The ABCs of Content
Find out how the authenticity hierarchy, DTC grooming products, and fart sounds can help your brand.
A is for Authenticity
As surely as the sun will rise, any piece on content will deploy the A-word early and often.
We believe there is an authenticity hierarchy, with three tiers:
Tier 1: Relatable.
Consistency in personality.
These brands are a mirror for the audience, vibe-wise. Think Pedestrian and Betoota as the upper end of the scale, whereas the lower end would be brands posting Twitter screenshots to show they ‘get it’.
This tier is the equivalent of a friend.
Tier 2: Authentic.
Consistency in behaviour.
These brands are an embodiment of the audience (Patagonia, DTC darlings like Koala, Billie, etc). The spirit and values and actions of these brands align with their demographic.
This tier is the equivalent of a celebrity crush.
Tier 3: Too Big To Fail.
Consistency in presence.
Us first, you’ll follow. These are brands like Apple and Nike, which are aware of and informed by society/culture, but are ultimately more influential than reactive.
This tier is the equivalent of an idol (btw never forget when the Pope said Mary was the original influencer).
Something else to consider is that realness is currently in high demand on social. In the below excerpt from a recent The New Yorker piece about influencers, Tavi Gevinson recounts her visit to Instagram’s offices, where she’s told irl stuff does better than living your best life content:
“Aspirational photos did better a few years ago, but now users crave posts that seem to be behind-the-scenes, candid,” [Gevinson] wrote. (“Seem” being the operative word.) Research by marketing companies confirms this trend; the consensus is that, at least on Instagram, the art of influencing is now about “relatability.”
B is for Brand
Never underestimate the power of a 1080x1080 box of pixels.
That box of pixels is an extension of your brand.
The content produced by a brand should be viewed in macro terms and not in isolation e.g. BuzzFeed isn’t just quizzes and Complex is more than just ‘Hot Ones’.
This is seldom the way content is perceived or approached: it’s more on a per-post basis (you’re only as good as your last post kinda thing) and not a grander brand narrative.
To illustrate the (lucrative) relationship between brand and content, let’s look at two big acquisitions in the personal grooming space: Edgewell, which owns Schick, bought competitor Harry’s for $US1.4 billion in May; Unilever purchased Dollar Shave Club for $US1.6bn in 2017.
Why the shaving spending spree? For the two buyers, a huge amount of value lay within their DTC rivals’ ability to develop strong brand identities, shrewdly market themselves, and engage (then convert) consumers.
C is for Community
“We don’t spark trends, we set them on fire,” TikTok says in one of its decks.
In case you’ve been deprived of internet, TikTok is the ephemeral, this-is-me platform du jour. It recently eclipsed 1.5bn downloads and demonstrates how content and community can co-exist in wacky harmony.
The brands have landed on TikTok and an Insta-replica is being trialled atm, yet it still remains a relatively pure social platform, bristling with silly choreography and fart sounds.
Looking at its success, two questions spring to mind:
Is your brand chasing high-octane virality or slow burn community-building? Not that they’re mutually exclusive, but which is your priority?
Content is a bottom-up field: the players up top (brands) are more often responding to or leveraging conversations from below than sparking them. So, how are you working with your audience to optimise your content?
Turning the spotlight onto ourselves, here are a couple ways we’ve addressed these points in recent times:
- By working with our partners better and more i.e. it’s not all discounts, all the time. The 2019 Student Awards is our most recent and substantial example of a campaign that champions our audience and gives them opportunities to collaborate with their favourite brands.
- Our podcast, The BuZZ, is now one season down. Our hosts went to the University of Melbourne to record two eps with students and also do a couple of focus groups. We’re actively looking to build our roster of student creators and do more with UNiDAYS members.
