Marketing isn't about bullshi**ng

Recently, I’ve seen lots of LinkedIn posts about integrity in marketing — how important it is that marketing is honest and transparent.

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Don’t get me wrong, I agree.

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But I’m confused that it even, apparently, needs pointing out. When has marketing ever been about bullshitting?

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Pulling the wool over someone’s eyes might get a quick sale, but it’s never been an effective way to win hearts and minds and keep customers coming back.

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When done right, marketing doesn’t need the bells and whistles. It’s based on something much more powerful: a deep understanding of your customers’ hopes, fears, dreams and honest, transparent communication around how your product can help.

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The temptation of the quick win

Marketers can feel pressured to add fancy bells and whistles in order to drive sales.

In economically tough times where we’re fighting to keep every penny of hard-won budgets, there’s huge pressure to create something different and to make it sell, fast.

But those are also the moments where you need your loyal, repeat customers the most, and that means drawing people to your brand with a high-quality product built on true consumer insight — no BS required.

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Understanding, not bullshitting

Marketing isn’t about “spin”. We’re not wheeler-dealers trying to con people out of their hard-earned cash.

Marketing is an exercise in matchmaking: the right audience, the right message, the right moment.

To do that, you have to really dive into consumers’ minds, taking the time to understand their hopes and fears and reflecting them back with empathy, style, sometimes humour.

Our job is to demonstrate how our products or services can help people solve their problems and achieve their dreams.

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Honest marketing works

The best bit about honest, transparent marketing? It works. There are so many brands out there across all sorts of sectors proving that this approach is incredibly effective.

Here are a few of my current favourites:

1. Walmart

They could’ve taken the easy route with their marketing and said ‘We sell cheap stuff, we stack it high and sell it low’. A nice, tidy, product-first approach.

But they didn’t. They did something unexpected.

Walmart went deeper and worked harder to discover the real, honest reason people choose to shop at their store.

And what did they find?

Whether it’s a holiday or a home renovation, the money customers saved by shopping at Walmart helped them save for their actual dreams and reach their big goals faster.

So, that’s how Walmart markets itself: as a partner in helping you save for your dream, whatever that may be.?

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2. The “It starts on TikTok” campaign

The TikTok Marketing Team was given a big business challenge to solve. TikTok’s core users are 18-24 year olds which brings many benefits, but also the challenge of less spending power than us older crew.

To win over the 40+ market, the “It starts on TikTok” campaign was born. From stretches to help a bad neck that escalate into a healthier lifestyle to finding new recipes, TikTok position themselves as a destination for solving problems and finding inspiration in the process.

What’s really smart about the campaign is its broad appeal. TikTok haven’t alienated their core users, but it really resonates with the older crowd, sending a clear message that there’s a place for older users on TikTok.

3. Tony’s Chocolonely

You won’t find big glossy billboards or rainbow Tony’s Chocolonely bars dancing on screen before your favourite soap.

Instead, they’ve baked their mission and purpose into the very core of their brand.

They want to make “100% exploitation free the norm in chocolate”. They talk about being “crazy about chocolate”, but their focus is on responsible, people-centred supply chains.

It carries through every aspect of their branding, from hard-hitting annual FAIR reports to creating your very own wrapper with your face on .

People first. It’s as consistent as it is powerful.

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The best marketing is a mirror

When you make a conscious effort to understand your consumer’s lived experiences and build that mirror reflection, marketing has absolutely no need for bullshit. It just works beautifully.?

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‘Oh my god, that’s me!’ — that’s the reaction great marketing creates.

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It should feel like a mirror for consumers where they’re shocked at the likeness to their own lived experience. It should leave them wondering: ‘How did they know that about me?’.

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Marketing is all about people, and needs to be so very human as a result. We all want to be heard, to relate to the things we surround ourselves with, and that can only be done with great, empathetic marketing, not bullshit.

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