Good Is the New Cool When It Comes to a Successful Brand The co-founder of a social impact consultancy discusses how companies can make a difference.
By Jessica Abo
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Afdhel Aziz is a thought leader, writer, speaker, consultant and board advisor with 20 years of experience working as a visionary marketer at companies like Procter & Gamble, Nokia, Heineken and Absolut Vodka. Despite creating world-class pop culture partnerships with everyone from Lady Gaga to the TED Conferences, he felt there was more he could be contributing to society.
This search inspired him to co-write Good is the New Cool: Market Like You A Give a Damn. The book's success led Aziz to quit his job and follow his own purpose. Now he is on a mission to help companies and individuals find purpose and meaning in their work and in their lives.
An internationally acclaimed keynote speaker, Aziz is also the co-founder and Chief Purpose Officer of Conspiracy of Love. The purpose consultancy supports a long roster of clients, including iconic brands like Adidas, Red Bull, Oreo and Microsoft, to Fortune 500 companies like Unilever, AB Inbev, Mondelez and Diageo.
"Goodisthenewcool.org is now a global movement of good, with events and podcasts in association with Soho House, conferences in LA, Sydney and Melbourne, and an online community of 20,000 purpose-driven leaders in business and culture," Aziz says.
Aziz spoke with Jessica Abo to discuss Conspiracy of Love, why businesses should take the "good is the new cool" approach and why it's not too late for companies to do better.
Jessica Abo: Tell us about your book Good is the New Cool: Market Like You A Give a Damn.
Afdhel Aziz: It's an exploration of the whole world of purpose driven marketing. Today, brands more than ever are asked to take stands. When you think about Nike with Colin Kaepernick, for example, consumers are asking brands to take positions in social issues. We wanted to explore that in this book that I co-wrote with Bobby Jones. The expectation for brands to help solve societal problems has never been more sky high.
In the wake of Covid-19 and Black Lives Matter, consumers are demanding that the brands in their lives stand up for their values. Consumers are voting with their wallets, we like to say, and making sure that if they're going to invest in a brand's products and services, that brand better be helping solve issues, whether they're environmental issues or social issues. There is an incredibly high level of scrutiny at the moment that brands are under and expectations keep growing as well.
What are some of the biggest mistakes brands make?
Aziz: One of the biggest mistakes brands make when they venture into this territory of social impact is positioning themselves as the hero, riding in on a white horse to solve the problem. We like to preach to our clients the maxim "be the helper not the hero." Brands who do this find a way to make the consumers the hero of the journey to give them platforms to help society at large. And this way you can avoid the trap of coming across as too egotistical when talking about how you're going to attack this problem.
Do brands have to be perfect to start doing good?
Aziz: Brands do not have to be perfect to do some good. In fact, I would say that no brand is perfect, just like no human being is perfect. It's important not to be paralyzed by the lack of perfection. Every brand has its problem, has its issues. As long as they're transparent about it and say, "Listen, here's the plan that we're putting into place to solve this problem, bear with us while we do it. But in the meantime, here's another problem that we really want to solve in society, will you help us?" Taking that humble posture really helps people understand the genuineness of your intentions and that really makes a difference when asking people to participate.
What advice do you have for brands that want to do some good in the world?
Aziz: The advice that we have for brands who want to do some good in the world is, first of all, listen. Listen to your employees, listen to your consumers, look at the culture in the world today and try and find a way of thinking of people as citizens, not just consumers. Think about the broad range of issues that they care about, and then figure out a way that you, as a brand can get involved in helping to solve some of those problems as well. We like to say brands should solve problems from the everyday to the epic. It doesn't all have to be about climate change and racial inequality. Maybe there are everyday problems as well that you as a brand can get involved in to make people's lives a little bit better.
