EXECS ARE REPLY GUYS
The C-Suite is venturing out from the shadows and stepping out into the spotlight/line of fire.
American Eagle and Gap drove a lot of discourse over the past few weeks with their denim ads.
The dust has settled a bit, and it was interesting to that the C-Suite at both corporations has chimed in.
Here’s Gap’s CEO talking to Jim Cramer (Tiktok):
“[The ad with Katseye] is driving record breaking responses for the brand. It’s in striking range of being one of the most iconic brand campaigns certainly in our history, but out there overall.”
Here’s American Eagle’s CMO on Adage (Article):
“I personally said when we were launching the campaign that this could push some buttons. It was designed to celebrate denim and spark a conversation around self-expression, confidence and optimism and the campaign was designed to be at the center of culture. We succeeded in a very big way.”
There’s something very ‘comments section’ about these responses.
Both are keeping score. Their each touting metrics and effectiveness, essentially saying 'it worked.' These declarations come with an added gravity when it comes from leadership. Their scorekeeping is superior to views, likes, and comments b/c business revolves around sales, profitability, and stock prices. If leadership declares success, it’s about dollars – a much higher hurdle than double tapping.
Both are claiming to be winners. From a discourse POV, it’s an unsatisfying resolution, but also plausible. Metrics can be up at both businesses. That said, the desire for a resolution and a ‘winner’ feels like an evolution of the ‘purpose’ era. While in ‘purpose’ era 1.0, there was a consensus across marketers on the vision for the world (inclusivity, green energy, etc.), there’s now divergent opinions across audience and demographics. Audiences want their side to win. Execs are leaning into this.
This is a further shift away from corporation as monolithic, un-named entities, driven by bureaucracies. The execs are stepping out and publicly declaring ownership around the decisions. There’s a parallel to the Duolingo owl or the various 'marketing girlie' posts. Audiences know there are people behind the posts and choices so execs are acting more like the account owners or posters. Put differently - brands used to behave like finsta's, run anonymously. Now they're mains, and with that, the provenance of decisions and who is posting becomes important.