A funny campaign that hides a ruthless strategy

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INTRODUCTION

Want to know one of the most common & dangerous misconceptions about brand strategy? That it only guides advertising & communications. A truly great brand strategy should guide everything the brand does. It should give you a ruthlessly effective path forward that makes everything work ten times harder. And do you want to know a brand that has been more ruthlessly effective than most recently? Uber. Ok, let’s break it down…

#1 STAND FOR SOMETHING BIGGER

Uber’s brand strategy separates them from the pack, guides all they do & allows them to stand for something bigger. All great brands do this. Nike doesn’t just sell sneakers, it sells the idea that everybody can be an athlete. A strategy that has guided Nike to create highly distinctive comms & expand into verticals beyond sneakers (ie wearables/events). Airbnb doesn’t just sell holidays, it sells the idea of belonging. A strategy that has again guided AirBnB to create highly dynamic comms & expand into verticals beyond rentals (ie events). And Uber doesn’t just sell cheap taxis, it sells the idea of a world with better mobility.

Specifically, Uber’s brand purpose is to “provide transportation as reliable as running water, everywhere, for everyone”. A strategy which sees them expand into new & more lucrative verticals. Which I’ll unpack in more detail, in the next section.

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#2 DOMINATE DISTRUBTION

When you boil it down brand building is fairly simple. Essentially there are two elements you need to aim to continually grow; mental & physical availability. The former is about ensuring you are top of mind when people are ready to buy. The latter is about ensuring you are easy to buy when people are ready.

Now long-time readers will know that when it comes to mental availability, I am fanatical about fame. Simply if you want to become top of mind you need to get people to talk about and share your brand. Want to know more about the importance of fame? Check out my previous write-ups on Oatly, Mid Day Squares & Dollar Shave Club . Yet despite the power fame provides, it’s all for nothing unless you have great physical availability (ie distribution). In fact, data now shows that distribution is the best lever to pull when it comes to growth. When you think about it, this is kind of common sense tbh. I mean how often would you go out of your way to buy a brand that was incredibly difficult to buy? Almost never. This is why physical availability & distribution are so essential to success.

Understanding the importance of distribution also helps us understand why Uber’s mobility play, is so ruthlessly smart. Uber’s initial business (taxis) and even their expansion into food delivery, had limited the brand’s availability to cities. Both businesses required a high volume of orders from people who tend to not own their own car (ie city dwellers). The downside of this is that the brand had failed to scale beyond cities into the countryside.

Venturing into train travel and striving for mobility, rather than just taxis, allows the brand to overcome these limitations. It allows Uber to massively grow their physical availability & in turn their customer acquisition. This expanded availability could also see Uber likely dominate in its original taxi market. Why is this the case? Well, Uber trains will likely be the first touch point for many new people into the brand. These people can then be locked into the Uber ecosystem, via cross promotions, and so will be more likely to book an Uber taxi when they visit the city. Equally city dwellers may now have a preference for Uber, over other providers, due to the national rail discounts they can enjoy. In short Uber’s purpose & distribution dominance creates a flywheel effect.

On all of the above, I think there is one important lesson for all brand’s to never forget. People are inherently lazy and want the path of least resistance when it comes to buying brands. Uber gets this better than most

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#3 HAVING A LAUGH

As previously discussed in this community one of the biggest issues in brand strategy today is the debate over purpose. Specifically, whether purpose is useful or well…just a bit…b*llshit. I’ll recap my point of view below:

Turning to Uber we can see they, thankfully, avoided the trap of being too purposeful in their communications. They could have easily defaulted to an overly serious & pretentious manifesto-style piece. A piece stating how Uber wants to “get the world moving” or “promote human progress”…whilst massively underpaying its ‘staff’ and putting black cab workers out of work 🥲. Thankfully they didn’t. Thankfully they leveraged one of the most powerful tools in the marketing playbook…humour.

So it just goes to show that even if you have a big audacious goal and purpose, you can still turn up with a smile and humour. In fact, we know it’s far more effective to be humorous and 91% of consumers prefer brands that are funny. Even more so during tough economic times, like we are facing right now.

CONCLUSION

Now it is not my place to comment on the ethics of a company like Uber. What I can say however is that their strategy is ruthlessly effective. And to recap three lessons we can learn from them are as follows:

• Aim for something bigger in your purpose

• Fame without physical availability is kind of pointless

• Purpose does not need to always be serious business.

Many thanks,

Will Poskett,
Founder of Defiant