Future-Proofing Your Wellness Brand: Navigating An Era Of Purpose-Driven Consumerism

Last month full service global creative agency Skipper & Skipper explored why vision, values and purpose matter when it comes to future-proofing your wellness brand. In this column, the team explores how in an era of purpose-driven consumerism, story-living is the savvy brand’s solution to success. 

Purpose over profit
As the wellness revolution continues to experience rapid growth, standing out from the competition has become a constant challenge. In response, understanding how to instil a sense of brand belonging through a clearly positioned purpose has cemented itself as a prerequisite. 

But in an age of conscious consumerism, the businesses that are thriving are the ones who’ve crafted an engaging narrative that supersedes product and service alone, living and breathing every aspect of their brand. Brands with purpose stand tall and naturally create a loyal and engaged community, fuelling innovation and delivering growth. But the key to long-lasting success is understanding the connection between your purpose and how that plays out in the lives of your consumers.

Today’s digitally empowered consumer has unprecedented access to information. People are instinctively navigating digital content and thus unearthing company backgrounds, from review sites to YouTube and everything in between. Hungry for information and increasingly conscious of the services they choose, the food they put on their tables and the beauty products they put on their skin, a holistic range of factors now impact consumers’ purchase decisions.

Brand Transparency
A call for greater brand transparency has been a dominant theme in the last couple of years and it’s not going anywhere soon. Conscious millennials keen to align with the brands they’re buying into are motivated not just by price and product, but by values and purpose.

Edelman’s 2018 study ‘The New Brand Democracy’, found that 53% of people agreed that brands can do more than governments to solve social ills – and nearly half say that brands have better ideas. Elsewhere, the ‘Global CSR Study’, conducted by Cone Communications in 2015 found that 9 out of 10 consumers now expect companies to do more than simply turn a profit. 

With 63% of those questioned in a recent survey by Accenture preferring to purchase products and services from companies that stand for a purpose that reflects their own values and beliefs — in a nutshell, consumers are increasingly putting their money where their hearts are.

Story-living
The insatiable rise of the conscious consumer has been particularly prominent in the wellness world, with wellness brands often held up as the frontrunners that should be setting the bar. This has meant wellness brands being called upon to be more transparent with their sustainability and eco-credentials. 

This cultural supercharging of branding is forcing wellness businesses to also build more authentic relationships with customers. At Skipper & Skipper, we believe that a huge part of this relationship comes from a compelling brand narrative, which draws consumers in on a deeper level.

Taking storytelling one step further, we believe story-living is the savvy brand’s solution to success. Story-living is a way to enhance your brand’s authenticity, empowering you to do more than just tell a story. Instead, it means taking action of some kind, whether that’s to support a cause or to create meaningful experiences. 

As well as a strong narrative, any successful wellness brand must proactively demonstrate that it is contributing to a healthier planet, society or both. 

One example of a brand proving its commitment and taking action to drive change is KIND Snacks, the world’s third-largest snack bar manufacturer offering gluten-free, non-GMO bars. The company’s commitment to transparent ingredient sourcing has resonated with health-conscious consumers while The KIND Foundation, a nonprofit established by KIND, recently launched an initiative to inspire meaningful interactions between children across the world. This philanthropic path allows KIND to embody its long-standing mission to promote kindness and empathy. 

Another example is Unilever, a company both aware of the conscious consumer movement and the value in making its brands purpose-driven.

Nearly half of the company’s top 40 brands champion sustainability. These ‘Sustainable Living’ brands, including Dove, Lipton and Knorr, are growing 50% faster than the company’s other brands and delivering more than 60% of the company’s growth. 

Do brands need to be purpose-driven to survive? Absolutely. Everything your brand offers, from your product to customer experience, should meet your purpose. But perhaps of equal importance is your customer, increasingly powered by emotion, not just by product.

Skipper & Skipper is a full service global creative agency, with a determined vision to inspire more people towards making better and more informed health choices. It helps its clients tell their story through its holistic values-led approach to uncovering true brand worth.

For more information visit: skipperandskipper.agency