On Purpose
I recently got back into working out. In my mid 20s through my mid 30s, I found weight training and running were really what my mind needed to stay balanced. However, after an unexpected layoff; an ACL tear and subsequent reconstruction and rehab; a move; kid #1; another layoff; another move; another kid (#2); COVID; caring for—and eventually losing—a terminally ill parent—all in the span of about 5 years—my motivation (and time) had been sapped and I rarely found the will to visit the gym. Fast forward a few more years to starting a business, navigating an uncertain economy, and requiring the energy to simply exist day-in/day-out in our current state of affairs, I knew something had to change.
If you’ve ever worked with me, you know I enjoy a metaphor. They aren’t always good ones, but I find them helpful when trying to talk to people who have little or no understanding or background in branding. In the past I’ve used the metaphor of working out to describe how branding works for businesses. It takes consistency and time to show results. The first couple of months you start doing it, you might not see any tangible results (just tell that CFO to back off!). But you know from seeing other people who dedicate themselves to working out regularly, that, over time, the benefits accrue and the investment pays off. And while I still believe this to be true, I’ve also been thinking about this from another point of view. It’s not just discipline, consistency, and time that build results. It’s motivation. The hardest part of working out is not the weights, or the machines, or the running. It’s overcoming inertia. It’s putting your shoes on. I stopped working out because I was so burned out by everything else in my life that was on fire that it was hard to find my motivation.
Lately, I’ve seen the empiricist pundits and the anti “woke-vertising” malign “brand purpose.” And while I don’t dispute that altruistic advertising not aligned with a brand’s values or perceptions will likely not be effective (and instead be very likely damaging), I do take umbrage with the co-opting of the term “brand purpose” to label this activity. Because just as I needed a clear and compelling motivation to return to (and sustain) my fitness journey, brands need clear and compelling purpose as well.
Brands are not built in agencies, in conference rooms, online, or in the store. They are built when an employee decides they are motivated enough to act in accordance with what the brand ultimately stands for, and that relies on a clear and compelling purpose. It doesn’t need to be “woke” or altruistic. But it does need to be something other than “make a bunch of money” or “deliver returns for shareholders.”
At the end of the day, brands are an accretion of beliefs, actions, and behaviors from employees of a given business. Your perception, as a potential customer, of how those actions and behaviors manifest equals your perception of that brand. When motivations are not aligned, actions and behaviors follow accordingly. Customers notice. Brand perception falls.
What most of the pundits and haters get wrong is that brand purpose is not for you. It’s for the brand, literally (it even says so right there). It’s for the people that actually do the work to make the brand work. It never belonged in an ad campaign in the first place. But it does belong.
If you’ve been on a fitness journey, you understand there’s a point in the beginning where you can tell your body’s beginning to respond, but no one else can. You are the first to notice the shift. Eventually, the continued work compounds and those results become visible to those around you. Great brands find their motivation and are able to sustain it over time. It attracts great people who in turn build a great culture that produces amazing things.
When you begin your fitness journey, think about your motivation; do you do it for yourself, or for others? And which do you think will be more sustainable in the long term?
