The End of the Exploit

The New Narrative of Branding

Branding used to focus on packaging an identity in a logo, colors, fonts, and images. Today, because of how people consume media, branding thrives on the emotional impact a business has through a narrative. We live in a storytelling world. What remains the same is that a brand, holistically, is simply how people feel about the business. The way you tell your story carries immense weight right now.

Business Backlash

Business will always do fine as long as people have needs or problems to solve. But, we are currently seeing people hate on business in unprecedented ways. Much like the social changes of the last 20 years, this shift is generally a positive development if you are a human-centric person. A huge transformation is happening. People are exhausted by the bullshit and seek agency and integrity in their lives. They want real value rather than another subscription or a virtual handjob.

As business owners, your identity and your purpose are more important than ever. AI will fail to find that essential human thread for you. That elusive why of your business takes a uniquely human process to coax out, reveal, and document. Learning how to turn that into an evolving story with emotional impact is a high art form.

The easy path of mimicry makes you invisible in a sea of AI scripts and over-stimulation. Mimicry leads to irrelevancy. People notice what is different. They ignore what is the same.

The Art of Connection

We are losing the art of connection. People are burnt out and they lack trust in businesses and each other. They want to be left alone. This total advertising aversion is a natural response to a history of exploits. Businesses have done a terrible job earning trust.

The history of commerce has been one exploit after another: collecting personal data, fake masks, virtue signaling, and green washing. Businesses have prostituted themselves to adapt to anywhere the dollar might land. Trust has vanished.

People are also realizing they are free from the garbage they were told they needed. They see consumerism as a form of financial slavery. They are weary of cheap ingredients, fillers, white labeled products, and toxic ingredients. At a certain point, people choose to walk away. They make their own toothpaste from coconut oil and baking soda. They make their own bread and their own clothes. They are opting out of a system of scammers.

In my 30 years of working with businesses, I have never seen anything like this. I believe this change is permanent. People are fed up.

Reclaiming Our Essential Nature

We escape the garbage pile by focusing on helping humans be human again. We achieve this by being humane, by solving modern problems, and by sharing the process through honest narrative.

Social media has reached peak stimulation. AI scripts provide max sensory impact to force a feeling, but that feeling is usually shock, alarm, or ideological validation. This path leads toward a total collapse. Something essential is missing.

Somewhere between the advent of MTV and AI, we lost a thread back to our humanity. I question if most people even know what that means anymore. The definition might even alarm a modern audience because it defies our current materialist instincts.

The definition of humanity is human beings collectively, but it is also humaneness or benevolence. It is the quality of being well-meaning or kind. Take that seriously. Read it and consider it deeply.

If to be human is to be humane, then we have lost our humanity and are actually no longer human. To be human is to be well-meaning. Most business practices killed that baby on day one. Business often functions as a psychopath when examined in an honest way. The idea that people are well-meaning has been extinct for a generation two.

This is the feeling behind the current crisis. We feel less than human because we have abandoned the definition. Having a body is a biological fact, but being well-meaning is our true identity. Our essence exists in our intention rather than our biological presence.

Reconnecting with this essential nature is a restorative force. It fills the gaps of emptiness we are all feeling. This is the definitive path back to purpose.

When We Had Humanity

Older generations definitely had a lot to learn, but we have thrown the baby out with the bathwater in some ways. Older movies, shows, and stories often had the humanity we lack today. They explored the simple concept of a heart closing and facing the challenges required to open it back up again. They explored drug addiction, abuse, and difficult transitions as paths to growth, not something to put a trigger warning on and censor.

Today, the common stance is to ghost, to disconnect, and to shield. People interpret the pursuit of reconnection as a form of abuse. While we have identified narcissism as a real issue, this mindset is now being applied to every situation. A closed heart is a surrender of one’s humanity.

We have lost the understanding of what makes us human. We have forgotten how to face and resolve challenges. To be human is to grow and to confront life with an open heart. This leads back to the powerful, missing narrative: the journey from a closed heart to an open heart and a community that supports this process.

The Path Forward

Brands, businesses, and people exist in a symbiotic relationship. To change the tide and be the ones who evolve, we must recognize that the path forward is quite simple; it begins with restoring our well-meaning nature.

Strive to maintain your focus even when money is tight or trends coax us elsewhere. Trust in this essential root of who we are to guide us. As brands in the world, we must re-evaluate how we can help. We must meet the needs of a world undergoing a total overhaul of how and why we do business.

We all have a story to tell. Make sure yours is human.