I SEE DEAD BRANDS

Back in 1990, I wrote a thesis for my undergraduate course at the School of Communication and Arts at USP (University of São Paulo), titled: A Holistic View of Advertising.

At the time, I was very impressed by reading Fritjof Capra's book, The Turning Point, and fascinated by the concept of a holistic view of the world. I could no longer see things the way I used to. But what did the work say?

Basically, I proposed that Marketing stop worrying only about itself and start looking at the company as a whole. The premise was simple: Marketing (and its tools) would lose power if it focused only on promoting a product or service based on a creative appeal, and companies would not survive if they could not deliver on the promise of communication. In other words, if you wanna talk the talk, you’re gonna walk the walk.

Today, this is nothing new, and we are seeing milestones that end up sinking in the gap that exists between discourse and delivery, especially in a world with ubiquitous social media. Every failure in delivery ends up reaching consumers' ears on the same day. And you can't trust that everything will be understood, forgiven, overlooked.

I won't say that the difference between promise and delivery per se is the main reason for the death of products, services, and companies. There are many factors, such as poor management, extinct markets, changes in consumer profiles, etc. But communication that promises what a product or service cannot deliver is the sure path to disaster and a clear symptom of something bigger.

I call this brandless marketing; after all, a brand is not what you claim it to be, but what the consumer believes it to be. Bradesco thinks it's a technological bank, but it's just the most aggressive and present of the private banks. The Post Office thinks it conveys trust, but the consumer only trusts it because they have no other option.

The origin of this disconnect is varied. We have companies that simply forget what their brands mean (or should mean), and companies that simply don't care, believing they will exist forever. Among them, we have those that think the brand is the emblem printed on the product and that the content doesn't matter. With this mindset, they outsource manufacturing, specification, sales, and customer service. And they discover that the consumer no longer knows what the product is or what the brand means. When these companies understand this, the brand has already disappeared or lost all relevance.

I remember when BMW bought Rolls Royce (actually, the brand, since no factory was included in the sale), the question was: who will want a luxury car that doesn't even use its own engine? Many predicted that the brand would disappear or lose value, but that's not exactly what happened. There's an explanation: the English brand of the "spirit of ecstasy" never even disclosed the real power of its vehicles ("sufficient," was the information in the manuals and brochures), so not worrying about the engine but about the product as a whole was already part of Rolls-Royce's consumer behavior. BMW just didn't let the ball drop.

Exactly the opposite of what happened with Ford and all the brands it bought: Land Rover, Jaguar, Aston Martin, Volvo, etc. Ford bought them and almost destroyed them all. Those who follow the automotive market weren't surprised: Ford buys brands only to reduce costs because it doesn't cut where it should (it's still a family business with all the drawbacks that implies in a corporation of that size) and it can't even figure out what its consumers expect, let alone other brands. The fact is that it tried to reduce platforms, engines, systems, design, and failed to incorporate any of the qualities of the brands it had under its control. It couldn't even increase their value to sell at a profit.

The point is that marketing needs to be connected to the inner workings of the product and the service it eventually includes. Talking about quality when that's all the consumer doesn't see is wasting money down a bottomless pit: the more consumers you attract, the more dissatisfaction you generate.

Consumers are tolerant when a brand fails, but not when it lies. And we have more and more lies, from banks that collapse soon after using celebrity testimonials, to products sold with supposed exclusivity at exorbitant prices that cost pennies in Asia. Or cars that promise completely false CO2 emissions (did I hear someone mention Dieselgate?). Not understanding that the consumer is connected to the world is to be very naive or shortsighted.

And we haven't even seen much of what AI can do in this regard. It won't be long before we have apps that investigate the past of brands and bring reviews that marketing would rather never have existed. Just wait. This is already being done with celebrities. So, don't think there's a safe place in a hyper-connected world: there are no more rugs to sweep the dirt under.

What you promise you have to deliver. If you can't, admit your inability or promise less. A brand is not a commodity, much less a superfluous item. A brand is the soul of the product, what it says what it's all about, what it promises, and what to expect from it. Killing the brand is keeping the product and the company on life support.