Here, Adam Ferrier, chief thinker and Tom Wenborn, chief creative tinker at Thinkerbell, unpack the potential dangers of both zigging and zagging in the light of recent global news.
There’s an old bit of advice in marketing, if they zag, you should zig. It sounds smart. Like the kind of thing a disruptive brand would do. But if you zig too hard, you risk disappearing completely. Not because you weren’t interesting, but because no one knew what you were selling. If you zig while they zag you may go broke.
Every brand (almost without exception*) lives inside a category. And every category comes with a set of expectations. Milk comes in white cartons. Banks talk about security. Cars are usually pitched as a mix of style and performance. These aren’t tired clichés, they’re helpful shortcuts that make life easier for consumers.
People don’t start with brands. They start with categories. I need milk. I need a bank. I need something to clean the bathroom. Our brains are wired to look for familiar signals, and those signals are usually built from category conventions. If you change everything, there’s a chance people won’t recognise what you are.
That’s why the best brands don’t just rebel for the sake of it. They find ways to stand out without falling out of the category completely. They zig, but they zig within the zag.
This is where the idea of borrowing from the category comes in. When you lean into the existing codes of the space you’re in, you give people a starting point. You anchor your brand in something recognisable. Then once you’ve borrowed what you need, you can give back something of your own. A fresh tone. A new point of view. Something that flips the expected just enough to get noticed.
It’s not about being louder, or whackier, or even more creative. It’s about being distinctive, showing up completely as you, but in a way that’s still within the semiotics /heuristics/conventions of the category.
Oatly is a good example. It still looks and behaves like a milk brand. It comes in a carton. It talks about health. But it layers on a voice and visual identity that are completely its own. You know it’s a milk alternative, and you also know you haven’t seen anything else quite like it. This is not zigging whilst they all zagged, it’s zigging within the zag.
The real challenge isn’t being different. It’s being different in a way that still makes sense.
Too many brands zig so hard they forget what aisle they’re supposed to be in. They trade familiarity for attention, and lose both. Others stick so closely to the rules that they blend in entirely.
You don’t have to zig. Some brands stay comfortably within the zag and perform just fine. But if you do zig, make sure you know what people need from the category first. Borrow the bits that matter. Then give back something that only your brand can offer.
The cost of boring can be high, the cost of being different can be even higher.
*some brands, very few in number do basically create a completely new category when they start and blow up the rules for everyone. Arguably even these rare brands still need to guide consumers what category they are trying to create by stealing from the cues of adjacent category (Peleton, Tesla and GoPro all come to mind)
