Hi, it's Jacob here.
I’d like to pick up the thread from the last newsletter where Marielle was writing about micro-trends and the core-ification of fashion.
This is something I too am fascinated by, except I’m a middle-aged man so I tend to approach these phenomena as an observer rather than a participant!
For those who didn’t read Marielle’s piece, here’s a quick recap: In recent times you might have noticed the word “aesthetic” cropping up rather a lot.
‘Aesthetic’ is how the young people appear to be thinking about fashion and style. There are lots of aesthetics, and you can learn how to get them from TikTok or Youtube, and experiment until you find one that’s right for you. Aesthetic guides, made by fans of the aesthetic, will tell you which outfits to buy, which hobbies to take up, movies to watch, home decor accessories to buy and even where to go on holiday.
An aesthetic, essentially, is a coherent visual style. They’re rooted in fashion, but also tend to be a feeling, a lifestyle, as the young people might say “a vibe”.
I find this rather revealing (and endlessly fun). This content shows us something that’s been hiding in plain sight for a long time - aesthetics drive purchases. People buy things because they like how they look, or because of how the way they look complements how they see themselves. And just maybe, this might apply to brands and not just products…
In the last five years UK consumers have searched “aesthetics” 5x more than “climate change”. Here’s a simple survey I conducted last week:
Fairly convincingly, “my aesthetic” is much more significant as a claimed driver of purchase than “my values”; “my politics”; “my sexuality”; “my age” or even whether something is new or fashionable.
Why then don’t we talk about brand aesthetics more? Indeed, why do we think that factors such as how we style the people in our ads, or the type of photography or illustration used are “executional” but not “strategic”? Why is it “shallow” to choose something based on how it looks, but “meaningful” to choose it because of what it “means” in culture, or how it reflects our values?
Why do some brands think its ok to make something as ugly as this:
Strategy means focusing on what’s most important. Culture and consumers seem to say that aesthetics matter. Research seems to be telling us that “distinctive assets” matter.
But that’s not what we tend to talk about when we talk about strategy. Strategy is messages. “Deep” insights; “universal truths”. Not anything as trivial as pictures!
I’d proffer three explanations for why the visual side of brands isn’t considered “strategic”:
- History: as Paul Feldwick’s amazing books lay out, our industry is largely founded on ideas taken from door to door sales. The “proposition” is just an adaptation of the salesman’s “pitch”.
- Technology: our forebears worked with typewriters. Images were expensive and slow to produce. It made sense to discuss brands in words in the 1960s. Today we have more options…
- Prejudice. Fashion brands have always been aesthetically driven. But fashion has traditionally been seen as feminine. And for some reason the marketers of the past thought that meant it shouldn’t be taken terribly seriously and certainly couldn’t be a model for how other categories work.
In my opinion, we’d do well to consider Brand Aesthetics as a different, equally good way to think about how to define a brand. After all, humans were a visual species long before we had language. In many ways choosing something based on aesthetics is a deeper, more fundamental process than choosing based on feature set or trivial “values”. Social media is merely returning us to our neolithic roots!
As a parting thought: when I was a child, this picture hung on my bedroom wall:
It’s an advert, from around 1950. All around the world, in homes, Irish bars and chintzy tearooms. You’ll find vintage advertising like this used as decoration.
You can buy a reproduction of this one for £13.46 on Etsy:
This one is £14.95 on Amazon:
A lot of hot air has been expended over the last two decades on the topic of how do you get consumers to engage, participate and endorse your brand. And much attention is paid to the latest trends and technologies that promise to create that engagement.
But cast our eyes back further into history and we can see that not only will people engage with advertising, they’ll pay money to own it and display it proudly in their homes.
If we make it look nice enough.
Jacob Wright
Problem Definer & Marketing Consultant