How To Scale Without Losing Your Soul: Part II
Sell enough without selling out.
It’s one of the greatest challenges any growing brand will face: staying true to your reason for being and remembering why you’re here, who you are, and who you’re for. As I outlined in last week’s post, there are a few common culprits of soul-hijacking that a brand must watch out for, including misaligned partnerships, a myopic focus on new customer acquisition, and a lack of quality control. After reading last week’s piece, a colleague and friend suggested that the unifying theme here is greed. Perhaps, but I am hesitant to paint this picture with such broad strokes. I fundamentally believe that growth is good, money can be used for good, and business can be a force for good. It’s the culturally pervasive “growth at all costs” mindset that can intoxicate founders, leading them to make hasty, haphazard decisions that can derail strategy, drain resources, and destroy a brand.
It doesn’t have to be this way. There are brands that have steadily and profitably scaled while keeping their soul intact. While I believe they represent the exception and not the rule, it’s not a game of luck. Below I share 10 things a brand should consider as it scales.
10 Considerations For Scaling With Soul
Always return to WHY. Simply put, the WHY is the soul of a brand. Simon Sinek made this concept mainstream, and this was rule #1 at my agency, Oyl + Water. It’s a universal truth about branding, marketing, storytelling and living a life of purpose. And yet, it is often the first core value that gets cut when a business adopts a “growth at all costs” mindset. A brand’s founder and leadership team (all of them, not just the CMO or CBO) should not only know but champion their brand purpose and be evangelists for the brand values. This brand DNA should be reflected in the company culture, woven into all brand communication, and be represented at every board meeting. The WHY is the alpha and omega, and losing sight of it is the death knell for a brand. It is the fastest way for subpar strategies and tactics to take over in an effort to drive top line revenue more rapidly. Clickbait copy, chasing trends and an over-reliance performance marketing may lead to short term gains, but they slowly eat away at the very soul of the brand.
Codify brand values. If the WHY is the brand’s soul, then the values are its muscles and bones, helping to give it shape and weight so that it can stand tall and move through the world without falling flat on its face. Brand values provide structure to support the WHY. Unfortunately, brand values are often vague, hard to measure, and easily compromised. That’s why it’s crucial to codify brand values as early as possible by creating a tangible and actionable framework that guides every aspect of how the brand operates and communicates, ensuring that the brand's actions are always aligned with its WHY. This helps create consistency within the company culture, and externally with consumer perception.
Commit to customer centricity. Not to beat this to death, but if the WHY is the brand’s soul, and the values are its muscles and bones, then the customers are the heartbeat. They are pumping life into the brand with their purchase, of course, but even more so with their attention, engagement, and loyalty. One of the biggest mistakes companies make is putting the brand at the center of the customer journey, and viewing their customers transactionally rather than relationally. In the era of distributed commerce, where there is no beginning or end to the customer journey but instead a continuous loop of discovery, inspiration, connection, and (only sometimes) conversion, it is essential that the customer is at the center of the brand. In a recent research article published by Vogue Business, over half of Gen Z believes that brand loyalty isn’t defined by purchase alone, but by “loving the brand”, following the brand on social media, and telling friends about the brand. This is a paradigm shift in the way today’s consumers think, behave, shop and traverse. They want brands to relate to them via well-executed engagement strategies at various touch points.
New research from Archrival reveals how Gen Z is rewriting the path to purchase, as seen in Vogue Business. Reimagine customer retention. Retention isn’t as sexy as acquisition. The goal of acquisition is growth and expansion. It often requires more investment and carries higher risk, but it drives top line growth which has been the name of the game since the explosion of DTC "unicorn" brands. Retention, on the other hand, focuses on sustainably nurturing existing relationships. It a slow and steady strategy, requiring personalization, creativity and continuous customer insights. A strong retention strategy is more than simply maintaining a customer base and securing repeat purchases. It’s about cultivating a community of brand advocates and delivering ongoing value beyond the product itself. With the traditional marketing funnel proving too simplistic and performance marketing proving too costly, brands must now adopt a consistent, creative, and authentic approach to building relationships. This means engaging with customers both online and off, wherever they are. Despite today's consumers being more brand-agnostic and non-committal, the opportunities to connect have never been greater.
Build your brand universe. #3 and #4 point to shifts in commerce and consumer landscapes, and both require that brands create new playbooks. The good news is that building a strong brand universe is a move that benefits both. With the customer at the center of the brand experience and a focus on nurturing long-term relationships, your brand universe becomes much more than a website, social channels and retail partners. A brand universe comes to life with strategies that engage customers directly in key decisions, from product development to content creation. You might include loyalty programs rewarding product testing, exclusive access to closed group channels for deeper connections and immediate feedback, or experiential pop-ups and collaborations that invite customers further into your world. Don’t be afraid to show up in unexpected places, wherever your customers are, to make an impact. I recently popped into Cha Cha Matcha on Abbot Kinney and saw a Kosas popup promoting the launch of Revealer Concealer. It took me a second for this to sink in. What does an iced matcha latte have to do with shade matching? Nothing really, except for the customer. (I bought shade 3.6C and I’m obsessed.)
In a US survey reported by WGSN, 92% of Gen Z said that the community surrounding a brand impacts their feelings toward it.
