Symbolic Brands: A Brand’s First Duty is to Create Meaning
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Symbolic Brands: A Brand’s First Duty is to Create Meaning
What’s the connection between Michael Jordan, meanings and the symbolic age of branding? Let’s see how it feels to be in someone else’s shoes.
A brand's first challenge is creating meaning for the people seeking it in their lives. The product, service or system comes second. We live in this age of branding and marketing: the age of symbolism. This has been cooking for a while now with approaches and philosophies like Brand Positioning and Value Proposition. It has been quite a while since Jack Trout and Al Ries wrote the founding books of this approach and established the space for semiotic and symbolic branding in the form of positioning the brand into a material or symbolic space.
If you need to become more familiar with the term, brand positioning refers to the mental space that a brand occupies in the minds of those who come across that brand. That's why brands communicate what they communicate in every single communication effort, big or small, sales or image, campaign or PR. They aim to strengthen the positioning of the brand. Brand positioning is a crucial differentiator from competitors and helps make the brand stand out in the market through its positioning statement and claim.
Marketing communications evolved in waves, let's give a few examples of these waves:
Scientific Wave: You can remember this with the scientific statements from detergent brands to toothbrushes, washing machines to condiments; they all had a scientific claim behind their design, engineering or formula. Do you remember the Swiss scientists designing the three-angled toothbrush? The detergent formula that targeted the dirt scientifically and dissolved it without harming the fabric?
Competition Wave: In this stage, all brands competing for a more significant market share were claiming that they did what they did better than others. Our detergent makes white clothes whiter than other products. Ours make them whiter than white. Ours make beyond white. Ours recreates whiteness...
Symbolic Wave: Then comes a time when all products and services are more or less on the same level of quality, and they do not have much "space" to differentiate from each other regarding unique selling propositions. No whiteness was left in the clothes to be provided; we were at the limits of whiteness—in terms of fabric. This brings us to the symbolic stage, where brands look for ways to do something other than what they already do as a product or service. That is to say, a soap brand became the altar of authentic beauty and loving yourself as you are; a chocolate bar signalled itself as a remedy for the anger that comes out of hunger; and a detergent brand let go of colours altogether and hailed getting dirty as a symbol of life well lived. And they prospered.
So, we are in the later stages of the symbolic wave of marketing and brand communications worldwide. Now, if a brand does not have a symbolic claim, one way or another, it generally goes unnoticed. This symbolic wave also coincides with the rising "search for meaning" in the new generations.
Many trend reports and research stated that Gen Z and Millennials search for meaning in their lives and prefer brands and products that provide meaning. Just enter "Gen Z and Millennials search for meaning" into a search engine and see the results for yourself.
image credit: cnkdaily.com
So, this brings us to one of history's most insightful examples of brand symbolism: Air Jordan.
You might have seen the feature film Air (2023) by now. If not, and if you work in marketing, strategy, branding, advertising or any brand-related communications field, you must watch it*.
The film is about how Nike convinced Michael Jordan and his family to sign a contract with Nike and create the Air Jordan brand. We see the story mainly from Sony Vaccaro's perspective as he is the main character, who was the sports marketing director of the brand at the time. And as the good old saying goes, "When the legend becomes fact, print the legend." The film just did that as the real actors of this historical event still argue about the facts between themselves.
When we look at how the film depicted competitors, we see that Adidas and Converse were portrayed as big brands that ruled the basketball world. Those big brands made the players whom they sponsored wear the same shoes. So, players like Magic Johnson, Julius Erving and Larry Bird were wearing generic Converse All-Stars shoes, nothing personal, nothing meaningful—a product with the claim to be the best shoes in the market.
If Michael Jordan signed with them, he would have been one of the legendary players in the NBA who wore Converse; nothing memorable with that. Moreover, these players were made to feel lucky as these brands have sponsored them. These players were practically employees of the brand. What stands out in Nike's approach is another area in which they revolutionised the industry: they took Michael Jordan as a partner. (And that was a new phenomenon for the basketball industry.)
Let's stick to the main idea:
Nike signed Michael Jordan in 1984, and the brand and its symbolism have grown ever since, which generated a revenue of over $5.2B in 2022. But this is a team effort of meaning creation between Michael Jordan and Nike.
"A shoe is just a shoe until someone steps into it."
Sonny Vaccaro (Matt Damon), Air (2023)
Nike positioned the person and what he means for basketball in the form of a pair of shoes. When a customer bought a pair of Air Jordans, they stepped not only into a pair of shoes but also into Michael Jordan's persona.
They were literally in someone else's shoes and shared the feeling of his combatant spirit, challenger nature and winning mentality. A pair of shoes, in this case, becomes a means for improving one's self-confidence, bravery and commitment, which is a lot more worth than a few hundred dollars.
So, Nike created a pair of shoes that are not only basketball shoes but also are a container for meanings for the one who owns them.
Problem with symbolic brands
The problem with the symbolic age in brand and marketing communications is that now everyone is trying to achieve a symbolic presence. And when they do, they need to start with what their brands mean for their audience and how they can add value and meaning to their lives. This should be where a brand begins to create meaning and partnerships to achieve a symbolic presence.
Instead, most brands just go for the most popular person with the highest reach and engagement and establish short- or long-term partnerships with them. Imagine a washing machine brand trying to become the next Air Jordan, so they sign the most influential sportsperson of their time—or a fridge brand signing the Barcelona football team to promote how they keep everything fresh! What meaning would be created out of that superimposition?
The brands interested in creating a meaningful partnership with an icon, person, tool or phenomenon must understand and acknowledge this: It is not only the popularity and reach of that entity you are associating your brand with but also the values, personality and behaviours of that being simultaneously.
So, if the meaning spheres of both parties do not align, a long-term value will not be created out of it.
Main idea of the story
In today's world of branding and marketing, creating meaning for consumers is paramount. Symbolism plays a pivotal role in establishing a brand's position in the minds of consumers. Brands must now focus on providing meaning and value to their audience, especially in an era where Gen Z and Millennials seek purpose in their lives. The success story of Air Jordan illustrates how brands can infuse profound meaning into their products and create enduring connections with consumers.
As Vaccaro said in the film, a shoe is just a shoe until someone steps into it—and thus makes it meaningful for the people.