All else being equal, the purpose-driven brand wins
When purpose emerged as a factor of modern marketing, there was a false perception that arose. Some mistakenly believed that adopting a purpose was the long-awaited secret to winning over prospects.
This caused a problem as inauthentic marketers grabbed at the first purpose that they thought they could reasonably claim. Forget whether it truly aligned with who they were or what they believed (if they believed anything). Purpose was the new and shiny tactic to lure customers to their brand.
Of course, it didn't take long for you, me, and everyone else to call them out.
This happened more than it should have. As you can imagine, these less-than-genuine efforts didn't produce the magical results that these brands thought were a lead-pipe cinch. All of which led some to claim that brand purpose simply didn't work when it came to customer acquisition.
Don't underestimate the power of purpose
Purpose is an exciting and powerful factor that any brand can benefit from. When embraced authentically, it can have a magnetic effect. We all have a profound need to feel like what we do matters. That we can make a difference for the world around us. A brand's purpose helps us in the pursuit to fulfill that need.
That sounds pretty awesome. And you can see why there was (and still is) a lot of interest and excitement around the promise of a brand purpose.
Understanding the real ability of a brand purpose
Purpose is not a silver bullet. It is not the overriding factor that will, on its own, magically deliver customers into your fold. This is what often gets left out of all the posts and discussions about brand purpose.
So what role does purpose play? Perhaps the easiest way to portray its role is as a tiebreaker.
There are a lot of factors that go into your prospects' decisions. Price, convenience, value, and more. A brand has to perform in all these areas. If you start with a poorly-designed product that's more expensive than the competitor, you can't expect your purpose to get prospects to ignore the offering's shortcomings.
Today, we expect any brand to live up to the standards set in the marketplace. After all, technology makes it incredibly easy for companies to spin up new products and new features. We as potential customers are just one Google search from seeing a multitude of options and understanding what is a reasonable expectation when it comes to price, convenience, value, etc. You have to establish that you are a viable option considering all these factors. Only then can you fully experience the effect that purpose can have on your brand's success. A study from eMarketer illustrates this.
After hearing all this, it would be easy to dismiss purpose as a nice-to-have rather than a must-have factor for a brand. That would be a mistake. Because purpose is not like all those other factors.
The other decision factors I mentioned are rational (price, convenience, etc.) They connect with the thinking side of us. But purpose is emotional. It connects with the feeling side of who we are. And, by the way, the emotional part of the brain is where our decisions are made.
Leave purpose out of the equation and you walk away from arguably the most powerful factor in helping people make a decision to engage with you. Suddenly that feels like much more than a tiebreaker. It feels like a game-changer.