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The Unstoppable Marketer®
Trevor Crump and Mark Goldhardt bring you quick marketing and entrepreneurial tips, tricks, and trends for DTC business owners, entrepreneurs, and marketers. These are lessons they've learned through the years of being right in the thick of scaling dozens of businesses. Whether you have an established business looking to grow, just starting your business journey, or trying to become a digital marketer, this marketing podcast will not let you down.
The Unstoppable Marketer®
EP: 133 The Superman Strategy: Standing Out With Vibrant Marketing
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In this episode of the Unstoppable Marketer Podcast, hosts Trevor Crump and Mark Goldheart discuss the importance of levity and entertainment in advertising. They explore how brands can stand out by incorporating humor and vibrant colors in their marketing strategies, drawing parallels to recent trends in movies and social media content. They emphasize the value of bringing joy to consumers' lives through advertising, rather than adding more weight or seriousness.
Emotional Marketing Through Levity
Speaker 1people are emotional, right, and so, like you're, you're trying to convert their emotions to you. One of the easiest ways to convert someone through emotions is levity, like you know, humor, or it's something that's entertaining enough that they're like oh, I really like this, right, but you're bringing a little joy. I mean, at the end of the day, you're bringing like a little joy to their life, not more drudgery or like more weight. So if you bring a little joy to their life, they're going to be more likely to buy from you because that feeling.
Speaker 2Yo, what's going on everybody? Welcome to the Unstoppable Marketer Podcast. With me, as always, is Mark Goldheart. Mark Goldheart, how are you doing with your backwards hat today?
Speaker 1Oh, it is on backwards. Huh, you look good.
Speaker 2Should I go forward? No, you're, you are Backward, backward. You are fully gray. Did you notice that I didn't but?
Speaker 1but it looks good it turned.
Speaker 2I think it looks fine I pulled out and not like I think it looks fine, like I think you look, I think it looks good, I think it pulls well. Personally, oh yeah yeah, little monochromatic.
Speaker 1Yeah, yeah, cause even this blue doesn't look very blue, does it?
Speaker 2yeah it, yes, like a. Is that blue? Yeah, is that blue Grayson.
Speaker 1Yeah, it's blue.
Speaker 2It's. Yeah, I could see being like a gray blue, because blue blue has like hints of gray in it.
Speaker 1Yeah, yeah. Well, this is for sure. Blue, though. No, not like a dark blue, it's a muted blue you would say I'm wearing blue pants yes definitely say you're wearing grey pants, this is grey this is blue. This is grey ish. There's a little blue in there.
Speaker 2No, that is grey. That is called heather grey, yeah, but there's a little blue in there. No, that is gray.
Speaker 1That is called heather gray. Yeah, but there's a little blue underneath it.
Speaker 2Well, I'm wearing black pants. Oh, those are brown.
Speaker 1But anyways.
Speaker 2How was your weekend? All well.
Speaker 1It was, it was good, good, very good. Went to the mountains.
Speaker 2Nice.
Speaker 1Forgot my kid's fishing pole so he was pretty sad. That's brutal. Made it up, we watched a Spider-Man movie and had s'mores Nice. What can't a Spider-Man movie Depends? Which Spider-Man movie it was the multiverse, one like the cartoon one they did, which I think is like the best spider-man movie they've ever made the first one, I think, is yeah, second, one's like a little too sad, a little too. What's his name?
Speaker 2morales, yeah that's by far the best, in my opinion oh for sure I agree, and the soundtrack's awesome, like it's good music too.
Speaker 1Speaking of animation. Can can I ask a question Because I think we're going movie theme today.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1And tying that back into marketing.
Speaker 2I want to give like a. I remember we used to do this and we haven't done it for a minute. Can we give like a? You can ask this question. Keep the question, by the way, Okay.
Speaker 1I'll keep the question.
Summer Marketing State of the Union
Speaker 2But tell me if you want that question to lead us into the actual topic, because I would like to give. Should we like a quick two minute? Like state of the union, it's summer. What people should be expecting? Sure, I think that's probably a smart thing to do. What do you think? Sure? So it's summer. Okay, there's a lot of people who well, in case you guys didn't know. Yeah, I mean, this episode is going to go live in a week, which means that today's the 15th. We're neck deep in the summer it's the 22nd.
Speaker 2So if you had a rough early July, really you're up against three things and maybe even right now it's still rough for you. Well, July's always the worst month. Number one.
Speaker 1Conversion rate-wise.
Speaker 2Number one you had the fourth of july weekend that just like led the the week off. Right, that's always a challenge, it's busy. Um, unless you were doing like a big fourth of july sale, a lot of people potentially saw some hurt there also prime days. Kind of suck some of that up number two, don't steal it from me prime day, which was the eighth, number two through the 11th. Okay, so you go, you go, which, by the way, they extended it to four days this year fourth of july weekend into prime day okay which was two days longer which is two days longer.
Speaker 1So that's numero two and numero three, although aov was down for substantially for a prime day okay and number three is july is the most travel month of all time.
Speaker 2It's your last month before summer vacation is over. People are packing and travel right now.
Speaker 1Um we've said it we said it trips.
Speaker 2yeah, I mean back to the old. Also the fact that, like most brands I mean I know several of you who are listening probably you know you might sell directly to men or to teenagers, or, you know, high school students or not, high school college students, whatever but the majority of purchases oftentimes come from moms and women of the household, women of the household, and so not only do they have kids and people the wallet rolling all you know, pestering them constantly.
Speaker 2My wife, for example, is like saying like hey, like the last, like six weeks, she's like I just live in my car, I'm just like constantly driving. So she's never on her phone. Now, my wife is not a social media person, so, but she is she is probably the norm for moms. You got between extracurricular activities baseball tournament friends.
Speaker 1Yeah, swimming party like swim lessons, yeah, everything everything you know.
Speaker 2she's like I literally live in my car. That was why we just bought a new car, Like we rushed to get her a new car, because she's like we've been, we've been looking for a new one.
Speaker 1She's like sitting in the car.
Speaker 2She's like trevor, I'm in the car all day.
Speaker 1We've been looking for, can we?
Speaker 2like get this, you know, and I'm like, yeah, let's, let's do it, let's upgrade, so, so that's the state of the union right now. Um, with that said, uh, oftentimes what you can do in July, august, september are what make your Q4. So remember that just as you think about slowing things down a little bit. And also remember that just because you slow things down meaning when I say slow things down, I mean maybe reduce your ad spend. Reducing ad spend does not always equate to better efficiency, just FYI. So don't get caught up in that.
Speaker 1It can well, it usually equates to better efficiency overall, because if you have returning customers, your overall efficiency is going to look better yeah, but but sorry, your your acquisition efficiency doesn't always get better. No, that's what I meant, yeah.
Speaker 2Yeah, so anything else? State of the Union Summer State of the Union. Stay cool, stay calm. No, I think that's about it. Get ready for back to school. Okay, all right, ask me your question related to movies. Okay well summers are also known for movies New movies, you mean, like releases.
Animation vs Reality: Storytelling Lessons
Speaker 1Last 10 years it's been superhero movies, right. Also, jurassic World did pretty well in the box office. So action movies, adventure movies, right. It's usually like fun, yeah, fun types of movies, but we just said that that Spider-Man movie was the best Spider-Man. My question with animation is like take the Lion King, the original Lion King, not the terrible, horrible CGI remake with Jonathan Taylor Thomas with JTT?
Speaker 1why is it that animation can tell stories that are clearly not real but feel real, like the storyline feels real, even though it's all fake, and it can do it better than a movie that's trying to show you things that are not real.
Speaker 2Is that? I mean maybe one your expectations going into a animation are different than if you're going into a real movie that might be more CGI developed.
Speaker 1Like Toy Story, for example.
Speaker 2Yeah, you're looking for that. Yeah, so I think that's one. I think number two you have 100% control in making the actors perfect in animation versus or at least the scenes or whatever. Yeah, yeah because all you're all you're worried about is voice. You're not worried about their emotions, you're not worried about their facial expressions, you're not worried about their. So maybe that's another reason.
Speaker 1That could be a reason I don't know I don't know either exactly, but I was thinking about it because, lion king, when you think about these classic movies and how like the new ones don't really and maybe that's just us getting old, I'll throw that out there but I think a lot of it is the audience's expectations of what it is sure right, and there's something called the uncanny valley, right, which is like the mind, the subconscious, just like kind of is grossed out, if something like feels human but isn't, or like Sure.
Speaker 1Like what's going on. Yeah, I think trying to make things too real creates a distorted perception. Yeah, I think trying to make things too real creates a distorted perception. Yeah, where, if you just embrace that, it's a cartoon Right.
Speaker 2You're embracing that. None of it is real.
Speaker 1But then the storylines often hit really hard, right, Like the Lion King story. I mean that hits really hard for a lot of people. Sure, Like it's not, like people left there just being like oh, that was like a fun cartoon, you know, like it was a very emotional, great cartoon but like really meaningful for a lot of people. Sure In a way that I think like a lot of these like newer CGI movies are just kind of like, doesn't feel?
Speaker 1Well, oftentimes I also think with CGI dependent upon the director. And I'm no movie, yeah, I'm not.
Speaker 2I'm not the guy to critique movies like. I'm just not that guy because I'm very easily pleased when it comes to entertainment. Yeah, I also think that when you add CGI to the real scenarios it is, it can oftentimes be a cop-out like you can overuse it yeah right, and it becomes a distraction yeah, so depending on the director you know.
DC Universe Rebranding: Marketing Parallels
Speaker 1anyways, I was just thinking about feelings and the animation, but superman is trying to reverse course on the dc universe right now and I think this is interesting to talk about in terms of ads too. Yeah, the director is known for fun movies like Guardians of the Galaxy, which was kind of a no-name. No one knows what that comic is or those characters, no one even knew who they were 10 years ago.
Speaker 2Yeah, but it's become one of the most popular.
Speaker 1It's like one of the most loved. It is the most popular.
Speaker 2I mean we'll have a. It's one of the few rides Disney has created a ride around. That's right.
Speaker 1They have their own ride, which?
Speaker 2tells you something Like there's not a, there's not a Hulk ride. Well, I take that back. There is one, but it's in Universal pre-Disney owning.
Speaker 1Okay, so that doesn't count.
Speaker 2Yeah, but you really only have from a superhero perspective. You only have a Spider-Man ride and you have a Guardians ride. I'm trying to remember in Disney World what you might have but there's no Captain America.
Speaker 1There's no Captain America, there's no Hulk, there's no Thor. And what made Guardians of the Galaxy different at the time was it was, uh, it did not take itself super serious, yeah. And then they started. Marvel started doing a lot more movies that took itself a little less serious.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1Like Thor Ragnarok yeah Right, but that was funny. But Guardians of the Galaxy was kind of like this moment of oh, it's just fun, yeah, like. Yes, there's serious tones in it and the story has seriousness in it, but it was just like.
Speaker 2But it's fun, almost always fun. No-transcript. It's fun the entirety, even while there's a wildly intense scene in Guardians, it's comic relief. That is the juxtaposition of the entire thing. From when they're breaking people out of jail to fighting a monster. There's always something funny or goofy happening.
Speaker 1Yes, yeah, and so they take James Gunn and now he's doing the DC Universe and Superman's kind of like the first go at it and it's supposed to be. I haven't seen it yet and you haven't either, but I've heard it's funny, apparently it's fun.
Speaker 2Yeah, it's really fun, and it's like light, not super serious in comparison to their last, you know, their batman man of steel. What else is dc?
Speaker 1like I don't know justice league and stuff.
Speaker 2Yeah, I never saw I never saw justice league, um, but they're all pretty like there's some comic relief in some of them. Yeah, there is.
Speaker 1but Just like there isn't every, they're just like more serious, yeah. And so I guess the question is with ads, right is it's going back to? I think we saw that moment with TikTok, like people were kind of craving a little more fun, a little less.
Speaker 2Well, but explain why they were.
Speaker 1Well, if you go back to 2010s, yeah, instagram, facebook, instagram became just so curated and just like so buttoned up and fake feeling, and influencers were just like only showing the greatness of their lives and everything. I think tiktok came out and it was like, well, and you had covid too, and you had covid, so everyone was stuck, but tiktok was already Well, and you had COVID too, and you had COVID, so everyone was stuck.
Speaker 2But TikTok was already starting to take off pre-COVID Sure in like 2018, 2019,.
Speaker 1yeah, I think TikTok came around and was like oh, you can just dance and be a nobody.
Speaker 2And just be like a real human being or just like tell stories, yeah yeah, and like it was fun, it kind of made it fun again.
Speaker 1Yeah, yeah, not so like serious and done up and like fashionista. Sure, sure, not that that area doesn't still exist on a TikTok and an Instagram, but it was kind of this moment of like levity.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1After people trying to take things a little too serious, yeah, and so again, I think what happens is brands sometimes pull the DC move where, like again, there's there's brands that should be serious. Yeah, we talked about this, but it's Superman. A moment. That's kind of capturing like the zeit, like the cultural zeitgeist of like kind of going back to this fun light, like even the coloring in it is like lighter.
Speaker 1Yeah, Right, like the, the outfit of Superman like looks pretty freaking yellow and red, right and blue yeah like there's no muted, like it's not a muted color scheme yeah, yeah, like it's pretty vibrant so is the coloring, is the, the vibrance of it, that this is, like the, still the trajectory we're on, or is it like a last attempt to see if there's still more to squeeze out of it?
Speaker 2sure, yeah, yeah, are we getting out of the? Because the 2010s were dark, picture perfect. Yeah, like I always. I always think of it as like that, the it's like this pastel II movement where everything is everything blends in, essentially like you're seeing this interior design.
Speaker 1A lot of like viral videos are showing people go green in their house yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I don't know, I'm using like brighter colors or bolder colors or just like colors in general, not just whitewash.
Speaker 2Yeah, it's an interesting concept, you know, like I think that I mean you're also starting to see more and more people sync up with bigger like production studios that are doing more entertaining things, things like so the brands that have money, uh, to put into a harman's brother-esque style video that is very entertaining, dr squatchy, like you're seeing more and more brands invest in that when they do. But, but surprisingly, the brands that don't have, you know, 100, 200, 300, 000 dollars to invest in that, they're. They're sticking. A lot of them aren't sticking to levity, they're not going down the levity route, they're sticking more to what seems serious from an ad perspective. So I don't know, I think it's interesting if that is the direction that our consumers craving. When we talk about content in a value perspective, we always talk about it in three different ways. It's like value is either informative here's a recipe, here's a marketing tip, here's a style tip Okay, it's inspirational or it's entertaining, and you don't see a lot of people hit the entertaining piece on the ad side of things as much.
Authenticity Without Vulnerability
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Speaker 1But there's low production ways to be Entertaining. Find levity. Now we had her on. Who kimberly?
Speaker 2oh yeah, you just, I think you were thinking that in your head I was kimberly o'connell from brixley bags brixley bags.
Speaker 1Yes, her entire tiktok is very much on the lighter, sure things in life.
Speaker 2It's the real, authentic stuff. But she is like she goofs with it.
Speaker 1It's like turtles and yeah it's like okay, yeah, I guess it's like real, but it's not yeah she's not like her. Like because again I don't want to make a mistake here like authentic and real doesn't mean like you're just being vulnerable all the time.
Speaker 2No, which is what a lot of a lot of people think it doesn't mean you need to show.
Speaker 1Yeah, the sides of your life that the public shouldn't see well, there's the, there's this, they're not, they don't deserve to see.
Speaker 2There's the. Have you, have you seen the viral girl? Who's going? The realtor have you seen this?
Speaker 2no so she's a realtor and she, she's going viral because most realtor videos you are seeing is like she's one that like dogs on it, right, yeah, it'll be like a fast movement to a door and then it's slow and then fast through the hallway and then it's slow and it's showing you know, and and and. All it is is like it's a good song with script like four thousand square feet, yeah, six bedrooms, five bathrooms. You, you know like it's. It's like that, which is what most people are doing, where she's getting up in front of the camera and she's like you know very dry humor, and she's standing in front of a mansion and she's like I effing hate rich people. Like that's, that's like her, her the hook, and she's like I could fit five of my houses in this.
Speaker 2You know, pretentious bitch's house or something like that. That's that's like her, her the hook, and she's like I could fit five of my houses in this. You know, pretentious bitch's house or something like that. That's how she's, that's what she's doing. And then the next scene will be like her in a big, like her in a massive bathtub and she's like who the heck would need a bathtub this big? This is ridiculous, you know. So she's showing the features, but being very dry, witty and humorous and and it's exploding. Now. I don't know if she's selling houses crushing it, but she's crushing it with views. Oh, absolutely, which is going to lead she?
Speaker 2will crush it.
Speaker 1I'm sure you know I think I brought this up with the new zealand car dealer well, guess what the reality of her strategy I gotta her strategy is, if it is working. Probably one of the brilliant things about it working especially if she's selling high-end properties is she's probably only dealing with the kind of people that she wants to deal with anyways, because they can probably take a joke.
Speaker 1So, true, right, she doesn't want to like, so her client list is probably people she wants to work with anyways. So she's probably pre-filtering a lot of people out by being like that. Yeah totally that she doesn't want to deal with, which is also a brilliant side of it. That might be an unintended consequence of her humor, but yeah, yeah. Maybe she discovered that before she started making videos.
Speaker 2But again, she's got 289,000 followers On TikTok, 2.9 million likes. She just took off, yeah, like her, her views at a minimum. And this is just a couple scrolls in smallest view I can see so far 257 000. Largest I'm seeing is 4.4. Oh, there's one, 63.
Speaker 1I mean she's blowing up like crazy because she's just funny dude. Yeah, and that's low budget, oh yeah.
Speaker 2Right, yeah, she's got a tripod and a mic and cap cut editing, so again going back to like the superman moment.
Speaker 1Right like I'm not. If you're a lola blankets, a utah brand, you know high-end yep blankets, probably not for you, sure, right like this kind of thing is not for you, but for most brands, like man, it's just create some levity, create some fun, make fun of yourself, make fun of something.
Speaker 2Well, the reason why it's not a Lola Blankets, let's kind of and stand out with.
Speaker 1You can try standing out in your ads first. I'm not saying like, rebrand everything, but try to use some like brighter colors. Yeah, stand out, brand everything, sure, but try to use some like brighter colors. Stand out right, like the superman moment is going to be interesting to look back on and maybe it's a total dud, right, but the colors are vibrant, like everything about it sticks out like superman does not blend in no at all yeah, which is why I think a lot of people hated him.
Speaker 1Like you're, kind of gravitated towards batman in the last because superman it used to be all about superman and then it became all about batman yeah, but is that because of christopher nolan?
Don't Let Your Ads Blend In
Speaker 1well, it started like it started a little before that with, like, the tim burton movies, but yeah, but anyways, all I'm saying is like, try to be a little more vibrant, try to bring some more levity to your message, to your, your brand, and try things out that and we talk about this every once in a while you know nothing new. Like we're not bringing in like a secret here. Sure, it's just. Yeah, use the summer to try some new things. Like hey, don't take yourself so serious. I think the key hey, don't take yourself so serious.
Speaker 2I think the key here Don't take your brand so serious. I think the key here is like especially if you're struggling and you're not standing out, right, you said, lola Blanket shouldn't do it necessarily, it's because they've stood out, they've, they've, they've. Nobody was in the high fashion blanket business, right, right, and they turned.
Speaker 2They turned a blanket into high fashion versus like an everyday need, right. So that's why they don't need to go down this route, because they're standing out as somebody who introduced and paved a new direction for something. But if other people come and pave, they're not going to be able to chase them on it, because then they're just going to blend in like Lola. You know they'll blend into a Lola Blankets. In fact, they'll probably help Lola Blankets sell more if they do it Right.
Speaker 1You know, I think you might be able to catch the coattails a little bit.
Speaker 2Sure. So the concept here is like, if you haven't already found a way to stand out, then levity is a great way to do it. You know colors, you know just difference, right? Like if everyone else in your space has pastel colors, then put something bright.
Speaker 1Like, here's a good idea if you're, if you're a beverage company, like, why don't you make videos of all the taste tests that you hated? What do you mean? Like if you make a drink, for example, and you're bringing in samples and, like you're tasting, it's like oh, that's terrible, yeah, of your product, of your own product yeah, yeah like you're not sending that out to people, but it's like you like going through the like. That's a little bit of the documenting process but to me it's more of just yeah, think of things that you do every day where you have like.
Speaker 1When I say levity, it's like kind of showing the bad, sure, but in a light way sure totally every day, a business has these moments of going like, oh, I hate that a thousand percent, or what was that about, or what happened here? Yeah, try to think of those moments and then capture them and see what happens from an ad perspective and a content perspective.
Speaker 2Yeah, I like it, yeah. One final note on this is like people struggle so much to let their ads be different from their you know, if you're not watching this, I'm using quotation makes their on brandness right. Everyone gets a little bit afraid like, oh well, this isn't. You know what our brand looks like. You like? Take it from us as somebody who spent millions and millions of dollars on ads. Like your ads don't make up what your brand ethos is and and everyone thinks that it does. You know and so like. We have done so many studies where we've asked people how they like, how they remember us, and if they say, oh, an ad brought me and we will ask them to identify what the ad was and no one knows, no, it's because people are emotional, yeah, right, and so, like you're, you're trying to convert their emotions to you.
Speaker 1Yeah, one of the easiest ways to convert someone through emotions is levity, like you know. Humor, yeah, or it's something that's entertaining enough that they're like oh, I really like this yeah for sure. Right, but you're bringing a little joy. I mean, at the end of the day you're bringing like a little joy to their life, totally, not more drudgery, or like more, yeah, weight yeah so if you bring a little joy to their life, they're going to be more likely to buy from you because that feeling yeah. Yeah, I agree, happy summer everybody, yeah.
Speaker 2Don't get too caught up, don't think, don't go firing your agency. Don't go firing your media buyer, your in-house media buyer, because things might not be working great During July. But fire the people if they're not doing something different. Yeah, trying things. Yeah. If, like, you're just stuck and like, yeah, trying things, yeah if you're just stuck. New ad angles, new creative yeah, you need people who are trying to find ways to stand out rather than blend in or invite them to try those things. Yeah, don't fire them yet.
Speaker 1Maybe they feel like they can't.
Speaker 2Yeah, that's better. I'm not saying to fire people.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2At some point, maybe fire them.
Speaker 2Sometimes it's not a good fit, yeah, but anyways, all right, guys. Thank you so much. We'll see you guys next week. Thank you so much for listening to the Unstoppable Marketer podcast. Please go rate and subscribe the podcast, whether it's good or bad. We want to hear from you because we always want to make this podcast better. If you want to get in touch with me or give me any direct feedback, please go follow me and get in touch with me. I am at the Trevor Crump on both Instagram and TikTok. Thank you, and we will see you next week.