What happens when brand magnetism starts to fade, and why are we seeing an epidemic of brands that exist in ever smaller bands of separation and distinction?
Now more than ever before CPG and retail brands are suffering an existential challenge to the very essence of advantage that was once responsible for their success. Simply stated, we observe a proliferation of business categories where too many brands are failing to make much of an inspirational impression. The consumers’ eyes are starting to glaze over.
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Why? Because uniformity and conformity have taken root, pushing brand behavior collectively by efforts to match competitive “one-ups-manship” moves over time. The irony of ironies: competitive competence will eventually submerge brand distinctions because like the laws of gravity, feature mirroring and spec creep inexorably push products closer to each other.
All airlines have frequent flier benefits
All detergents offer stain fighting formulas
All delivery is fast
All retailers have loyalty card programs
Should the Hummer slide towards the larger addressable market of a family friendly ride or remain the “toughest motherf____er” on the planet?
Take pet food and the impact of category premiumization. In herd-like fashion many premium pet brands have moved to mirror each other on:
- High quality animal protein ingredients
- Biologically appropriate standards of nutrition
- Low impact, minimal processing
- Customization to specific need states like food sensitivities or aging
Once a higher bar is set, pet brands across the business spectrum rise to it and differentiation quickly dissipates with it.
Build Brand Passion And Investment?
Competitive differentiation is increasingly a rarity. It is being replaced by the mastery of imitation and similarity. Eventually, uniqueness begins to exist only in the minds of some marketers while the reality is lost on consumers who simply don’t see it. In the absence of authentic distinction brands begin to collapse on top of each other because the differences between them is ever more trivial.
Connoisseurship, devotion, passion and inspiration is the hallmark of brands that matter to their core user base. This is a top priority for brand owners because of an increasingly demanding challenge: what comes next when consumers decide the differences between brands are too narrow and don’t matter anymore? We know the ability to compete successfully over time is dependent on a brand’s efforts to create and maintain meaningful separation from everything else. To be a category of one.
When Mavericks Become Champions
Sustainable differentiation is never an outcome of well roundedness but rather lopsidedness, intentional tradeoffs, taking stands and decisions to fight conformity. There’s just too much preoccupation with solving for competitive moves that leads to regression towards the mean. Over time categories start to slice and dice into ever smaller segments that hunt for unique appeals to narrower targets of interest. Until — the profusion of alternatives gets less meaningful — and then the rust of category commoditization starts to spread rapidly.
Trying to squeeze differentiation out of minuscule discrepancies is essentially the marketing version of making mountains out of a mole hill. Our calling as marketers is to build a process and strategy that leads people to be more discriminating and picky about what they buy. The villain we fight is purchase behavior based on routine rather than passionate commitment. If a person publicizes their affinity for a brand, it means the connection has gone a whole lot deeper.
- When brands pay too much attention to adjacent competitor changes and keeping up with those feature adjustments, the business eventually becomes incompatible with consumer devotion to it. Instead, we strive to continually earn a foundation of loyalists who retain a stubborn passion for the brand – a fanatical hard core fan base.
You know when brand fidelity starts to shrink, something is definitely amiss. Usually, the result of accentuating non-essential differences. Until — a brand comes along that does something unpredictable, shaking people out of their complacency and enticing them to move away from entrenched consumption patterns. This also means a planned escape from focusing on the competition altogether.
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Unafraid brands will put a stake in the ground, take a point of view and fight overblown promises and spurious claims. When other brands go north, the outliers head south. Instead of conformity and uniformity, these disruptive brands are preoccupied with unearthing unique ideas because they are more interested in separation than comparison. They know real differences can be truly charismatic and magnetic.
How To Escape The Competitive Herd
Marketing is the intersection of where business meets up with real human beings. Consumers don’t organize their worlds with charts and graphs. They are unpredictable, disorganized and make emotional decisions. Then we task them with selecting products in a sea of similarity – the differences diminished to package graphics or a compelling image.
We want them to be advocates and ambassadors but then refuse to offer any deeper meaning they can attach to and believe in. Said one marketing advisor, “the mockery quotient of a category is directly correlated to the amount of meaningless differentiation in it.” What’s missing are meaningful grooves of separation enhanced by a higher purpose and mission that touches the hearts of people who want to be part of something greater than themselves.
We should be laser focused on that agenda rather than relentlessly tracking competitors to make sure we aren’t outgunned on the feature playlist. It’s time to get off this comparison merry-go-round to work on genuine emotional relevance and resonance.
Contributed to Branding Strategy Insider by Robert Wheatley, CEO of Chicago-based Emergent, The Healthy Living Agency.
At The Blake Project, we help clients worldwide, in all stages of development, define and articulate what makes them competitive and valuable. Please email us to learn how we can help you compete differently.
Branding Strategy Insider is a service of The Blake Project: A strategic brand consultancy specializing in Brand Research, Brand Strategy, Brand Growth and Brand Education
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