Why a bit of weird and quirky in your ads is actually your secret weapon to successful marketing

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (00:00)

That the reason founder content, UGC content, influencer content, employee-generated content works is because you get that human connection. You get that little bit of weirdness. You get that little bit of quirky. And I do think that's what people are going to resonate with. I think we are going to very quickly fly past the perfect polished.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (00:19)

Hi and welcome to the Bright Minds of eCommerce podcast. I'm Dahna, founder of Bright Red Marketing, and I created this podcast because I wanted to bring you the best advice from Australian experts in eCommerce and eCommerce store owners. If you're wanting relatable stories and actionable advice, as well as the latest Facebook advertising strategies, you're in the right place. So let's get into today's episode.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (00:38)

Today I'm going to talk to you about why your marketing should be focused more on the fact that you're connecting with your audience rather than just collecting their data. We are in a world at the moment where everyone is so obsessed with the numbers.

I am not for a second saying that you need to not be obsessed with your numbers. But what you do need to be aware of, and what I do think we need to focus on, is the fact that behind every number, behind every metric, behind every dollar that is spent, there is an actual real human being that is sick of being sold to. We are in a world at the moment where there are AI ads, we've got AI influencers, we've got AI-written copy. Everyone is trying to get the next big trending marketing tactic, and everyone is so focused on growing and scaling their businesses, which is fine to a point. But I do really think we have lost sight of the fact that we are actually marketing to humans, and human beings really do need that sort of personal connection.

So we have a lot of conversations with business owners, we have a lot of conversations with people in this space. And there are a lot of people at the moment that are really focused on these sort of vanity metrics — follower count, list size, database size.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (01:47)

MER and ROAS are really important. Your list size, your follower count — that's less important. But these are numbers that are really important and they are important for you to pay attention to and to know. But I do think that if that is all you are focusing on, you are going to lose sight of the big picture.

It's a problem we see a lot with ads. There will be a series of ads that we create. Some of those ads are really about building a relationship. They're about connecting with an audience. They are about being a little bit more human, about having a little bit more fun. And then you have the ads that are a little bit more salesy. The challenge becomes that we are now in an ecosystem where Andromeda is taking the lead. And Andromeda essentially means that Meta is going to show the right ad to the right person at the right time. That is the base principle of their new algorithm.

So what we want to be careful of is that we don't take out all of the ads that are helping a brand to feel like a brand, that are helping a brand to connect — because maybe that ad itself is not the one that at that moment drove the sale. Maybe one of your more sales-focused ads did that at the last minute. But what are these ads doing to that ecosystem? And what are they doing to actually help you connect to the consumer? Because we really are just so disconnected at the moment. We make these ads, we put them into the back end of Facebook, and then people are seeing them on their feeds while they're doom scrolling.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (03:14)

It's such a wild world. We had a guest on the podcast that's actually going to drop next week, and she's talking about the wild difference between marketing her brick and mortar business versus the online business, because it is just such a wild disconnect. She's learned some really great lessons from actually having to have those conversations in person and is now trying to replicate them in the online world. And I just think that's so important, especially when we see there is such a big rise in AI.

People are starting to use it. It is nowhere near where I think it's going to end up. I think it's going to end up in a slightly dodgy place before it kind of gets reined back in. But there are real humans on the other side of these ads that are using their real hard-earned money. And I do think it is important to really focus on that — whether that's your Meta ads, your email marketing, or your social media.

I think metrics are great. Obviously we need to be profitable. But I think really taking a step back and asking, how can I actually make my marketing connect with people? How can I make my marketing actually have meaning and resonate with people so that I can build that relationship, rather than just being so focused on some of these numbers that are just telling you one story?

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (04:28)

I firmly believe there's a quote along the lines of: you get what you focus on, and what you measure is what you're going to get. So there are a lot of situations where if you're measuring the wrong thing, you might get more of that thing — but at what cost? And for how long will that actually work?

What you want to be careful of is that you are not training your customers to ignore you. If you have too much content that is very heavily salesy, if you are always sort of shoving things down people's throats, people can feel that. They can sense that.

People do not like being sold to. We have to remember that these platforms — especially Meta ads, Facebook, Instagram, Google ads — we are reaching people in their downtime. That is not a time when people really want a hard sell. They want to feel something. They want a problem solved. They want to connect. That's why people are on social media, regardless of your stance on it. So making your ads fit that bucket and making sure that your ads are doing some of those jobs is really going to make a massive difference to your sales.

I'm not suggesting this because I want to go all woo-woo on you and suggest that money doesn't matter. You're in business — money matters. But we want to make sure that we can do that in a way that is going to give your brand longevity. There are some brands out there at the moment that are really going in for a hard sell, and it might work for a minute, but I'm really curious to see how that holds up long term if they don't manage to switch and change that up.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (06:05)

I sort of touched on this before in terms of the AI side of things. A lot of people are asking me at the moment whether I think AI is coming for our jobs. And while I think there is definitely going to be a place where AI does take parts of our jobs, at the end of the day, this is marketing. We're dealing with people. If AI is doing everything, then AI is doing everything for everyone, and then everything is going to be the same.

So what I think is actually going to start to show up more is some really weird and wacky things. It's going to be things that are a little bit more human. I horrifyingly — and I hate saying this — predict we will see a rise in typos. Because you're not going to get a typo from an AI. They're not going to spell something wrong, they're not going to make a mistake in there somewhere. So I do have a theory that we are actually going to see a rise in typos — intentional typos. Check back with me in a couple of years and see if that is the case.

AI is being used in so many different places. And I do really think that having that human element — whether it's a typo, or just a really weird wacky idea, or a founder video talking direct to camera — whatever that human element we can bring back, I think is going to be really important. And I think a lot of brands are sort of running in the wrong direction at this point.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (07:32)

I think we are seeing a lot of brands trying to optimise and really keep an eye on those numbers and get into the nitty-gritty of things. And I think there's a time and a place for that. Your marketing has to be done in a way where you can still be human, still have fun, and still be a little bit creative with it — because we are human and that's what we like. And I think the more that we head in this direction, the more we need to be careful of that.

We had a client who was really, really getting into the nitty-gritty of their data. They wanted it broken down by day, by category, they wanted everything broken out. And I had to sit down and say to them, look, I understand where you're coming from, but some of these pieces of content are not actually designed to sell. Some of these pieces of content are not designed to make you a dollar. What they are designed to do is to build that relationship with your customer.

So for instance, we made a retargeting ad for them. And that retargeting ad is not a sales ad — it is a thank you from their team. If you had asked me what the goal ROAS of that particular ad was going to be, my goal for that ad was to have a zero ROAS. I just want their customers to feel appreciated and to really start to feel who is behind that brand.

To kind of prove my point, that one ad now has a 22 times return on ad spend. The idea of that ad was not to make sales. And because it's not designed to make sales, it's actually making more sales. It's a little catch-22, because I'm telling you not to focus on the money, even though sometimes these things bring in more money. But even if it wasn't bringing in money, I would still recommend they do it.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (09:14)

Because they are in a part of their business where they are really trying to grow, really trying to establish brand, really trying to build that community with their customers. And sometimes you just have to spend a little bit of money to do that in a way that is a little less salesy. So it's something to keep in mind. And I really, really recommend you add some more of those fun human elements to your ad mix.

Again, I sort of touched on it before in terms of Andromeda. Andromeda really is showing people the right ad at the right time. This is why having that variety of content is really important — because Andromeda is going to show those ads to the people at the moment it thinks is most important. If someone has never heard of your brand before, that is not the time to go in for the hard sell. We are not going in at that moment like, hi, buy this handbag, you'll love it. We need to introduce them to the brand. We need to show them the craftsmanship behind it. We need to show other people using it, do the walkthrough.

Then you can have a sale. Then you can talk about the quality. You can really start to build and flesh that out. Not every single ad has to do every single piece of that journey.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (10:19)

We used to say it took seven points of contact to make a sale. I have not seen any research lately on what that number is now. I would wonder if it's a three-digit number. I think a lot has changed. I think a lot of people are no longer just impulse purchasing. There was a moment where that was an option, and then unfortunately there were a lot of scam websites, spam websites, copycat websites. And people are no longer just impulse buying — they are looking at something and going, okay, I'm going to do some research, I'm going to Google it, is this a legit website? So making sure that you've got all of those different pieces of content to not only build that trust, but build that relationship, is really, really important.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (11:04)

Now, if you're sitting here listening and going, all right, that sounds great, but what does more human even look like — especially in an ads context? I'll give you some options.

Founder content is probably the best thing for this, because you are the founder of the business. People will start to resonate with you. I know a lot of people hate being behind the camera — I'm one of them. Not that you would know that from seeing this snippet, but I really do. Brittney Saunders is probably the best at this that I have seen in a really long time. She is spectacular. She does a great job of it. If you don't follow her, go follow her.

The next thing that everyone is talking about at the moment is employee-generated content. Now, I can't convince my team to do this — so if you can get yours to, good on you. My team don't want to be behind the camera. But we also don't run an eCommerce business, so it's a little bit easier for us. Having your employees, your staff, people packing orders, people in warehouses or in design houses doing any of that kind of content — we're just adding more human faces. The more human faces we can add, the better.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (12:11)

A lot of people are trying to replicate this content with AI. It's not there yet. And I would really caution against using it too much, even when it does get good enough. I get the ads on Instagram where it's like, hey, just have your talking head video and AI can do the rest. I think it's going to be a problem.

I'm all for AI in a lot of spaces. I think having it replicate humans is going to give people the ick. I think it's going to be creepy, and I don't think it's going to be something that resonates long term. Using it for image generation and repurposing of content — sure, we'll see how that goes. Using it for back-end things, I'm all for. But trying to replicate that human element of "I am talking to you, and this is as close as we can get to talking to you" — I'm not here for that. And maybe I'll change my tune on that.

But I do think that the reason founder content, UGC content, influencer content, employee-generated content works is because you get that human connection. You get that little bit of weirdness. You get that little bit of quirky. And I do think that's what people are going to resonate with. I think we are going to very quickly fly past the perfect polished. So it's going to be interesting to see how that plays out.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (13:20)

So we've covered founder content and employee-generated content. Obviously you've got your influencers and content creators. I do think a lot of influencers and content creators get misused. I think a lot of it is too forced. I think the best way of getting something out of your influencers and content creators is to let them be themselves. If you haven't picked up on the theme here, the being themselves is the part that's important. It's the fact that they are a little bit more human — they can have and show their weird quirks, and the way they speak is not so perfect. And I do think that is going to be really interesting to watch as time goes on.

We've obviously got user-generated content. If you've ever tried to get a video out of your customers, you will know how hard that is. But again, it is really, really good content to get if you can. And I do just think the less produced content is potentially going to overtake that really polished, scroll-stopping content as time goes on. So in the meantime, feel free to test and see what's working.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (14:20)

The last thing I would say in terms of feeling more human, especially in the ad space, is actually replying to your comments. We have a lot of clients, we see a lot of ads, and a lot of them don't reply to comments. Or it's a really generic reply. That is a real human being who took the time to comment, ask a question, interact with your content. If someone walked into your store and asked, hey, what size do you think I would be? — you wouldn't just ignore them.

And I think we again forget that the other side of this is an actual human being. Obviously you get trolls — they're annoying. We can do a whole other episode on how to deal with that if you want. But I think it's really important to actually speak to these people like people, and Meta rewards it. The more you can have a conversation, the more you can engage with people — fabulous.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (15:07)

So just to wrap it up and summarise: we are moving into a world where people are losing a lot of trust in brands. There is a massive rise in AI content, and people just don't have trust. We really need to be focusing on building that connection and those relationships with brands. And I think that has just been lost so much in this massive rise and uptick in marketing at the moment.

If you can focus on connecting with your people rather than just collecting all this data and really going hard on the data side of things, I think you'll see a massive improvement in your marketing. It's something that we really are striving to do with our clients — making sure that every ad is not a sales pitch, that we are really building on those relationships and that connection. And we are seeing that it's working. So at the end of the day, if you can show up like a human and not a machine, it will do very good for your business.

Dahna Borg – Bright Red Marketing (15:56)

Thank you for listening to the Bright Minds of eCommerce podcast. As always, you can find the show notes on our website at brightredmarketing.com.au — just look for the podcast page. Thanks for listening.