It seems that with this trend that we see in some companies and in a large majority of marketing blogs, including this one, we have just reinvented the wheel. And as it usually happens philippines girls telegram in marketing, what we have done is to name a behavior to an aspect of the relationship between consumer and company.
As with the sales funnel or purchase funnel (not to be confused with the funnels made up of certain automations that lead the user to the sale that describes one of the possible paths to the final objective), we are talking about the sales process already defined with the AIDA methodology in 1904, with the brand purpose we are talking about something that we have been dealing with for some time in the brand strategy of companies and that few companies took seriously.
When I talked about defining brand purpose in previous articles, we saw several options from people who have been working with this approach for decades.
But just as with the definition of insight, we understand it better when we summarize it and bring it to the consumer's field (an insight is the reason why someone would buy your product or service, but wouldn't tell you so), when we talk about brand purpose we ask ourselves the following question to define it and understand it at the same time:
What would the world lose if your company disappeared?
I know it may sound too lofty or pretentious to believe that all companies have a valuable contribution to the world. This question is more about what society loses if your company does not exist. If the answer is something like we would not supply our products, your company has a fundamental problem. It does not contribute much beyond its functional value.
A purpose-driven company is focused on making a positive impact on the world. Whatever its area of influence (local, national or international), a company is able to connect with its audience when it seeks to improve the society around it in some way. It doesn't have to be social or environmental (as many companies confuse), it is what the company wants to achieve beyond sales.
If Apple were to disappear, in addition to no longer having its products, we would lose a company that has been a reference in its sector for decades due to its innovative and disruptive products. And more importantly, for many of its customers it would represent the loss of a reference in their lifestyle.
How to implement brand purpose in a company
We study and promote brand purpose for its connection with customers (and the benefits that this brings to the company in the form of sales), but the reality is that this positive effect extends to suppliers, partners, investors and other interest groups (or stakeholders as we call them in marketing). They all feel more committed to a company with a soul than to one that ships products.
It is not enough to have a clear brand purpose for it to be visible throughout the company and for it to be successful. To achieve this, we must begin by creating a direct relationship between the purpose and the quality of the company that generates the most value.
For example, if Inditex, with Zara at the helm, were to define their brand purpose, they should create a direct relationship with what they do best: logistics and design (their ability to create new designs and put them in stores with high frequency).
To bring it down to earth, we can follow the golden circle methodology that I have previously described in this blog:
Why = brand purpose.
How : They represent the environments where we can make the purpose a reality. Ultimately, they represent the components of our value proposition for our clients, those things that make it a reality. This is where we unite that contribution beyond the product, with the design of products and services that represent it, with processes, attitudes, etc. that make it possible.
What : the tangible nature of the hows. In social and commercial policies, etc., that represent the why, in products that are aligned with what our clients are looking for and with what the company represents, with processes that support them, etc.
To ensure that we have taken into account all the most important points, we should start the exercise by reviewing our business model , to define which points we need to review and refocus.
My marketing philosophy has always been from the inside out and from less to more , so applying it to this case and adding the phases of the golden circle, I think that the pillars of the brand purpose implementation process are: