If you’ve got feet, you probably wear socks. All things being equal, what inspires you to purchase one sock brand over another? Is there a differentiation point in comfy footwear substantial enough to carry a new company and sustain profit?
For wunderkind brand Bombas, the answer is emphatically yes. And the successful sock maker cites a clear brand purpose that drives long-lasting, meaningful customer relationships. The brand was born just five years ago after the founders learned that socks were the most requested item in homeless shelters. Inspired, they focused their efforts on creating an innovative, style-forward sock line that also gives back to the community. Their one-for-one business model means they donate a pair of socks for each sold. To date, over 8.5 million pairs have warmed the feet of individuals impacted by homelessness.
What drives these powerful results? “I think it adds up to an experience where people are thinking about socks in a way that they never have before,” says Randy Goldberg, co-founder and chief brand officer of Bombas. “They’re turned on to the idea that there’s something better out there that they can realize. It kind of ruins other socks for them.”
Brand purpose can be defined quite simply as the reason a brand exists. Not limited to products and services, it describes the company’s foundational beliefs and the unique—sometimes even intangible—value proposition a company offers its customers. Harnessing the power of purpose informs evolution of the business and inspires both employees and customers to continually invest. Executed successfully, it becomes the foundation on which all marketing, communications and experience can be built. After all, almost all companies have competitors, but a brand with a clear, communicated ethos has a powerful differentiator in the hearts and minds of customers.
For today’s CMOs, an even bigger challenge is ensuring that the brand purpose is reflected in brand experience. While brand purpose might amount to “doing good,” its importance is not limited to purpose-driven or cause-related marketing. Instead, it infuses core values into everyday transactions, business strategy and product development to create richer emotional bonds with customers at every touchpoint.
We spoke with CMOs at several leading brands whose purpose continues to drive their overall customer experiences.
Ben & Jerry’s
Ben & Jerry’s established, three-part mission drives its decision-making: Make fantastic ice cream—for its own sake. Manage the company for sustainable financial growth. Use the company in innovative ways to make the world better. This three-pronged statement powerfully serves the brand’s social ethos, first by committing to a delicious, beloved product and then by sustainable management of profits. Equal commitment to these distinct pillars fuels meaningful investment in the ice cream maker’s communities and their impact on the world at large.
“What we discovered early on is that if you lead with ice cream, people are more likely to have a conversation with you about activism or about your values or about your purpose,” says Ben & Jerry’s CMO Dave Stever.
Over the years, the Ben and Jerry’s marketing machine has been fine-tuned to serve their brand purpose, whether they’re boasting amazing new flavors or inspiring social change. Stever says, “The same tools that we use to market flavors are the same tools that we use to communicate our mission and our values and our activism to our fans. That involves flavors, that involves scoop shops, that involves menu items in our scoop shops.”
“As a marketer, I think I love everything that Ben & Jerry’s stands for because we’re set up not to just have transactions with our consumers, but to build relationships and talk about a multitude of things, whether it’s pop culture …[or] what’s going on in the White House,” he adds.
Seventh Generation
Marketing an environmentally conscious brand in-store presents challenges other brands don’t often face, says Hanneke Willenborg, CMO for Seventh Generation, a maker of plant-based cleaning products whose brand purpose whose brand purpose is all about sustainability (Its mission statement: To inspire a consumer revolution that nurtures health of the next seven generations). For instance, its laundry detergent bottles are white (dyes make the plastic harder to recycle) so it is at a disadvantage on the shelf next to the bright orange and deep blues of Tide and Cheer. And its biodegradable ingredients and botanical oils are more expensive.
“Designing for sustainability in today’s world comes with a cost,” Willenborg says. She adds that “The biggest barrier for green products is that people worry their diapers will leak and the detergent won’t get the stains out,” she says.
That means providing a brand experience that is based on transparency and trust about how its products are safe for people, their families and the environment. Now part of Unilever, Seventh Generation believes that consumers have a right to know what’s in the bottles they buy. At the same time, the brand has to show that plant-based products are as effective as chemical ones—something it is doing now through its “Powered by Plants” video campaign starring SNL star Maya Rudolph.
“Our business fuels our mission and our mission fuels our business. You can’t have one without the other,” Willenborg says.
Fetzer
For 50 years the Mendocino County winery Fetzer has championed sustainable farming, says marketing VP Rodrigo Maturana. It was a pioneer in the farm-to-table movement, the first vintner to operate entirely using green energy, and its Bonterra label currently accounts for more than 40 percent of all organic wines sold in the U.S.
But communicating those messages in a supermarket next to hundreds of other bottles is a challenge.
“Most of our marketing efforts are related to the point of purchase,” Maturana says. “We try to scream as much as we can about the organic aspects of Bonterra. But you can’t go too deep into purpose when people are shopping for wine. It’s easier on social media and the Web, where we have more control over what we communicate.”
It comes down to authenticity, something that Fetzer back up through its history of being at the forefront of organic farming and viniculture. “You compete with brands that have bigger budget or are larger than ours. But I think that’s when authenticity comes to be a key driver within the journey of purchasing a wine,” he says.
REI
Started 80 years ago by 23 people with a common passion for outdoor activity, REI’s purpose is authentically baked into everything they do. Even its status as a co-op enables people to come together and enjoy great gear not simply as consumers but as members. “For us, it’s about ‘How do we put that [brand purpose] into action?’” says chief creative officer Ben Steele. “It’s the ability to walk into a store and encounter a level of authenticity you won’t find anywhere else.”
Environmental and social values infuse everything REI does, says Steele. In April, REI announced a sustainability standards program that details the environmental and economic requirements for the 1000+ products it carries. Every Black Friday, REI closes its stores so employees and members can enjoy the outdoors, and last year’s Force of Nature campaign addressed gender inequity.
“We did a brand takeover,” he says. “For all of 2017 every story, photo, and film we put out on Facebook, Instagram, email and our direct mail pieces led with women. We were driving a conversation about the quality of life and the outdoor space and talking about these big ideas while also telling people about an awesome coat. We believe it’s our job to do both of those things.
“We’re stewards of the outdoors, not just in terms of the experience you have, but in terms of the quality of life outdoors. That’s the standard we try to hold ourselves to.”
