Beyond nice: The misunderstood side of authenticity

There’s a pervasive misunderstanding that being authentic equates to being nice. This misconception has led many credit unions to dilute their unique voices in an effort to appear caring, polite, and universally appealing.

Take brands like Liquid Death and Mountain Dew. These brands are anything but quiet and reserved, yet they are paragons of authenticity. Liquid Death, with its rebellious, in-your-face approach to selling water, and Mountain Dew, with its extreme, adrenaline-fueled marketing campaigns, are loud, unapologetic, and entirely true to their brand identities. They reflect the identity of their audience – the thrill-seekers, the rule-breakers, the ones who want more than just a product: They want a statement.

And this is what many credit unions fail to see.

Average consumers don’t really care about how many awards you’ve won, what investments you’ve made, or how good you think you are. What people truly care about is how you can make something possible for them or make a problem they have go away.

 

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