ipa excellence diploma - module 2 - brands and people - by tom darlington

8/3/2019 IPA Excellence Diploma - Module 2 - Brands and People - by Tom Darlington

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Tom Darlington @darlo_t

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IPA Excellence Diploma

Module 2I believe the future of brands and people lies in disrupting the cult of

Me

Tom Darlington@darlo_t


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I believe the future of brands and people lies in disrupting the cult of Me

David Ogilvy once famously remarked, people dont think how they feel, they dont say what

they think and they dont do what they say. For brands and agencies, so long forced to use

claimed behavioural information, the digital age provided soothing relief in the form of the

perpetual data stream (Charnock & Longden, 2010, p. 1) facilitated by real time

behavioural data.

However, as digital technology has matured, a dangerous trend has emerged that of

personalisation. This trend has the power to undo all of the good achieved by the web in its

infancy. Instead of creating connections, personalisation is cutting people off locking them

in an invisible echo chamber. This will ultimately reinforce prejudices, stifle the adoption of

new ideas and create people with a narrow worldview. The blame does not lie with the user,

but with media suppliers, services which have begun to chip away (Berners-Lee, 2010) at

the founding principles of the information age. People are becoming members of the cult of

me.

Brands, as devices trying to create behavioural change must rally against this. I believe the

future of brands and people will rely on brands acting as agent provocateur, challenging the

status quo, and attempting to lead the masses out of their silos via a distinct point of view.

Welcome the era of personalisation

In tandem with our surroundings, media is one of the most important contributors to who we

are as people. Media provides us with news, information, ideas, and entertainment much

of what we talk about is supplied to us via media outlets. In the modern era, digital

technology is radically changing and influencing all media channels, both old and new. In the

old media world, human editors decided which information to include at any one time. In the

digital age, algorithms pieces of code that form the back end of the Internet, are


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increasingly performing this role. Algorithms are optimising the content that we are exposed

to. Using our previous behaviour as its starting point, we are served content that is more

relevant to us - the media we consume is being personalised to our individual taste.

Websites like Google and Amazon use dozens of online behaviours to generate this

personalisation, and the more signals they use, the more individual our media consumption

becomes. Nicholas Negropontes vision of The Daily Me has come to fruition. (Negroponte,

1996)

This is not a trend limited to new media, as technology improves similar techniques are

being integrated into traditional media. BSkyB have announced that they are working on a

system called Adsense, which in tandem with their Sky Anytime service will serve

personalised content and advertising.

To paraphrase William Gibson, the future of Spielbergs Minority Report is already here, its just

unevenly distributed

In Outdoor advertising, traditionally the most broadcast of all media, ClearChannel are

testing facial recognition software providing different ads to different people based on sex,

age and mood.

The roots of personalisation come from an issue surrounding navigation of data. At the

Techonomy conference in August 2010, Google CEO Eric Schmidt suggested that Every


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two days we now create as much information as we did from the dawn of civilization up

until 2003 (Siegler, 2010). Given the torrents of information being published online daily,

algorithms such as Googles PageRanksystem were designed in order to help the consumer

find what they were looking for with a minimum of fuss. This is choice architecture in its

simplest guise, with the algorithm responsible for organising the context in which people

make decisions (Thaler & Sunstein, 2008, p. 3), in this case decisions about which content

is consumed (Fig.1). From an infinite amount of content, Google and other digital platforms

create a framework in which relevant content is delivered every time.

Fig.1 Choice architecture in actionthe higher a piece of information appears in Googles listings the

greater consumer interaction becomes(Optify Inc., 2011)

In stark contrast to the old world of communications where Leverhulme mused that half my

advertising budget is wasted, I just dont know which half this model of communication

provides no wastage. Advertisers can be assured that they are reaching exactly the people

they want, when they want to.


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Echo chambers and the Cult of Me

The algorithms that increasingly dictate which content we are exposed to are placing us into

our own, individual echo chambers. These echo chambers imprison us in invisible walls - we

are unaware of where the walls begin and end, what content we are allowed to see and what

we are shielded from. Eli Pariser calls this the filter bubble (Pariser, 2011). Based on what

we have viewed, interacted with, who are friends are, even what we email, content is filtered

and made specific to each of us. Echo Chambers, from a social point of view, are dangerous

places as Bill Bishop highlights social divisions, leads to extremism and highly polarised

views. (Bishop, p. 21) In the digital world we become surrounded by people who reinforce

our own views, in environments such as Facebook those (real world) friends who do not

mirror your behaviour are optimised out of your news feed (Pariser). Instead of creating

communities, cults are being formed the difference being a lack of diversity, which leads to

obsession. This is the cult of me. Once these walls begin surrounding the individual, they

are very hard to escape from. Every action we take reinforces them, and because this

process is invisible, it is hard to identify when and to what extent this is occurring. This is a

perfect example of Jay Forresters notion of feedback loops, systems that are refined

constantly based on the sending and receiving of signals (Curtis, 2011).

The systems which are segregating us from others in the name of a more personalised and relevant

experience.

These systems, either deliberately or inadvertently, take advantage of a number of cognitive

biases that are hardwired into the brain of every person. Firstly, we are programmed to


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confirm what we already know (Pariser, p. 88) the walls of the echo chambers we inhabit

are strengthened as we engage with content we already believe in. Secondly, human beings

are instinctively lazy, and delay difficultywe prioritise the easier now over the more

challenging soon (Hull, 2009, p. 13). We put off content, which may challenge us until later,

instead choosing to engage in more palatable material now further reinforcing the walls of

the silo, and making it harder for the new, more diverse ideas to get through. If a brand is

trying to generate behavioural change or introduce new ideas, these biases in conjunction

with the echo chambers they strengthen create a very inhospitable landscape in which to

operate.

How brands can disrupt the cult of me (and why they should care)

It could be fairly straightforward to suggest brands could simply hold up a mirror to their

consumers, creating communications that speak directly to the individual as the consumer

base segments itself further. Much of the current wisdom suggests personalised targeting is

the future of brand building; a whole issue of Admap was devoted to the subject. As much as

this method may bare fruit for business, I believe this is unsustainable long term for brands.

To counteract the hostile consumer conditions being created by digital environments, I

believe brands must take the following steps:

Learn to love wastage again

Lead consumers

Be an agent for change

Learn to love wastage again

The personalised world brings with it the promise of zero wastage, of always communicating

to those people you know are relevant. In an era when accountability is key, this is an

extremely attractive proposition to businesses. Brands, however, arent just consumed by


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their customers. For brands to have meaning, they need to be understood by not just those

who are relevant, but also those who arent. In the modern age, brands no longer simply

guarantee quality, but act as a badge or status symbol. Cars are a classic example of this.

We choose a vehicle not only because it meets our practical needs but also because it

makes a statement about whom we are.

Car manufacturer Audi have long understood that people who dont drive the cars are as

important as those who might, its about a shared cultural understanding of what that

purchase means (IPA, 2010) an insight which drives much of their communications

strategy. It is the people who dont drive the vehicles that lend value to the badge for those

who are. Statistical analysis of the IPAs databank by Peter Field and Les Binet verifies that

a mass approach to communication, which aims at creating Brand Fame is the most

successful in terms of short term sales benefit, and long term brand health (Binet & Field,

2007). Fame, as with the value attached to brands, is a quality, which is decided by the

many, rather than the few.

This view is further compounded by the work of Dr Byron Sharp. Sharp pos its that the key

marketing task is to make a brand easy to buy; this requires building mental and physical

availability (Sharp, 2010, p. 181). Sharp suggests that it is vital to avoid strategies which

fail to reach non-buyers or light buyers of the brand. Most of the brands sales potential lies

with these customers (Sharp, p. 202). If businesses decide that they can maximise sales

amongst customers in the short term by targeting only those relevant via behavioural data,

they may in fact be damaging the brands long-term health.

Leading consumers: create windows onto brands, not mirrors for consumers

As progress has been made in the area of neuroscience, we as an industry of brand

custodians have become more cognisant of how the human brain works. Neural networks in


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the brain strengthen and grow with repetition and time, neurons that fire together, wire

together (Franzen & Bouwman, 2001, p. 17) these are the same systems that interpret

brands. Consistency and repetition are crucial in establishing strong brand recognition in the

mind as connections which are no longer used become weaker (Franzen & Bouwman).

Brand communications are vital in cementing these associations over time, and for a brand,

which simply mirrored a multitude of individual consumers, certain associations that make up

the overall perception of what a brand stands for would vanish. Eventually the overall brand

associations would become weaker and fragmented the value of the brand as badge, or

social signifier, would be lost.

From an organisational point of view, a solid, defined brand identity is an invaluable asset. A

strong brand is as directional for people within a business (what should we make, how

should we operate, who do we employ) as it is for the consumers who use them as

heuristics for decision making. A brand that is defined, in any number of ways, by customers

rather than brand owners would become a rudderless ship. As Henry Ford once said If Id

asked my customers what they wanted, I would have built a faster horse.

Brands may be a collection of perceptions in the mind of the consumer(Feldwick, 2002, p.

4), but they rely heavily on the same perceptions being held by a volume of people. Brands

need to take a distinct point of view on the world, which is expressed through every

consumer touchpoint. As with repetition, consistency is central to brands building strong

neural networks in the brain (Franzen & Bouwman). Consistency and repetition build the

shared experiences brands require to be successful.

Be an agent for change: Challenge consumer bias

Whilst the personalised web may be taking advantage of the biases that are hardwired into

our brains, other biases exist which present an opportunity for brand owners. In 1956, Leon

Festinger coined the term Cognitive Dissonance. This relates to the fact people have


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a motivational drive to reduce dissonance. They do this by changing their attitudes, beliefs,

and actions (Festinger, 1956). Dissonance is the discomfort experienced by people when

they are confronted with something which opposes something they already know or belief.

Dissonance is an extremely powerful force, and one which when used correctly has the

power to truly affect peoples behaviour. The COI in the UK has long struggled with how to

encourage people to stop smoking, it is a habit that is not only harmful to the individual but

burdens the state. By recognising that smokers freely understood the damage they were

doing to themselves, the COI realised they had to reframe the issue in order to achieve their

desired behavioural change. Instead of focussing on the end user, communications were

used to demonstrate the emotional harm to the smokers family (Kemp, Nairn, & Waters,

2010, p. 1). Previous communications, had simply confirmed what smokers already knew

(Kemp, Nairn, & Waters, p. 2). The dissonance caused by damaging your childrens future,

rather than the damage to the user was a significant trigger in changing peoples attitude

toward nicotine addiction.

In the personalised world the creation of dissonance provides a powerful tool in creating

behavioural change. Brands that choose not to mirror their consumers but instead take a

differentiated point of view will have the advantage over those brands that mirror, rather than

challenge, consumer biases. Mirroring consumers based on the behaviour they currently

demonstrate removes this powerful tool from your arsenal.

I believe the future of brands and people

In 1964, Marshall McLuhan suggested, we shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape

us (McLuhan, 1964). In the era of personalisation, this prophecy has become manifest

with technology deciding what we see and when we see it. Brands, as consumer centric

devices, must rebel against the walls of personalisation to guarantee their own futures.

Strong brands, are shared cultural symbols which lead the public, rather than simply mirror


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current behaviour. In doing so, brands can perform in the interests of society introducing

new ideas and challenging the status quo. This challenge to consumers will be ever more

important as people gorge themselves on ideas in their own image, a scenario which has the

potential to stagnate innovation and progress in society. Brands must fight the cult of me.


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ipa excellence diploma - module 2 - brands and people - by tom darlington

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