Seth Godin: Ethical marketing and the importance of real value over short-term attention grabs

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He believes that brands that focus on resonating with their audience, embracing their niche, and fostering genuine relationships will not only stand out but thrive in the long term.

Ultimately, success comes from being indispensable to the right people, not just visible to everyone.

Recently inducted into the Direct Marketing Hall of Fame and the Marketing Hall of Fame, with 20 bestsellers and over 9,000 blog posts on marketing, renowned entrepreneur, speaker and best-selling author Godin knows a thing or two about this subject and related business topics.

What grounds his work is his belief in the importance of building meaningful connections and communities, and the value of marketing ethically through storytelling rather than manipulation.

Real connections and false proxies

Digital communication and social media have created a strange narrative around connection and relationships.

However, Godin emphasises that following someone on Facebook doesn’t mean you have a relationship.

“We've created all this noise and flurry, but relationships are about mutual trust, the mutual exchange of value, giving other people the benefit of the doubt and offering them dignity.

“This is very hard for profit-driven corporations to do because they want to be in charge.

“I think it begins by surrendering our desire to be in charge and finding the empathy to understand that other people don't see what we see or want what we want.”

This requires building an actual community slowly and with intent, but the success of that can be difficult to measure, especially in an age of instant gratification and short attention spans.

Godin says broadcasting your message doesn’t work in this environment.

“If people are going to know your work, it's because their friends told them, not because you did.”He adds that measuring success by the number of followers is a false proxy.

“The way we use social media is not by trying to build a big following for our company, but by giving the people who do follow us tools that give them status and affiliation when they talk about us.

“No one's going to talk about you because it's good for you; they're going to talk about you because it's good for them.”

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It might be a strategy problem

In Godin’s latest book, This Is Strategy, he argues that many businesses think they have a marketing problem and try to solve that by spending on more advertising, when in fact they have a strategy problem.

“If you think it’s a marketing problem, then you try to get the word out, you broadcast, you try to hire a new advertising agency. However, often it’s a strategy problem instead.”

Godin gives the example of Yahoo, where he was vice president of direct marketing. “One way you can tell if a company is in trouble is that they run more ads when competition shows up.

“When I was at Yahoo, it was the beginning of the end for them, and that's when they started investing in advertising instead of saying, our strategy is now obsolete, we need a new strategy.”

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Find your genre, find your niche

One strategy Godin advocates is establishing your genre.

“Basically, what section of the bookstore do you belong in? I’m going to make some assertions about who you are and what you do, and if you don't make it easy for me to do that, I will ignore you.”

He says that this can mean being very specific but believes that no niche is too small.

“I have never encountered a successful organisation that niched too much.

“If people pick you and they’re not delighted, it’s not that you niched too small; it’s because your product is no good.

“Ask yourself how small you need to be to be beloved and trusted. How small do you need to be to become indispensable? That’s how small you should be.”

In a world where people’s values are shifting towards empathy and purpose, this creates opportunities for challenger brands.

“These brands that are leaner and nimbler are looking at this world and saying, I don’t need the largest possible audience; I need the smallest viable one. If I show up for the right people in the right way, they will tell their friends.”

Be valuable, not viral

Another shift we’ve seen is audiences connecting much more with ideas, rather than the gimmicks that brands and marketers try to produce.

When social media first appeared, brands thought virality for virality’s sake was what attracted people, where it was communities.

So why are brands still chasing the next viral thing on TikTok and X?

“Because marketers are selfish, short-term narcissists who love putting on a show,” says Godin.

“That's what they signed up for, and it's inherent in the way most people approach it, which is, look at me, I'm doing something cool.

“TikTok is just cocaine for those folks because it's this dream that you're going to win the attention lottery. Someone's going to win the attention lottery, but it's probably not going to be you.”

Resonate, don’t manipulate

One question that has cropped up time and again is around the ethics of marketing.

Can it be moral? He says it’s crucial to differentiate between manipulation and storytelling.

“Manipulation isn’t ethical. It involves using the tools of promotion and marketing to get people to do things they regret.

“Ethical marketing involves telling a true story that resonates with people and helps them get what they want.

“Marketing got us the vaccine. It got us clean water and the ability to fly across the world.

“Manipulation isn't helpful; we shouldn’t be focusing on it. But if we can build a story that makes things better, I’m in favour.”

The above is based on Mongezi Mtati’s podcast, The Lead Creative.

You can watch the conversation here.