Switch to Mission-Driven Marketing for Sustainable Growth

Every business has a mission – written or unwritten. What is yours? When I ask this question at seminars and workshops, some executives answer “making money”, or “driving growth and profitability”, “becoming No.1 in our industry” or “maximise shareholder value”. But these are not really mission or the purpose of being in business. These are the results of the mission. Even if someone says their mission is to do good things, that philanthropic drive is not a mission for business, either.

Just as companies need to have a mission, brands too should have it. The real mission of your business should be why you want to do business with your products or services, not what or how. The mission should remain in place even if business strategy and tactics have to be changed from time to time to address the changing business environment. In order to build a great company you need to have a strong set of values, which should withstand all kinds of temptations even if some business is lost due to the adherence to the values. For example, if your company has a value system that proclaims a no-bribe policy, will you make an exception when it comes to a multi-crore government tender?

In a similar fashion, a brand too needs to have a mission today. This is so because of two reasons: First, product parity is too commonplace today and consumer not at all notices minor differences. Media clutter makes it impossible to reach out and get noticed for the rational benefits your products provide. Therefore it is critical to find a differentiation bigger than a product benefit.

Second, brands need to create experiences rather than mere advertising in today’s world. People are no more followers of ads. They need to see you in multiple touch points delivering a unifying experience. Brands must develop more, and more relevant, communication opportunities. This is difficult to do with product attributes alone. In the era of social media you cannot do much tweeting, sharing and liking with a brand’s attributes.

By the way, a brand’s mission need not be of high philosophical nature. It need not talk about making world a better place. It can be as simple as having fun. It need not be even at the level Britannia had done: Eat Healthy, Think Better.

The key is in having a mission, which can be helpful in a multitude of ways:

Beyond your products it gives you a “why” instead of “what and how”. You may be making a chewing-gum, but you could have made any other product like soap, shampoo or wine. Why that particular product? Finding why is useful in many different ways. If you look at Surf, which has been in India over decades and has gone through many changes over its lifetime so far. It really did not have a mission years ago, and when it came out with the new version that removes all types of stains, the mission was something the brand team seemed to have made up. They believed that kids should get dirty and that life was about getting hands and clothes dirtied, and that stains were simply a symbol of having lived life to the fullest. And, by the way we will take care of the stains while you enjoy life.

• A mission is like a perpetual motion machine, dynamically creating new campaigns, product ideas, and brand experiences. Similarly, a mission helps brands create new content and brand integration opportunities.


• Mission drives brands and people to act in meaningful ways. I am unable to resist quoting my favourite example here: Southwest Airlines – the airlines that invented low cost airlines, and the way they have done it with the mission of flying passengers within the USA on time at the cost of surface transport. They planned everything from this mission and remain the only airline in that country not to have reported any loss all these years. I could not find any airline in India with a solid mission. Everything Southwest does is with this purpose in mind: From the recruitment of staff who have a high sense of humour to disposing off of physical boarding passes, the free bags allowances, and low fares. They clearly drove differentiation across all consumer touch points.


• As mentioned earlier, a mission helps connect everything in a meaningful way, consistently.  It is like the Kapferer model of branding. You need something at a higher level to include your brand extensions or dissimilar products in your portfolio like Godrej. For instance, with the mission of creating the ultimate driving machine, BMW has been bringing all types of cars and SUVs. Even the Mini Cooper fits into this game plan. Contrast this with say Renault which does not have a unifying mission and it is hard for them to differentiate the various cars and SUVs.


• The most important thing a mission can bring forth is alignment – across the company, suppliers, customers and people. With a mission, you can generate a passion for your everyday work and help get a lot of focus on your daily work.


• A clear mission helps connect more easily with customers and this in turn helps customers connect with it more easily via social media. Even if every brand rushes to make a social media presence, do they see customers having the same interest to embrace them? I don't think so. Consumers might be more interested to connect with a Sunsilk shampoo rather than a Chik socially.  The brand mission makes the difference.

Brands with mission will indeed have an edge in today’s marketplace. And indeed they are the ones that will grow better, increase shareholder value and create sustained growth.