The last three posts have outlined a series of critical assumptions about the role of brands in society.  Relying on the observations of others, I’ve argued that the distinction between people and brands is increasingly fuzzy — and that the ties of dependence between them are increasingly strong.

Central to this idea of interdependence is the concept of ‘imagined communities’ that people form when they consume similar things.  These communities are both shaped by and deeply influential to the everyday decisions people make about how to spend their time, money, and attention.  Their very existence propels the brands they rely on.  And their terms are constantly redefined; they are the ever-evolving sum of all of the individual identity projects of the people who drive them.  The net effect is a symbiotic ecosystem of people and brands brought together around a central idea but in a state of constant flux.

Built from a cross-section of business strategy and social theory literature, this idea of people-brand interdependence around an evolving central idea is not altogether new.  It is, however, still dense, abstract, and far more of a novel thought experiment than an actionable insight.  Bridging the gap between theoretical head-trip and applicable framework is a matter of one new and critical observation:

At a macro level, imagined communities start to take on many of the same qualities that traditional brands do. Visual language.  Expectations of experience.  Hierarchy and architecture.  A promise.  Arrived at through a decentralized process of many independent actors, the end result is remarkably similar to the effect of the best centrally-managed brands: a core, compelling identity that inspires loyalty and gets people to act.

These are metabrands: systems of people and products centered on an evolving cultural idea. Applying the lens of strategic brand management makes this abstract social idea concrete, researchable, and actionable.

‘Green’ — environmental responsibility and ecological awareness, expressed personally and corporately — is a particularly compelling case study for this application of the metabrand framework.  It is a system truly decentralized; a disorganized multitude of people and products ranging from activist eco-terrorists to image-conscious Prius drivers.  Expression of green identity is driven by a saturated market of everyday decisions as mundane as light bulb purchases, light switch management, detergent choice, and the substrate of your shopping bag.  But it also reaches into the most basic fundamentals of energy infrastructure and the furthest dreams of technological innovation, and is underwritten by decades of volumes of overlapping rhetoric; of religious responsibility and moral obligation and imminent planetary doom in the face of aggregate apathy.

And yet, the externalized sum of this multilayered cultural chaos exhibits a surprisingly concise meaning, vision, mission, values, and promise.  ‘Green’ is a color, carried on a visual language of earth tones and deepwater blues.  It has an architecture, built on the hierarchies of increasing investment and effective action, ranging from idle greenwash to deeply ‘dark green’ commitments.  It comes loaded with specific experience expectations that range from personal sacrifice and radical politics to economic efficiency and the promise of global security.

Ultimately, metabrand green is an aggregate identity that – like any strong brand identity – inspires fierce loyalty from its core followers, maintains casual relationships with a mass audience, and polarizes those on the fringes.
Unlike centrally-managed brands, however, metabrand green is constantly changing in the hands of every actor that participates in its common identity project.  It traverses an arc on which public policy and consumer preferences are pulling the metabrand from an activist and ideology-driven past, and its precise future is inherently impossible to predict, much less globally manage.

But it is possible to influence from the inside.  Success in a metabrand economy will rely on learning how to operate influentially within—indeed, as a part of—this complex system. In an interdependent and evolving ecosystem of people and brands, the one-way orientation of classic consumer research and reactive product development will consistently fail to capture the imagination of metabrands.

Rather, those who provide leadership within – and thus profit from – the metabrand economy will understand two critical components that distinguish metabrand communities from classic brand relationships: gravity and momentum.  The remaining posts to this blog will begin to explore these dynamics through the lens of specific case studies of individuals and entities that have influenced metabrand green.  Stay tuned.