Move over Digital Transformation, It’s Time for Brand-Led Transformation

For the past five or six years, digital transformation has been a key priority for brands as they look to refine their CX, smooth out their commerce platforms, get their data flows organised, ensure their tech stacks are cutting edge and get the business in a fit state to adapt to any disruptive new tech on the horizon. 

But isn’t it all much of a muchness? The best practice wind tunnel has brought most brands in alignment.

So is it time to take digital best practice as a given and focus on brand-led business transformation? With so many new categories emerging and new frontiers for businesses, how are brands and their agency partners looking to evolve? 

Aristotle Onassis famously said, “We must free ourselves of the hope that the sea will ever rest, we must learn to sail in high winds”. This belief and call for adaptability and resilience to life’s changes and challenges applies to business as much as personal life.

It is within this context that I view business, organisational and brand transformation - not as an end goal itself but as a constant striving to remain relevant and able to service our customers better than any other alternative. And to achieve this, I believe brands and teams should be set up to be comfortable with this agility, although this is counter to the way that humans are hard-wired and most institutions and brands operate.

Brand Transformation for a Brand New World

When I think about the notion of Brand led business transformation in a world characterised by volatility, the questions that arise for me are:

1. How can an organisation leverage its brand and equity to pursue new opportunities?

2. How can we be comfortable challenging and adapting to change in order to remain relevant?

To delve into these questions I draw on three recent observations.

Culture is more important than brand

In the early days of branding, marketers and advertisers were focused on external branding and image or identity making. 

As society has evolved to become more participatory and creative, brands should have a role at the centre of this creation. To this end, culture needs to matter more than brands, that is not to say that brands are not important, but brands have to be part of culture rather than a detached layer sitting on top of it or borrowing from it.

And these days, not only does culture move at a rapid rate but we are evolving from a unified cultural experience to a highly targeted and granular experience, so the opportunities to be part of multiple relevant sub-cultures is greater and more necessary.

Be Comfortable Having Multiple Conversations

New media and social platforms allow us to have multiple conversations about different topics in different ways, for different audiences. And brands should be comfortable not being in control but rather to turn the control over to their customers. This is how Tik-Tok has become so successful, it gives the reins to people and allows them to use a brand in the way they want to.

If brands wish to have a compelling place in our modern economy, they should develop multiple layers of communication and creative depending on the circumstances.

‘Brandplasticity’ - Imagining a New Future For Brands

Though the allure of brands has always been their consistency and heuristic cues, we no longer operate in a world of fixed parameters or limited access to information. Additionally, the speed of change is so great and people are much more comfortable with the idea of intersectionality and fluidity and also discovery.

The latest neuroscience research is around the concept of neuroplasticity - the brain's ability to change and adapt as a result of experience. For example, Dr. Tara Swart shows that our thoughts, emotions, and behaviours can physically change the brain's structure and function.

If a highly complex organism like the brain and human behaviour can change and adapt, so can your brand. In business and branding, a brand must be able to be change and adapt depending on the cultural forces around it. Our role as marketers is no longer just custodians and guardians of brand but enablers of creativity and orchestrators of pivots depending on the cultural zeitgeist.

In conclusion, as we enter a new stage of human and business evolution led by cultural and technological change, there is opportunity to navigate these complex waters by developing more agile and multi-dimensional brands that are born from culture rather than adjunct to it.