriculture plays in contributing emissions (especially from livestock). The emergence of various technologies like precision and biomass fermentation and cell-cultured protein creation swarmed the decks of a start-up tsunami fueled by ample funding to go around.

Stirring this pot is an eco-system of attorneys, bankers, VC’s, distributors, pundits and alt. protein convention companies all with a stake in the future food pie, helping promote expansion, while simultaneously encouraging new combatants to join the fray. One look at the aggregate logo farm on convention web sites of investors, suppliers, brands and supporting actors promised a form of ‘more is better’ while the line-up to secure capital infusions got longer.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are now somewhere in the range of 500,000 new startups every year, much of this an outcome of investment flow and the growing availability of contract manufacturing that lowers the capital cost bar of entry.

Kaboom!

Lots of noise, a friendly media spotlight, ambitious environmental virtue signaling that the future of food was about to flip — all fueled by escalating global emissions and rising temperatures moving at a record busting pace threatening to disrupt life as we know it, especially in the southern hemisphere.

Then poof!

Beyond Meat’s decision to access public markets with a stock offering also created a high level of scrutiny on performance reporting, with cracks in the veneer starting to show as questions swirled about ingredients, processing, taste, cost and whether or not these products were actually better for you. This analysis caught up alongside the erstwhile decisions to jump the new category development shark by entering broad market retail and QSR distribution (too) early. The false positive of rapid volume growth slammed up against a souring media climate and wave of consumers who had less at stake in the plant-based protein promise.

The shift in results met with a media whip that questioned, “is the plant-based meat party over?” The net effect of all this had a dampening impact on all corners of the emerging proteins marketplace, while inflation pushed the cost of money up. Investment slowed and suddenly the emerging brand players were confronted with decisions on mitigating cash burn. Horns pulled inward and the entire innovation train quickly slowed. The push towards market launches with it now moving at golf cart speeds, while the mechanics of survival of the fittest had its way.

Truth remains inescapable

• Has climate change stopped? No, it is accelerating.
• Has the repurposing of valued Amazon rainforest for raising livestock reversed? No, it is expanding.
• Has food somehow become less of a contributor to global warming? No, it continues.
• Has the promise of proteins made without an animal become less relevant? No, it is an important tech development that deserves to win.
• Is it conceivable the expanding demand for protein based on world population growth will outstrip the conventional supply system? Yes, we need better, more efficient way to make proteins to nourish a world with 10 billion souls by 2050.

The biggest barrier to successful commercialization of new food tech?

Most will argue it’s the lack of manufacturing infrastructure to make these fermentable proteins at scale to both lower prices to parity with legacy products while producing in sufficient volume to be a reliable, viable replacement. That’s a real challenge. One that desperately calls for government support to speed up the development of fermentation manufacturing capacity. Yet I would counter there’s ample proof that major shifts in technology that impact consumer behavior and perceptions can inadvertently form a stalwart block to change, if not addressed with skill and strategic consideration.

When the capital flow started to slow in emerging brand land, so did the efforts to effectively educate the world about the who, what, how and why of these new food solutions. You can’t just show up one day and say here’s meat and dairy made without an animal that’s not plant-based, but is exactly the same as the animal version only more sustainable.

First question: is that even possible?

Second: How did you do it?

Third: is it safe?

Fourth: will I like the taste?

Fifth: can I afford it?

Sixth: does this mean conventional meat and dairy goes away? What about farmers?

Complicated messages about things people aren’t familiar with runs a chance of falling flat right out of the gate. Perceived risk is a killer of innovations that don’t find early footing. People will not tolerate a substandard experience.

Time for a restage, restart, recommitment to authoring the future of food

The negative baggage trailing plant-based meat is unfortunate. It sent a chilling effect across the entire alt. protein investment landscape. The cooling became circular as shelf presence narrowed while people returned to their traditional food buying grocery list habits.

No, it’s not over by any means. But this whole future of food engine needs a restart. The fundamentals of why it must happen aren’t weaker. That said we’re talking about food here, and food is a uniquely emotional category. The bar for safety, health, taste, texture and cost is higher for anything people put in their bodies.

There needs to be a collective meeting of the minds on how to talk about and romance these new foods in a way that’s respectful of how people behave and make decisions. Too many brand cooks in the messaging kitchen and you have chaos on how the story is told. Organizations like the Precision Fermentation Alliance need proper funding and experienced marketing guidance on how to package and present the story (insight research) about a better way to make proteins, while managing consumer expectations and reservations. No, Founder intuition won’t solve this.

A word to the wise: adapt to changing food culture

Historically, America’s beginnings with a north European immigrant base led by England, Ireland and Germany brought generally brand cuisines to our shores that later collided with America’s industrial complex built on cheap, fast and efficient. What did we get? Fast food, TV dinners, microwaveable meals and industrialized processing. Now comes a sea change…

Live to eat vs. eat to live

A massive makeover in how we view food is in motion, and the emergence of foodie culture once reserved for high income households has democratized with the Food TV network, food trucks, chef driven fast casual, sensory appreciation, and a realization that food is integral to human bonding. Thus, why cuisine exploration, meal preparation, experiences has spawned an unprecedented interest in better ingredients, creativity, craftsmanship and slower paced meals. America’s preoccupation with capitalistic efficiency personified in McDonald’s is evolving with new culinary infusions:

France – croissant and coq au vin

Italy – pasta and prosciutto

Japan – sushi and ramen

Food is an adventure

When we move to the most significant change in where food comes from since agriculture was invented 10,000 years ago, the context we build around food experience walks alongside the important story of sustainability, carbon emissions, natural resource consumption, land use and better farming practices. Ultimately leading with the mouth and heart before head, it is incumbent on future food to embrace the moral static of the right way to live.

People need something to believe in and we can provide that by building a better food world with new rules. Changing behaviors will lead to changes in beliefs. To get to behaviors we would be well advised to cast a net in taste adventures and culinary creativity while being careful to navigate around any perception of mechanized, highly processed, industrial friendly efficiencies. Lean into science and you’ll lose people in a heartbeat. The questions we’ll be tasked to answer: will people rave about the new food products we create? And in doing so will it change their expectations about what’s possible.

You never get a second chance to make a first impression, so how it starts is meaningful. That said the time to start is NOW. Prepping the beachhead won’t happen overnight. Laying track now to get the world comfortable, even looking forward to what’s coming, is essential.

If this discussion got you thinking about the future of food, us the link below to ask questions. If a robust dialogue ensues, we will do a follow-up story.

Looking for more food for thought? Subscribe to the Emerging Trends Report.

Bob Wheatley is the CEO of Chicago-based Emergent. Traditional brand marketing often sidesteps more human qualities that can help consumers form an emotional bond. Yet brands yearn for authentic engagement, trust and a lasting relationship with their customers. For more information, contact [email protected] and follow on Twitter @BobWheatley.

Why is it evaporating in CPG and retail brand building?

Your customers want to be part of a brand world and ecosystem you construct through conscious cultivation of your brand’s deeper meaning, higher purpose, convictions and expressed values. Never before have CPG and retail brands had this extraordinary opportunity to build such close and endearing user relationships because our culture — and consumer behavior with it — has permanently changed. Yet far too many organizations struggle with this, or ignore it, because they have inadvertently lost, diluted or forgotten their own soul. Yes, brands indeed have a soul.

• In the absence of a clearly wrought and codified “brand constitution,” too many compromises amidst the battles of year-to-year commerce and the inevitable maturation of category rules and conventions, work to chip away at this essential brand foundation.

In the go-go 80’s and early 90’s prior to arrival of the Internet and the power transfer from corporations to consumers, much of the dialogue in brand building had a distinct military flavor to it, with brands seeking to dominate their categories, erect barriers to entry and defend their territory through command-and-control tactics. Vestiges of this thinking still remain, despite the evidence that consumer-to-brand relationship creation has transformed. In this milieu, too often the disciplines of soul nurturing are circumvented by surface level attempts to bolt on shiny imagery and applied marketing lipstick that glosses over a baked in priority for commerce metrics and transactional behaviors over consumer-relevant strategic thinking.

Building, codifying, prioritizing and delivering on the levers of brand soul are indeed vital and essential to sustainable growth in the modern consumer-powered era. People are far more interested in and attracted to your “why” (values, purpose, beliefs) than either what you do or how you do it — no matter how enamored you may be of your superior product mouse trap.

How a brand’s soul gets buried

As virtually every business category grows and matures, an implicit set of rules and boundaries begin to arise, informed by consumer and retail customer expectations, competitive actions, regulatory requirements and industry standards of conduct. These conditions tend to push all category participants towards the middle resulting in comparable product offerings, features, benefits and pricing. Over time this includes growing similarity in business practices, supply chain standards and even manufacturing processes.

The not-to-be-taken-lightly threat that incubates in this environment is the ceaseless, endless and rust-advancing march of commoditization. The condition that compels category players to emphasize scale over other considerations as they pursue efficiency gains, enforce retail leverage and bolster thinning margins.

Commoditization has already taken root in cell phones, computers, hotels, airlines, cars and many food and beverage categories – and in doing so, opportunities for innovative, soul-inspired disruptors are unleashed to move in and gain marketplace traction.

In sum, over time…

1. Meaningful differentiation can dissipate
2. Marketing leverage based on budget tonnage in spending eventually starts to post diminishing returns
3. Brand soul and purpose recedes into the background amidst commoditization pressures
4. Increasing similarity rules the day among category participants
5. Businesses begin to focus on price promotion to achieve volume goals

Whole Foods was once a champion of purpose and meaning, its business model informed by advancing the organic movement, education around same and the firm belief foods produced this way ultimately contribute to the improved health, wellbeing and happiness of people and the environment. Since its acquisition by Amazon the belief system has receded, and in its place traditional supermarket merchandising mechanisms like PRIME promotions are driving the brand story.

Meaning and values were at one time the insulation and inoculation for Whole Foods’ higher pricing and the value proposition underneath it. Now the banner faces more competition and pricing pressures because the belief system is no longer the tip of the brand spear. Further the adoption of organic brands and sections within mainstream supermarkets serves to commodify the uniqueness of Whole Foods’ differentiation and so the advantages of its original specialness atrophies.

• Soul is the engine that drives brand separation and elevation with consumers who actively pursue and are attracted to deeper meaning and values-leaning strategies.

Symbols can tell the tale

Consumers are remarkably adept at reading the room. We immediately understand the cues, signals, icons and images that explain what and who we’re dealing with, where we are, how to behave and what to expect from a brand.

• What signals is your brand transmitting?
• Are you sending the right message?
• Do your values come through in the symbolism you generously (or not) display through every point of consumer contact?

Brands informed by their soul are always focused on fulfilling consumer need, dreams, expectations, desires and growth. They are also unafraid to express views on societal issues that consumers care about such as sustainability, environmental responsibility and the wellbeing of disadvantaged people.

Soul signals and consumer-centricity

Brand soul and higher purpose tends to fall from a deep understanding and preoccupation with supporting consumers on their life journey. This manifests from genuine care and consideration for their welfare and personal growth while also helping people realize their hopes and dreams.

It is in those dreams and aspirations that we find an emotional anchor for storytelling that moves people to embrace and join your brand ecosystem. Every human, every day wishes for progress and improvement. Are you actively helping them on their journey to grow?

From:

Unhealthy to healthy

Good to great

Weak to strong

Lonely to popular

Confused to wise

Invisible to recognized

Novice to expert

Poor to secure

Plain to fashionable

Make no mistake, to be human is to be emotional. However, brands without a soul-led code of conduct tend to talk endlessly about themselves and product features rather than enablement and celebration of consumer passions. In doing so the brand story is likely to be fact-dense and analytical, despite the reems of research confirming people won’t burn the mental calories to decipher that kind of messaging. People simply are just not fact-based, analytical decision-making machines.

How do you know if you’re succeeding? When consumers can state with clarity what your brand stands for, its meaning and purpose.

A powerful tool at your disposal: surprise and delight

Do the unexpected. In his book Unreasonable Hospitality, restaurateur and author Will Guidara tells the tale of a table of New York City visitors who were overheard saying they were disappointed that the following day they were leaving the city without ever having sampled a hot dog from one of the many carts that line the streets of Manhattan.

Mind you his restaurant, Eleven Madison Park, is one of the finest, most elite culinary palaces in New York. His team sprang into action sending a runner to track down hot dogs at a cart. They were ferried back to the kitchen where the chef arranged an artful hot dog presentation. The diners were blown away that the restaurant would do this without a word ever being spoken to staff about their hot dog curiosity. It was the restaurant’s soulful belief in unreasonable hospitality that brought the surprise to life.

Have you ever been to Harrod’s department store in London? If so, have you shopped in their over-the-top food hall? Harrod’s isn’t a supermarket mind you but thy indeed sell fresh and packaged foods. Their fresh fish displays are legendary for their artistry and creative arrangement of fresh fish choices.

Of course, any grocery store with vision and applied talent could do the same thing, with the goal of making their store talked about and Instagram worthy. Yet nothing of the sort happens past the layers of crushed ice surrounding rows of whatever fish is on feature.

Surprise and delight are a choice. It is a strategy. It recognizes the very human preference for artistry and empathy.  Stores and brands with a clearly curated and developed soul are more likely to find this path and exploit it than those that don’t and who are more comfortable staying within the category accepted norms of behavior.

• When you’re willing to be a disruptive player you have a chance to alter the paradigm of what consumers think you are about and engineer a new and more engaging perception of your brand.

If this article has you thinking about how this could be brought to life in your business, it’s important to note you will need outside experts to help you work through the right mix of tools and messages. Use the link below to start a conversation with our team of brand soul experts.

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Important to respect the human sitting on other side of the screen…

The Super Bowl attracted a bit north of 123 million viewers, the greatest aggregation of human eyeballs in one place at one time, and thus the reason why 53 TV spots aired at a $7 million per 30-seconds clip. It is an unprecedented event where advertising is as much of a contact sport as the action on the football field. People tune in specifically to consume the ads — what an amazing impact opportunity-in-the-waiting, but nevertheless not often optimized largely due to an absence of sound strategy on how people make decisions and take action.

• David Ogilvy once famously remarked that if attention was all that mattered then you could put a ‘gorilla in a jockstrap’ in an ad. Yet that’s not what drives real effectiveness. He knew it and built a global agency powerhouse on that model of respect for consumer insights, perhaps now forgotten in the age of ‘can you top this’ over-reach with the display of so many digital bells and whistles.

Moreover, the Super Bowl ad is just the tip of the spending iceberg when looking at the total costs of gargantuan celebrity contact fees, massive production budgets and the veritable supermarket of extensions in packaging, retail tie-ins and social media on and off ramps.

Yet in astounding fashion, sound strategy is mostly absent from this festival of short form cinematic spectacle. The temptation to pursue attention at the expense of real relevance is just too great. In circa 2024, the ad party turned into a conspicuous mish mash of celebrity faces, much like excessive name-dropping at a Hollywood cocktail party. It’s no secret that all-too often the celebrity brand will outshine the product brand. So why does it go this way?

Guess what, emotion drives behavior

The neocortex area of the human brain governs our decisions and the actions we take. As much as we would all prefer to believe that people are logical beings who make decisions based on facts and information, instead we respond to emotional cues – how we feel in the presence of a brand. Yet too few of the ads we saw were designed with intention to drive for that kind of authentic connectivity. Given the huge one-shot spend level, you’d think it would be different.

Yes, a different approach is needed

In 2023’s super game, the highest rated commercial was a total outlier from a small pet food company called The Farmer’s Dog. This high-level and instructive achievement in strategic brand communication was the polar-opposite of the celebrity dragon-riding special effects we witnessed this year. Here Farmer’s Dog offered a story well-told that traced the poignant and touching relationship between a dog and young girl owner, charting the course of their life’s journey together. Not a word was spoken. No celebrity cameo. No green screen special effects wizardry.

It was an emotional, heartfelt, memorable celebration of the incredibly powerful and important relationship between a person and their dog. There was no recitation of production formulation features or superior ingredient claims. The brand wasn’t shouted in every frame. It didn’t need any egregious self-promotion to get the message across. It was supremely effective because people left it with an emotional connection. We all recognize that unique bond between pet parent and furry family member. The pet food existed as an enabler of pet wellbeing on life’s pathway.

Desperately seeking attention

Creating content for an engaged audience is just different than trying to capture an audience with some wild content. Too many brands seeking attention at the expense of sound strategy. The truth is human beings are feeling creatures who think not thinking creatures who feel. If you want to manage perceptions of your brand, and yes that should be a goal, then you really need to manage emotions. If your objective is to assure communication is remembered, to have impact, then emotional gravitas is paramount.

Proper use of the world’s greatest ad venue to deliver boldness

Way back in 1984, Apple used the setting to unveil their new Macintosh computer with a historic ad that captivated the world’s attention. It was a bold and also controversial strike, so much so the Apple Board was wary of showing it right up to the telecast. It aired and both ad history and the upstart Apple brand was made. It was a powerful message about democratizing the power of creativity and expression in the hands or everyone – railing against the dictates of the “establishment.”

Speaking of bold, what about sustainability and ESG in the midst of uncertainty?

Nearly every major brand in the food, beverage and lifestyle worlds is working hard to address their sustainability bona fides and emissions performance. It is by definition an opportunity for a brand to focus on higher purpose, mission, reputation and value beyond transactional thinking. Yet we don’t see that showcased here. We have entered a new era where brands are expected to have a point of view, a belief system and to be standard bearers of change. We remain hopeful that someday soon, a progressive brand will take advantage of the super venue to convey what people seek – a healthier, safer planet.

Guidance going forward

Put the consumer at the center of your planning and thinking and work backwards from there. Recognize that shameless self-promotion makes a brand the hero of any story told, and by doing so casts the brand in direct competition with the consumer who sees themselves each and every day as the hero of their life’s journey. Celebrate your consumer and their wishes, needs and aspirations like Farmer’s Dog did with such excellence. This is sound strategy. Your brand deserves this approach to spending effectiveness and outcomes, whether at the Super Bowl or in routine quarterly brand and business support.

If this post gets you thinking about how best to optimize and improve your planning for improved communications effectiveness, use the email link below to ask questions and start and informal conversation.

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Now more than ever, brand storytelling is the link to engagement

It is our mission at Emergent to continuously study the evolving dynamics of influence on the consumer journey to purchase. No surprise, we are doing business in revolutionary times. To wit, advances in AI technology will permanently alter the future of brand communication and how consumers operate when buying. Meantime, another behavior shift has arrived ahead of the trust challenges AI will inevitably create. Below we bring you the details.

Since the dawn of modern retail shopping, people have invariably looked for guidance from trusted sources as they seek to make what they believe to be less risky purchase decisions (people always work to avoid a bad decision/experience).

Below are two more recent areas of influence on consumer behavior. Then ahead we see a third pathway that is currently dialing up.

1. 10 years ago, we started looking to credible third parties

We trusted those perceived to be credentialed experts from academic, scientific and reputational influence backgrounds who brought their educated assessment of what constitutes the state of the art in any given category.

2. Five years ago, this evolved to a focus on belief in peers

With digital apps came crowd sourcing and social community “proof” at our fingertips. We experience this through sites such as Facebook, Yelp, TripAdvisors, Goodreads, TikTok, LinkedIn and Instagram that aggregate the views and experiences of our peers. We trust fellow citizens to verify and validate the assertions and claims made by brands.

3. Next, public trust failures have led consumers to turn inward for guidance

We are on the cusp of another evolution in buying behavior. People are looking inside themselves – relying on their intuition, inner wisdom and ‘gut feel’ about brands and businesses. This felt-to-be-true knowledge springs from an implicit understanding that originates in the subconscious. In essence, consumers land on a sense of what feels right to them. They trust these feelings to provide guidance and confidence for their decisions. Pundits in the brand strategy world are referring to this new school of thinking as Noetic Intelligence.

What does this mean for brands when consumers turn to intuition for trusted guidance? Your response should be to refocus on what people are feeling in the presence of your brand. Translating that into best practices means dialing up stories that amplify values, beliefs, deeper meaning and emotion to hit the right subliminal chords.

Storytelling is the most potent, engaging, strategically-differentiating form of communication available to businesses and brands.

By definition, this is a unique and more emotive approach focused on a different and more lifestyle relevant set of topics than pushing product features, benefits or reciting factoids and reports to support a new technology or innovation achievement. Specifically:

• What is your brand higher purpose?
• What do you believe in?
• What is your opinion on substantive issues impacting the world around us?
• How are you enabling a path for consumers to act upon their beliefs and values?
• What lies within the heart and soul of your brand’s value system?

Stories help people get involved with your brand and don’t present themselves like overt selling. Instead, storytelling cultivates interest and engagement, fueled by an increasingly easy ability to publish and distribute through social channels and other content platforms as narratives, videos and podcasts.

Stories can help build an emotional connection between brands and users, by enabling the humanization of brand conversations. This is how you secure rapt consumer attention.

• When I started in this business, we often bemoaned the challenges of controlling messages and lamented that our outreach existed only within media platforms owned and managed by third parties. Today brands can operate independently as publishers AND media channels. Yet some brands are hesitant to fully leverage this incredible controlled messaging capability to greatest effect.

All too often, brands remain tethered to product presentations rather than the context and belief afforded by stories. A pet food brand can self-promote its ingredient quality, nutritional philosophy, commitment to ethical sourcing and the like. Or the brand can bring forward stories of transformational change and impact their diets have on beloved pets whose lives were improved through better nutrition and the wellbeing that bestows. This blends with and imprints the positive lifestyle associations people desire with their furry family members.

Which is more compelling? The story of how a pet’s life has transformed from consuming a new diet. Or waxing on about nutritional panel ingredient integrity and high sourcing standards? It’s going to be the first approach every time. Human beings love stories. So why don’t we see more of it more often in marketing?

During the persuasion era of brand marketing, interruption-style media was deployed to circulate product feature communication constructed around entertainment or humor to bait the attention of its intended audience. Some of this marketing manipulation thinking still lingers today, despite our knowing consumers have the ability to avoid nearly all of it.

The story telling era has emerged to replace interruption and manipulation

Some of best examples of powerful storytelling can be found in books and movies that deftly use conflict, tension, struggle, and lead character redemption, ultimately leading to a favorable outcome as a blueprint for successful engagement. Yet many brands struggle with storytelling because it’s not a direct product hard sell. As if hard selling will continue as a bankable path to consumer engagement anyway?

Brand storytelling is at its most dynamic state when integrating:

Culture –

Culture governs shifts in preference, social relevance, priorities, meaning and even language. It is influential to behavior and so should be respected as a conditioning and context agent for brand stories.

Psychology –

Neuroscience proves how we work incessantly to avoid perceived risks. Our subconscious is the ruler over decisions and actions and so we use archetype development to help inform the tone, manner and character of brand messaging that resonates.

Emotion –

Humans are feeling creatures who think. We are not analytical, fact-driven decision-making machines. Emotion sits at the front door of how we behave and influences our opinions and judgments. It is fundamental to our actions and the decisions we make. It’s the emotional grist which makes the communication memorable by the way.

Today this approach manifests in a refined set of outbound tools including:

Content streams

Social communities

Installations and pop-ups

Real world and retail experiences

If you want to know more, ask questions or discuss Noetic Intelligence and its application to your business, use this link and let’s talk.

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