Digital Concept: Authenticity, Part 1

Let's take a look authenticity. This is a very important concept in a digital world. Firms typically promote their brands by making various claims about their features, benefits, and performance. Although most countries have laws against false advertising, firms sometimes stretch the truth. For example, early cigarette ads routinely make claims about the health benefits of smoking and actually claimed that cigarettes would protect your throat and improve your digestion. Although the tobacco companies probably knew that these claims were untrue, it was difficult for most consumers to evaluate their authenticity. However, given the amount of information available today, on the Internet, for example, and the ease at which it can be retrieved, these types of claims will be very hard or impossible to make today. In today's digital world, false claims are quickly uncovered and often result in substantial embarrassment and potential financial loss for the firms making such claims. 

As a result, a growing number of firms are realizing that presenting themselves and their products in a genuine manner is simply good business practice in a digital age. 

This is the basic idea behind digital authenticity. Here are a few good examples of authentic digital marketing initiatives. All of these come from the food and drink category. First of all, Domino's Pizza. In 2009, a national consumer survey revealed that Domino's had the worst tasting pizza in America. Consumer postings on social media channels, such as Twitter and Facebook, agreed. Many customers complained that its crust tasted like cardboard and the sauce tasted like ketchup. These are not good things. 

The company responded to this challenge by reformulating the way it made its pizza and by telling its customer about this change through a series of authentic ads distributed through both traditional as well as online channels. 

These ads showed clips of actual focus group participants criticizing Domino's Pizza followed by the appearance of Domino's Pizza chefs who went to the house of these participants, asking them to try their new pizza and then captured their reactions. 

This campaign was a tremendous success and resulted in double digit growth in product sales as well as a sizable increase in Domino's stock price. The second example is a company called Aspall. It's a British manufacturer of apple vinegar and cider that was founded way back in 1720, has been a family-owned business for eight generations. 

Aspall leverages this long history to tell an authentic story about its products. This story can be clearly seen in its corporate blog, which is called 1728CyderHouse.com. That's Cyder House with a "y." This blog provides both stories about the brand's rich heritage as well as updates about the family's current activities. 

However, what is most interesting about this blog is the total absence of any explicit promotional activities. 

There are no product claims, no sales messages, or even any information about where to buy its product. The sole purpose of this website is to tell the Aspall story. 

The final example is a restaurant called the Heart Attack Grill. And this is an actual restaurant. This medical-themed restaurant is located, you may have guessed, in Las Vegas and provides a controversial, but intriguing example of authentic marketing. This restaurant's menu is full of a variety of unhealthy options, including its famous Quadruple Bypass Burger, which is about this big. It consists of four eight-ounce beef patties, 20 slices of bacon, and eight slices of cheese, and contains nearly 10,000 calories. 

The restaurant's owner, a fellow named Jon Basso, says, "Our menu is purposely designed to be offensive. It's absolutely as unhealthy as possible. 

In fact, any customer who weighs over 350 pounds eats for free and multiple customers have had heart attacks while eating in the restaurant." 

This offensive, but honest approach has been extremely popular with his clientele, has provided this restaurant with a tremendous amount of free publicity. Given these examples, now let's take a look at the definition of digital authenticity. 

In essence, digital authenticity refers to the degree to which a product's online promotion provides customers with a genuine portrayal of its origins, features, and benefits, as well as its limitations. Authentic promotional campaigns typically focus on telling a story rather than making a claim. This story is usually connected to the brand in a genuine manner and provides customer with a sense that the brand has a purpose other than just making money. Now, let's take a bit of a deeper dive. 

There are lots of interesting issues surrounding digital authenticity. For the purpose of this discussion, I'd like to focus on three issues in particular. 

First of all, what makes a promotion authentic? This is a good question and one that really is hard to answer. There is no specific recipe for creating an authentic promotion. However, there do appear to be some key ingredients. 

First of all, most authentic promotions focus more on telling a compelling story about a product or the firm that produces this product rather than making a set of product claims. 

For example, Domino's Pizza told a compelling story. Their pizza wasn't very good and they were determined to fix it. If claims are made, these claims are typically more authentic if they come from actual users rather than paid spokespeople. 

A good example of this is Proctor and Gamble's Swiffer ads. You may have seen these. This is for their Swiffer housecleaning product. These ads include testimonials from actual people who talk not just about the product, but also about their lives. 

Finally, authentic promotions are genuine and often have an element of uniqueness. Thus, they stand out from the pack. For example, Dove' Real Beauty Campaign, which is now almost a decade long, has helped this brand stand out from its competitors by creating a series of conversations about what beauty is and how it affects our self-image and engaging conversations with actual people rather than paid models. 

Second, what is the role of consumers in this process? This is another good question. 

Traditionally, the role of consumers in the promotional process is simply to respond to the promotion, with the ultimate response being the purchase of the product that is being promoted. In contrast, authentic promotions typically engage the consumer in a much more active manner. 

First, as discussed earlier, most authentic promotions feature real, actual consumers. Those consumers are often the stars of the show. 

A good example of this is Patagonia's recent campaign in which customers tell stories and submit photos and videos about how they use this company's product. In addition to starring in these ads, customers sometimes even create them. 

For example, many firms, such as Pepsi, Miller Beer, and L'Oreal have held crowd sourcing contests to ask consumers to create the ads for their products. Thus, consumers can play an active role as content creators. Finally, consumers often help distribute authentic ads through social media outlets, such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube. Third, what are the benefits of being authentic? 

Well, engaging authentic promotion appears to have lots of benefits for firms. First of all, authentic promotions are less likely to be victimized by a harmful Doppelganger Brand Image. 

As noted earlier, these DBIs are usually directed against brands that are portrayed as being something that they're not. 

Thus, if a brand is authentically portrayed for what it is, a Doppelganger Brand Image seems less likely. In addition, authentic brands are more likely to receive positive word-of-mouth and be broadcasted through social media channels. For example, Dove's Real Beauty Campaign that we just discussed has been largely communicated by digital word-of-mouth and through relatively a small amount of typical, traditional advertising spending. Finally, there is growing evidence that consumers consider authenticity when making a purchase decision. 

According to one recent survey, over 60% of consumers around the world say they would choose an authentic brand over its competitors. 

Therefore in some, authentic promotions appear to provide substantial benefits to firms.

by A. Rinderfleisch