Brands are using social media in different ways to reach their target audiences. With a plethora of content coming out every day, it’s challenging to differentiate yourself from the competition. Many companies try to copy the content marketing strategies of their competitors, but that’s not always the best way to go. Businesses need to figure out what works for their company, office culture, values and their target audience to be able to create content that reflects what they stand for.

To stay ahead of the curve and motivate customer engagement, companies can invest in showcasing their office culture. In an era of “cancel culture,” highlighting company values and upholding positive messages that demonstrate corporate ethical practices can humanize a business, boost brand trustworthiness and create a stronger bond between the company and its audience. Through well-articulated narratives, businesses can stand out from competitors as leaders in their industry. Investing in defining your brand’s values through content can both amplify employee morale and strengthen customer retention.

 

Humanizing The Business With Culture Marketing

I’m a huge fan of businesses on social media that tell their stories and exhibit strong identities that humanize them. Off White, Vans and Vetements are some of the brands that I follow online, and one thing that’s common between them is that they delightfully showcase their stories and connect with the audience and the community they are situated in. It’s not a secret that one of the things contributing to marketing success, in general, is a solid foundation of engaged customers and connection with the community. But what these brands are doing that makes them stand out from their competitors online and offline is integrating their brand heritage, values and advocacies into content – thus the emergence of the term “culture marketing.”

 

What Is Culture Marketing?

Culture marketing is an essential element to consider when crafting a successful brand or product campaign. It involves the strategic integration of heritage, values and advocacies into content that speaks louder than most verbal or visual hard-sell advertisements.

Culture marketing is the strategic integration of heritage, values and advocacies into content.

We are seeing top brands like Dove, WeWork and Vans start to move away from traditional advertising and tactics and toward making meaningful connections with their audience through culture- and value-driven narratives. This strategy provides a unique story and brand experience that resonates with consumers in an authentic way, especially if these narratives echo their own morals and belief system. Incorporating this approach ultimately leads to increased trust and affinity for the brand, and it is imperative that brands evaluate how culture marketing can be part of their overall marketing strategy to gain a competitive advantage in today’s market.

 

How To Use Culture Marketing In Your Content Marketing Strategy

Content marketing is a fundamental tool for businesses, organizations and content creators alike to develop thought-provoking content for their target audience. However, content marketing alone cannot capture the spirit of an organization and communicate who they are and its values, beliefs and goals. Culture marketing takes content marketing one step further, providing an in-depth understanding of what sets that business apart from its competitors and offering a deeper level of connection to its customers. As Column Five Media further explains, “Whereas general content marketing may be focused on your service, product, industry, or area of expertise, culture marketing focuses on who you are, what you care about, and how you interact with the world.”

 

I was actually privileged enough to previously be part of a company with an amazing brand heritage, and it still fascinates me how they were able to reflect their values and tell their history through the content they create and share, without sounding boring. In this article, I share my experience working with a culture marketing-centered brand and the steps I learned that are equally applicable to include in any content marketing strategy:

  1. Starting point: Identify what makes your brand unique, what your company’s values are and what you want to uphold.
  2. Create: From that information, start creating content that is aligned with these values.
  3. Connect: Create an emotional connection. This can be achieved through various content such as social media, blog posts, articles or even video content that evokes positive emotions and values.
  4. Share: Make sure that your content is shareable and has the potential to go viral.

 

Integrating Corporate Identity Into Your Content

A brand is more than just its guidelines, logo and metrics. Office culture is one of the most important elements that can make any brand or business successful. From creating a welcoming atmosphere for employees to helping reach potential customers, your company culture can be used as a powerful tool in your brand marketing efforts. When you use it to create engaging content, you can better connect with your target audience and make sure your message resonates.

The key difference between culture marketing and other types of content creation is that with this approach, you’re not just creating something to post on your social media platforms. You are actually making an effort to engage with your audience so they can feel included and valued as part of the company or organization’s unique voice. This also goes back to the reason why the business started in the first place!

Culture marketers create valuable content that brings together their audience, who often share a sense of belonging through shared values and advocacies. This creates an environment for engagement that leads directly back to your company goals.

 

1. Where to start

If you’re looking to create a content marketing strategy that truly resonates with your audience, it’s important to start by understanding your company culture. After all, your culture is what informs the type of content you produce and how you go about producing it. Businesses that are open to sharing their history and advocacies – where they started and what drove them to start the company – create that sense of belongingness to their followers and make them feel they are part of the brand’s success.

 

Define your culture

A clear definition of your office culture will help you create effective and relatable content that resonates with your audience’s values and beliefs.

The first step to integrating culture marketing in your content marketing strategy is to clearly define your company culture. These are some of the questions that can help you get started in identifying your office culture:

  • What values do you want to uphold?
  • What kind of vibe do you want to create?
  • What mission do you want your employees and followers to rally behind?
  • What advocacies are you supporting?

 

Your company’s long-term goals may not be immediately clear, but by consistently referencing your vision and mission in both verbal and visual materials you demonstrate that you stand for something greater than a simple product or service – that there are real ideals at work.

 

Establish consistent messaging

Creating an engaged following is key to success in any business, regardless of the industry. But it is only through consistent messaging that bolsters a company’s core values and mission that true connection can be established and loyalty cultivated. This includes not only words, but visuals as well – all content should reflect a unified cultural identity. If done correctly, this creates an environment of integrity and trustworthiness between your brand and potential customers, increasing visibility and presenting opportunities for further engagement.

Once you have figured out what drives your company forward, the steps below will help you get started on integrating office culture into your content marketing strategy.

 

2. Create

Your office culture is unique, so don’t be afraid to create organic and genuine content around it! Write posts about your history or advocacy, or post photos and videos from employees, influencers and personalities that reflect your brand identity. This kind of creative storytelling is best complemented and showcased through unique visuals, whether shot through events or one-on-ones. Use photos, videos and graphics that reflect the culture of your office and represent it in an authentic way and showcase your brand’s unique identity. The more people see and hear about your culture, the more they’ll understand what makes your company special.

Many brands also utilize influencers and even their own employees’ stories to share their message and find an audience that not only applauds, but takes part in, their journey. Marketing is all about storytelling, and your company’s story is best told by the people and communities who live it every day. Whether it’s food, fashion or inspiration you’re striving to communicate, several companies have had success in using the resources available to them and rallying together those who feel the same.

If your mission lies in expressing yourself and developing relationships with people who share your beliefs, you should take inspiration from the imaginative ways these certain brands have been carrying out their messages.

 

Vans

This brand has advocated for creative expression through its various sports and endeavors since it started in 1966. The founder created an admirable brand culture that effectively reflects how they create the products and adapt their messages to resonate with their target audience’s values and advocacies.

Their campaigns range from supporting inclusive and equitable nonprofit organizations, championing sustainability and celebrating the LGBTQ+ community, all of which are founded toward honoring individuality and creative expression – the core values of the brand.

A&W

When employees understand and live out your company culture, they can be your best brand ambassadors! Getting employees involved in the company’s processes deepens their appreciation of the office culture and values and makes them feel valued and appreciated.

This food chain interestingly launched a campaign involving their employees to celebrate “anti-celeb meals.” Providing a refreshing take on content, they used actual employees as ad models not only to boost the morale of the entire company but also to encourage talent amid the economic situation.

As Liz Bazner of A&W said, “Giving them the celebrity treatment and recognizing the talents they bring to the workplace every day was not only really fun, but also rewarding.” 

 

3. Connect

If you want your marketing efforts to be successful, make sure that your team is living and breathing your culture every day — from the way they treat customers and each other to the way they dress and speak online and offline. Actively engage with your audience by responding to comments, creating polls, repurposing their content and asking questions to get feedback on their experiences. This will give you the opportunity to learn more about what matters to them and how your company culture can be used to make your brand marketing even more effective.

 

Indigo

Twitter is a fun platform to easily connect with the audience! In a swift response to them being tagged by Twitter fans regarding a certain artist’s album release (carrying the same name), Indigo (a bookstore located in Canada) hopped on the trend right away and made the album available in their online and offline shops.

It can get overwhelming for a small store to have received a barrage of mentions, but this company effectively utilized the power of customer engagement to drive sales and traffic to their platforms.

Vetements

What separates this brand from all other retail brands is they don’t use influencer marketing to promote their products! They either repost content that they have been tagged in or share photos from influencers coincidentally wearing their products. They try to avoid influencer marketing and instead focus on their community, who is into street lifestyle, individuality and creative expression.

 

As seen with these brands, consistency is key when it comes to marketing your company culture. You need to be able to reach out to your target audience and be intentional about the messages you send out into the world, making sure that those messages are always in line with how your team actually behaves. Otherwise, you risk damaging your credibility and confusing both employees and customers alike.

 

4. Share

This part is self-explanatory: you gotta share that content! Social media is the ultimate key to getting your message heard in a loud and crowded online world. Sharing thoughtfully crafted social media posts and well-timed updates is a surefire way to generate engagement on a consistent basis.

If you want to make your statement resonate, it must be distributed across multiple platforms and networks. Your target audience within the communities and industries you work in will ultimately share the content, but to amplify it further, why don’t you encourage your employees to initially share the content on their own platforms?

Finally, don’t forget to measure the results of your marketing efforts! Track things like website traffic, social media engagement, employee turnover rate, customer satisfaction levels, etc. By monitoring these metrics closely, you’ll be able to tell if your office culture, values and messaging are really resonating with people — then adjust your strategy accordingly.

 

How Can Culture Marketing Benefit My Business?

Your company’s culture is an important part of what makes it special — so don’t be afraid to use it as part of your content marketing strategy! When you share your story with the world and live out your values every day, not only you can attract top talent but also build trust with customers and differentiate yourself from the competition.

There are a number of benefits that come with using culture marketing in your content strategy:

  1. It allows you to connect with consumers on a deeper level.
  2. It can help you to attract new customers and build loyalty among existing ones.
  3. Culture marketing can also help you to differentiate your brand from competitors.

When you translate your company culture into compelling content, you ensure that your message resonates with those who matter most – your target audience. 

By infusing your culture into your marketing, you create a more humanized business that customers will want to do business with. The more you can tell interesting stories about your brand, the more you can pique people’s interest and bring them into your brand story. Showing off your company’s personality and unique values will make you stand out from the competition and help customers feel like they know you on a personal level. You’ll be able to create a strong brand identity that resonates with your employees and customers.

 

Need Help Incorporating Culture Marketing Into Your Business?

Still not sure where to start and how to infuse your corporate identity into your marketing? Let Three Girls Media help! We offer a complimentary 30-minute consultation with our CEO. Contact us today to see how we can assist in putting culture marketing to work for your brand!

 

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