Redefining “Marketing” to Engage and Empower the Organic Consumer
By Kevin Williams and Dan Mishkind
Think Different!
Gandhi, Albert Einstein, Martin Luther King Jr., Bob
Dylan, Pablo Picasso, Amelia Earhart.
What does a computer company have in common
with these world luminaries?
Apple, Inc. borrowed the respect that we have for
these incredible forward thinkers and, leveraging our
desire to be like them, created a very powerful affiliation with their brand: We are different from the conventional thinkers, unique, forward, and we use Mac.
It worked.
Welcome to Marlboro Country.
How in the years after World War II does the first filtered cigarette become the world-leading brand?
They didn’t talk about it; instead they identified
themselves (and their consumers) with the quintessential icon of the rugged American individualist—the
Cowboy.
You Deserve a Break Today!
How does a fast-food joint sell billions of not-so-great hamburgers every year?
They sell a smile, not meat.
What do all these campaigns have in common?
They are examples of “branding,” a type of marketing
that caters our to emotional side, and supports this
with rational methods. It’s a fact that we navigate much
of our world though our feelings, or intuition. Traditional
branding efforts target these feelings, seeking to align
a brand with who we want to be and make us want to
be part of that brand’s virtual community. It often capi-
SEPTEMBER — OCTOBER 2009
talizes on desires or fears, operating just below the
threshold of consciousness. What takes precedence is
not always something tangible, but how a brand makes
us feel.
While conventional companies have used branding
to influence consumers for decades, the organic
industry has instead primarily relied on marketing attributes or direct benefits—e.g., lack of harmful pesticides, non-GMO, better for the planet, better for you.
This appeals to a shopper’s logical side, and it may encourage trial, but what most companies in the organic
industry are not tapping into is the power of “emotional
allegiance.” This is the difference between a person
who buys a product based strictly on logic (e.g., price)
and another who makes a purchase because they
identify with the brand. This emotional allegiance will
make a consumer loyal to your brand even in the face
of aggressive competition or economic downturns. If
properly nurtured, this emotional allegiance can last a
lifetime.
Unlike conventional companies, however, organic
brands don’t have to create a fictional character or a
false pretense of feeling good. There is no need to associate with influential figures to elevate our position.
There is another option: conscious branding.
When it comes to emotional allegiance, organic has
one major advantage: we don’t have to fake it. We
have real stories. We are part of something that honestly feels good and is good. We are a community of
forward thinkers that people want to associate and
identify with. Now is the time to reach out to consumers and invite them—through conscious
branding—to be part of our virtual community.
