Authentic Thoughts on Authenticity
Everyone wants to be authentic these days.
Today in corporate speak, we explore authenticity and its significance. Here's the original definition for reference.
INT. A windowed conference room - 9am. Client meeting. The ad employees sit, groomed and caffeinated, as the clients enter the room. The strategy or creative lead gets up to deliver the pitch.
He/She speaks, "Meet our IDEA, an authentic take on a consumer trying to authentically go through their day. We will take their authentic feelings and demonstrate our authenticity to our target consumer." She finishes with a flare and looks to the client.
Client: "I like it... but do we think it's authentic enough?"
Wordsmithing remains a chief source of industry pride, especially among the ranks of checkered clad copywriters. But certain words become so pervasive that they lose their original meaning. Advertising irony strikes again.
Authenticity is a difficult concept to grapple with as many point out. Marketing by its very nature is inauthentic. In fact anything produced in media is edited, scripted, pinched, pricked, and sculpted to fit into a discernible narrative. Even reality TV is scripted despite it's given nomenclature, unscripted television.
Yet, communication forces have shifted our collective focus to 'authentic' approaches. Namely social and multi-channel media has forced brands into dialogues with consumers in immediate and sometimes uncomfortable proximity to their end target. When a consumer can question the reason for your existence in an instant message it makes your communication stakes much more palpable.
The result - when marketers says "I want this to be authentic" they most likely mean "I want this to be good." Technically speaking, the only authentic message an advertiser can tell is "Our products are damn good, you should buy them". Brands have gotten so caught up with relating to their audience that some forgot their main prerogative remains to tell them something.
The main problem with authenticity is that it serves as an umbrella term for when we don't know what we really want. Deeper questions need answering. Most notable - what are we aiming to do and how do we do that?
Are we trying to create something useful for our audience? How about a series of DIY videos with your products utilized? Are we trying to be emotive? What about finding a consumer's or cause story others can identify with? Are we highlighting a product point? Let's get an endorser or community to exemplify how we help. Being 'authentic' never met anyone's KPIs.
Being useful and relevant for your target audience did.