Over half a century ago, consumer research was considered irrelevant and the ad-man-as-god model ruled the landscape: whatever the advertising said the product was, that’s what the product was, and you needed it.
Forward thinkers caught on early: Theodore Levitt in his classic Marketing Myopia argued that the downfall of companies is a lack of focus on the consumer perspective; and advertising guru Bill Bernbach realized that consumers really weren’t paying attention to everything the companies were shouting in their ads:
Do you know that 85% of ads don’t get looked at?…They ignore us…We’re right about everything, but nobody looks.
Decades later, spurred on by the rise of the Internet and consumer generated media, focus shifted to the opposite end of the spectrum, and shouts from the advertising world echoed around the world: “Help! The consumer is now in control!”
The latest incarnation of the consumer-in-control model was explored by Rob Walker in his popular Buying In: the best brands act as blank slates for consumers to craft their own personal history. One brand Walker highlights is Red Bull, showing how a variety of different people from extreme-sports enthusiasts to club goers have latched onto the drink. Yet, despite never telling consumers what they should think of the product, Red Bull, as detailed in Alex Wipperfurth’s Brand Hijack, releases a manual to determine which events are on brand and off brand—hardly the behavior of a company that gives over total meaning to the consumer.
The truth is that consumers never were and never will be in control, and neither were or will the companies and their advertising agencies. Great brands have always realized that, just like in all aspects of life, there are two parts to great relationships—it’s a constant give and take.
Over at The Cult Branding Company, we help clients understand the nature of this relationship—we like to use the term “coauthored brands.” The brand sets the initial context, grounded in the nature of its products (Red Bull can’t get away from its extreme nature, it’s an energy drink, and Apple would be hard pressed to anchor its brand away from beauty and creativity), of what its value is for the customer, but from that point it becomes altered and refined through a constant dialogue between the customers and the brand.
This coauthored experience is something that it is hard for many brands, especially large ones, to understand and even harder to implement. One brand that really gets it is Wine Library TV and its creator Gary Vaynerchuk.
After transforming his parents’ alcohol business into the over $45-million-a-year wine business Wine Library, Gary picked up early on the trend of social networking (a Twitter user since 2006), and promoting his brand online. With that in mind he created Wine Library TV where he regularly broadcasts episodes of him tasting and evaluating wine.
His goal with the show is to inspire passion for wine among his viewers, inviting them to find wines that “bring the thunder” for them—wines that excite them and deepen their passion for the Dionysian juice.
And this is where Gary really excels. Although he rates the wines on his show, he reiterates how important it is to find your own taste in wine, and explore the wine world, making it okay if you like a wine he doesn’t.
Gary even admits he likes drinking wines he doesn’t rate highly, because they expand his knowledge of wine and he finds them interesting. This is in contrast to other critics in the industry whose reviews that focus on a point hierarchy that gives the wine drinker little incentive to try a wide variety of wines.
Gary counts 80,000 viewers on Wine Library TV daily (in addition to over 675,000 Twitter followers), with his most devoted fans deubbing themselves Vayniancs. This Vayniac nation cuts across demographic barriers, ranging from people who started out like Gary—those interested in wine who are too young to drink and yearning for the time they can try their first glass—to even seasoned wine professionals.
Gary understands that the real force behind changing people’s opinions on the accessibility of wine, and therefore building his brand, lies with his viewers.
Gary signs off each show with, “You, with a little bit of me, we’re changing the wine world.” It’s rare for brands to understand the nature of a co-authored brand and how critical it is to developing a successful, lasting following. Kudos to Gary for getting something so few brands do.
Now that Gary is expanding his business into the consulting business Vaynermedia with his brother AJ Vaynerchuk, he is conveying the same message to his clients. In a video blog post in May, Gary speaks of what he likes to call storytelling, and how great storytelling becomes the property of the group by the end, as everyone adds a little bit to it. Gary’s use of storytelling is another way to think of a coauthored experience.
Many companies entering the “social media” stream (Vaynerchuk hates the phrase and so do I, my part because it encourages thinking of it as just another media channel alternative to radio and television) are treating it just like another channel for broadcasting messages. The ultimate use of this medium will for brands to be able to establish a strong connection with their fervent consumer base, deepen their understanding of their passionate fans, and do more of what all great brands have always done: create coauthored experiences.
Tags: brand · Branding · Business · cult brand · gary vaynerchuk · Marketing · red bull · wine library tv1 Comment
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