Today storytelling is an inherent part of any brand’s communication – be it large brands, small ones, premium brands and even D2C brands.
Unlike traditional retail models, D2C businesses have the unique opportunity to interact with their customers directly, forging a deeper, more meaningful relationship. One of the most powerful tools in this endeavour is storytelling. The youth craves authenticity and looks for various ways to connect with brands. The brands need to keep the brand guidelines in mind while maintaining brand authenticity.
Manchanda owns Zappfresh, a brand in the category of fresh meat delivery - have been in this space since 2015 and it is now available in an omnichannel manner.
Authenticity In Brand Positioning
Discussing the role of authenticity, he outlines, “We are a farm-to-fork brand, and our authenticity is what sets us apart. As a category player, we are looking at solving the problem of shelf life, expiry dates of meat, and the freshness of the meat – to tackle this issue, we make sure all our meat is processed 24 hours prior to consumption. These are the parameters that we keep in mind to continuously maintain quality, transparency and traceability which are significant. Some of our campaigns show how we take our entire process ahead form farm to fork, our procurement, and all of that - the consumers are shown about what reaches their plate. They also want to know about the antibiotics and all that goes into all our products. It is our responsibility to be honest to the consumers – it is about authenticity with the consumers.”
Nikita Malhotra, Co-founder, Winston Electronics and Milagro Beauty started an Instagram page, Royalicious - wherein she used to sell international brands on her page – she realised that she could sell other brands then why could not she start her own brand. She thought of starting in the personal electronics industry at a time when the pandemic had hit – and launched Winston in the DIY salon solutions category when it was needed the most, as a lot of people could not visit a salon to avail their services.
She pointed out, “Both are Insta babies – they are born on social media, so building a community is my focus which helps me take my brand further. The content and tapping on micro-influencers is the way out, rather than macro-influencers – as even though micro-influencers have a comparatively smaller number in terms of following consumers would understand their authenticity."
While sharing her Shark Tank story she said, "It is only about numbers eventually – and consumers could also purchase the brand for the first time, but it is about a certain ‘glue’ that your brand needs to possess – be it after sales which helps a brand maintain and keep its consumers close and get them to return to the brand again and again. Your product should have strength.”
Educating Customers Can Create Value
Anshita Mehrotra, Managing Director, FixMyCurls, a hair care brand that helps consumers embrace their naturally textured hair. She said, “I wear my hair curly – that’s the natural texture of my hair. But a lot of consumers need to be convinced that they should be comfortable in their natural state of hair. Consumers should be able to realise that they can’t keep utilising external hair treatments which will damage their hair permanently. To maintain authenticity, we look at educating customers about the reality of genetics of how their hair grows. Additionally, I am part of my campaigns and endorse the bets that we have so that the consumers know that we stand by our brand and its good quality.”
Oswal operates a premium high-performance skincare brand, the manufacturing of which is done in Korea, but still not under the K-beauty banner as it has its own formulations. He points out that Covid helped them build their brand and scale it up online. “Along with us as founders being the promoters of our brand which gives the consumers a boost to utilise our products and also acts as a validation to the good quality that we offer, we use more consumers to promote our products rather than influencers so that it is a more realistic opinion. We focus on listing our ingredients and transparency which helps build our credibility – because that’s what would help a brand in the long run.”
Conversing at the BW Marketing World D2C Conclave 2024 on 1 May, 2024, the panelists spoke about how brands are taking a step ahead from reaching out to the core of the consumers, to the heart of the consumers.
In a panel discussion, Anshita Mehrotra, Managing Director, Fixmycurls; Nikita Malhotra, Co-founder, Winston and Milagro Beauty; Deepanshu Manchanda, Founder and CEO, Zappfresh and Akshay Oswal, Co-founder, Oceglow came together to deliberate on the topic - The Brand Story: Connecting With Consumers. They underscored the power of storytelling for crafting compelling brand narratives that resonates with today's customers.
The panellists spoke about brands using storytelling to help their consumers recall and be attached to them. Connecting with the brands directly – tech has disrupted the D2C category, immensely.
