cultural branding
1.What is cultural innovation marketing and which brands does this apply to?
In marketing, brand strategy has focussed on the day to day running of the business and leveraging existing strengths of the business. According to David Holt, “Cultural branding strategy adds a strategic perspective for important market place goals, namely developing new business and resurrecting moribund ones. It has a distinctive approach to strategy informed by theories of culture, society and politics. The aim of this approach is to propel branding as a distinctive and value added frame work for managing the big picture market place challenges that firms face particularly with respect to innovation.”
Traditionally, brand strategy had focussed on incremental product improvements through leveraging existing strengths of the company leading to “new improved” products and the thought was that customers would see the superiority of the product and buy it. They thought that technological innovation that provides a step change in the product value proposition. Strangely, customers often do not perceive it that way.While there is nothing wrong with this presumption, cultural innovation that has been key to the success of a number of brands, is overlooked to the detriment of the brands of the company. Some brands, among many, that have used cultural innovation to reinvigorate/launch/grow their businesses include Starbucks, The Body Shop, Pepsi, Absolut and Volkswagen. These companies did ensure that technology innovations were part of their overall strategy but additionally offered consumers a product that stood for an ideology that they could relate to positively.
Many products and product categories may be in the “Red Ocean” category where product innovations do not work. Holt discusses how Budweiser Beer leveraged changing cultural ideologies to reposition their brand in the staid and mature beer market in the US. Initially positioned in the 80s as a workers beer through ads saluting the workers and showcasing cheerful workers working hard. However by the 90s, the demand shrunk but the brands place was taken over by Budweiser Light. One may think that it was product innovation. But competition came up with their own version of Light beer which tasted close and had the same product values. What clicked for Buds Light was the advertising that changed to show stories of men involved in antics like Peter Pan that show cased rebellious macho traits that resonated with adult men as symbolic of masculinity. These were essentially cultural innovations. Cultural innovations deliver an innovative cultural expression: a new ideological opportunity that could be captured to jump far ahead of competition that may still be following solely the product innovation strategy. The synergies of combining product innovation with an ideological opportunity would reward brands tremendously. A model for cultural innovation could be as given in the figure below. Cultural innovation marketing is therefore part of the Cultural branding strategy that leverages cultural innovations that demand a better ideology to move brands from the red ocean space to a different type of blue ocean space and can be used to lift brands that are losing traction and even for new brands as a differentiated strategic initiative that breaks new ground.
2.What should brands do differently about advertising on social media today and why conventional branded content doesn’t work anymore?
In this age of social media, companies invested extensively in “branded content”. But despite all expectations, the dream of engaging customers directly because of “branded content” very rarely became a reality.
To understand reasons for this we must remember that brands succeed when they become culturally relevant. Digital media changed how culture works and established powerful social networks that dictate, influence and impact how culture works and form new networks. These networks effectively influence and innovate culture. This is what David Holt, in his article “Branding in the Age of Social Media “calls crowdcultre. If we learn how crowd culture operates, we can comprehend why branded content failed and what alternatives could work.
Branded content is essentially content developed for mass media rehashed for digital media. As long as competition was limited, branded content The content which was essentially from big media houses worked as long as they were the only ones providing content. So ads could piggyback on this brand content and work effectively. Once consumers could opt out of ads, brands found it tough going. Brands moved to sponsoring TV events and shows, new films, major sports events, cultural festivals and bands. But the big media companies were to face competition from unexpected sources.
Cultural innovations always originated from the rebels of society, people who lived on the fringe of society. These innovations have changed fashions, food habits, language and performing arts. Jazz originated in New Orleans among the African American communities in the late 19th century and ultimately led to the evolution of a number of musical genres. Jazz by itself has its origins in the Blues, a genre peculiar to the black workers working in fields of southern USA. In the 1700s when British aristocracy’s fashion was dictated by French influence, bright and opulent clothes were worn by men with a lot of importance to accessories. Beau Brummel, a middle class gentlemen, not usually welcome among the aristocracy changed that with his monochromatic clothing with its focus on cut and fit and accentuated the masculinity of the wearer. He became a friend of the British royals and dictated men’s fashion. All these cultural innovations originated from the fringes of the mainstream of society. Media and corporates leveraged these innovations and popularised them in mass markets.
Social media changed the equation with its ability to network greatly dispersed people groups in microseconds and as these new networks attained critical mass, their influence became exponentially large and immediate. These crowdcultures according to David Holt, “incubate new ideologies and practices, and art worlds, which break new ground in entertainment.” It is their agility in meeting evolving audience needs quickly that has been the death knell of branded content produced by major media houses.
Crowdcultures exist for every possible topic. By the power of social media they network, collaborate, co-create and critique work done, check audience reactions, correct and deliver fine-tuned content exactly attuned to audience needs. These networks eliminate many of the bottlenecks creators used to face such as funding and distribution of produced content.
So what should brands do ?
YouTube channels throw up some interesting insights. In India, stand-up comedy is a recent genre. English stand-up comedy only addresses a very small fraction of Indians, a possible audience size of about 20 million. In just 5 years, Indian stand-up comedian Kenny Sebastian has 2.06 million subscribers. Compare this with the current ruling party in India now with 3.32 million subscribers. Pew Die Pie a gaming comic has a subscriber base of 108 million while the US President elect has just 673,000 subscribers (December 2020). These political leaders used powerful media houses and branded content. The other two brought out culturally relevant and innovative content which scored successfully. “5 minutes craft” has 68.7 million while Netflix has 18 million subscribers, FORD Motor Co., has 2.11 million, Mac Donald 451,000, Suzuki Global 68000 and Pepsi 854,000 subscribers.
Celebrities have been used in social media to promote brands. However success has come to the few that challenged the status quo of branded content such as what Under Armour did in featuring Mary Copeland and Giselle Bundchen in culturally different scenarios , far removed from the traditional ballet costume and fashion modelling. However, using celebrities may obtain a large and engaged community but the rub off effect on the brand is transient while the celebrity is remembered.
All this proves that brands succeed when they breakthrough in culture. Digital media created new social networks where culture works differently. Brands like Red Bull and Chipotle or Under Armour, have used what Holt calls cultural branding. Chipotle aligned itself with the new cultural ideology that challenged the US food production industry. Social media empowered it to do so. In its YouTube channel it has this statement up front “Chipotle started in 1993 with the simple idea that food served fast did not have to be a typical fast food experience..” Chipotle was offering a different, healthier fast food experience to the social network that was wary of the produce churned out by US food industry giants in the regular fast food outlets.
Summarising, to brand effectively on Social Media, brands need to target crowdcultures actively
3.Are cultural marketing and cultural innovation marketing different?
Cultural brand strategy, as the term implies, is a distinct approach to strategy, informed by theories of culture, society and politics. The aim of this approach is to propel branding as a distinctive and value added framework for managing the big picture “market place” challenges that firm face, particularly with respect to innovation. Cultural branding adds a crucial strategic perspective for the most important market place goals: developing new business and resurrecting moribund ones – David Holt (in a chapter of Handbook of Marketing Strategy Gregory Carpenter and Venkatesh Shankar, Editors)
Innovation has been always viewed, essentially by engineers as better products that offer often only incremental benefits. Thereafter, the regular traditional branding process starts and it is expected that the consumers will perceive the superiority of the “new improved” product and buy it. Cultural innovation branding offers a different world view which “champions a better ideology” which the world will notice as well (Cultural Strategy: How Innovative ideologies build Breakthrough brands.Holt and Cameron 2010)
Cultural brand strategy therefore is a strategy that directs organisations to build brands with innovative ideologies. To put it simply, Cultural branding incorporates cultural innovation.
4.How should brands approach their advertising strategy based on these new insights?
David Holt maps the approach as following five principles which were used at Chipotle.
1. Map the cultural orthodoxy
Every sector has its cultural orthodoxy. In the rice fields of the South East Asia, farmers still swear by flood irrigating their crops even though it is a practice that wastes precious resource of water.
2. Locate the cultural opportunity.
As time passes, culture’s traction gets eroded because of societal changes. Consumers begin looking for alternatives. The Covid 19 pandemic, a major disruption, caused many families to rethink the traditional extended family thanksgiving celebrations. Some food chains identified this change as an opportunity and stocked up smaller turkeys below 16 pounds also on their shelves apart from the usual large birds
3. Target the crowdculture.
As most corporate executives led sedentary lives, they tend to lose out on fitness and put on weight. In the Asian context, the carb rich food common culturally adds to this. Since 2010, many corporate executives, who spend long hours at a desk and also commute long distance, found no time for any exercise and could not stand the usual calorie restricted diet where on had to count everything one ate and also go through a day long sense of hunger. They were looking for alternate diets. This was the cultural opportunity that was targeted by many a small entrepreneur. So in internet savvy India with over 600 million internet users, we have Apps and diet plans that they access. Asking for Keto food only for themselves in a family was a tough call. Recognising this crowdculture, there are now Keto meal suppliers and even restaurants offering a Keto menu. These entrepreneurs depend exclusively on social media for promoting themselves and have been additionally getting wide media coverage too.
4. Diffuse the new ideology.
The obvious next step is to diffuse the new ideology and social media, the obvious choice
5. Innovate continually, using cultural flashpoints.
This is obvious as consumer fatigue needs to be overcome with fresh new messages to sustain the cultural relevance. An organic food brand should use every opportunity presented by health concerns released by healthcare experts about processed food to their advantage. Ben & Jerry’s did this during the Reagan administration. Amul, a market leader among butter brands in India has been consistently innovating with new messages over the years that capitalised on every cultural flash point, whether it was a fuel price increase or a blockbuster movies or even the US president.
Douglas Holt is the founder and president of the Cultural Strategy Group and was formerly a professor at Harvard Business School and the University of Oxford. He is the author of How Brands Become Icons: The Principles of Cultural Branding (Harvard Business School Press)