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[/responsive]Red Bull’s Ian Trombetta and Greg Jacobs were the closing speakers at the recent NewsCred Content Marketing Summit, and their talk blew the audience away. As well they should, given their brand’s mission.
“There are, of course, many ways to go about building loyal audiences, and Red Bull operates on one simple principle: Giving wings to people and ideas with the aim of being the most relevant and inspiring brand in the world,” writes NewsCred.
This overriding philosophy is what has turned this energy drink company into a global media network. And they’ve done it by mastering the art of the experience, “by creating the kind of everlasting moments that stay with fans forever,” the article continues.
“Opportunities like the chance to perform in front of 100,000 people or witness the live thrill of a brand new extreme sport. According to Red Bull, their brand is all about experiences. They’re what turn consumers into brand lovers.”
It’s an incredibly awesome sauce they serve up, and they’ve been able to do this because they understand their key audience – people who crave the energy to do incredibly awesome things. This is the kind of outreach and engagement that creates tribes, movements, indeed a whole new category of people who identify with their brand.
The key, according to Trombetta and Jacobs, is authenticity.
“The livestream of the Red Bull Stratos mission received 9.5 million concurrent viewers, the largest concurrent number in history, and used eight percent of the entire global Internet bandwidth on the day of the jump. The broadcast also earned Red Bull Media House a National Sports Emmy,” notes the article.
“Something that huge is inherently authentic; you don’t jump from space to sell a product, you do it because you really want to do it. For Red Bull, that’s the number one key: Be as authentic as you can.”
As brand marketers struggle to create their own success, this authenticity is paramount. Combine that with surprise, innovation, consistency and the ability to inspire, and you’ve got brand magic waiting to happen. We can’t all plunge through the stratosphere for the sake of the brand, but we can learn to take risks and push the limits of what we know to be.