I was trying to help a client develop a new brand in the food industry. For a product that he was still trying to perfect. With a production process he was still working the kinks out of. And in a category that, if we’re being honest, sort of didn’t exist yet. So there was a lot.
And because of all of those variables, the brand we were developing, the voice and tone we were talking about for this “still to be perfected product in a non-existent category,” was going to be a little unusual. Okay, a lot unusual. Because it had to be. It had to be because otherwise it wouldn’t stand out at retail. You’ve stood at the shelf in a grocery store or a bodega. You’ve seen the thousands of products screaming at you – and that was when you knew what you wanted. This was something that nobody knew about yet. In a category that, like I said, sort of didn’t exist yet. And because it was a startup, it certainly wasn’t going to have the cash behind it for advertising and marketing that competitors like KraftHeinz or Campbells or Mondelez count on. So really, the shelf was our only battlefield.
Which meant we really had to have a personality on shelf that was attention-getting – because if it didn’t cut through there, we were dead.
But it also needed to be distinctive for another reason, I told my friend.
Because it was.
He was confused. So I told him a story.
“Marc Maron is a famous comedian with a famous podcast and he told a story once about when he wasn’t so famous. Not unknown – he had fans and he’d been in movies and on the late night shows and he made a living – but he was certainly no Kevin Hart or Dave Chappelle or Jerry Seinfeld.
“And he was doing a show one night and the club was pretty full of fans who had come to see him, who knew his kind of humour and who made a point to come out when he was in town. And a few minutes into the show, a couple of couples were seated near the stage. No big deal. But after a few jokes he could tell that they had no idea who he was. He could tell that they had said “Hey, it’s Saturday night, what do you want to do?” “How about we go to a comedy club?” “That sounds fun!” Which is fine, no harm in that at all. But he could tell as he was doing his routine that his jokes weren’t really their thing. And to be clear, they were good people, they weren’t assholes. They were trying to dig it. But it just wasn’t their kind of comedy.
“And so Maron stopped the show and turned to the couple of couples and said ‘Hey guys, look, you seem like nice people really, so I’m gonna level with you. What you’ve seen for the last ten minutes? This is pretty much it. I mean, it’s gonna be like another hour of this. It’s not gonna suddenly turn into Carrot Top or Kevin Hart or whatever. It’s gonna be this. A lot more of this. So if you wanna jet, that’s fine.’
“And when he said that, he suddenly realized, as obvious as it sounds ‘Oh, I’m not for everyone.’ And to be clear, this isn’t ‘No one likes me’ or ‘I’m no good’. It’s something entirely different. It’s that people like different things. Some people – like all the folks in the audience EXCEPT the couple of couples who came in late - they got him. They got his humour because it was their humour. They thought he was funny. But some people didn’t. And that’s fine. He’s just not for everyone. And it was a real epiphany for him and I think it changed his life in many ways.”
And when I related this story to my friend, his eyes lit up and he nodded enthusiastically and said “I get it! You have to have the courage to be who you are! Your brand has to be brave! Has to be heroic! You’re exactly right! That’s great!”
Now, loathe as I am to disagree with a client when he’s agreeing with me and telling me I’m great, I sorta had to here (really, it’s amazing I have a career at all).
“Well, yeah, but no. See, I think with marketing there’s often a lot of talk about ‘You have to have courage! You have to be strong! You have to be fearless!” or whatever. And while yeah, wishy-washy is bad, there’s more to this stuff than just telling some poor brand manager whose sales are tanking that he has to be more entrenched, that he has to be more tenacious, that he just doesn’t have enough god damned backbone.
“For me, Maron’s story is so great because it reminds me ‘You have to be what you are, not because everyone else is an asshole (though, yeah, probably) but because really, that’s all you can be. Because that’s what you’re gonna be. Some folks will dig it and some folks won’t and your job is to spend your time seeking the former out and not wasting time on the latter. And if the latter come around at some point, great. But they’re not likely to come around because you tried to twist yourself into something you’re not. They’re probably going to come around because they finally got what you were. No one became a fan of the Rolling Stones because they were ‘the new Beatles’. They became a fan because they got who the Rolling Stones were. Same with Maron. Same with your brand.”
And I get that it’s hard for brands and their brand managers who have CMOs, distributors, holding companies and more saying: “This is how we do things” and “Look at this case study!” and “Why can’t you be more like your brother” (oops). But that’s why it’s so important.
Because while it’s easier to just be a clone of someone else – the template is already there – ultimately you’re not only not giving people a reason to buy you, you’re actually reinforcing the reason they should buy someone else. At best they’re gonna say “I love that – it feels so [insert brand here]” and then go buy that brand.
So don’t be the new Apple. Don’t be the new Oatly. Don’t be the new Liquid Death. Instead, dig deep into what you are, what makes you unique, and how you uniquely meet some need that maybe no one has ever figured out even existed before – and then be the hell out of that.
Because for what it’s worth, you really don’t have any other choice.