Brand News: Unilever's Bold Pivot

Unilever is making a strategic shift toward influencer marketing instead of traditional advertising. This massive consumer goods company is responding to increasing consumer skepticism by collaborating with authentic voices to promote their vast range of products.

• Unilever owns countless FMCG products from personal care items to foods
• Traditional brand advertising is becoming less effective at building consumer trust
• The company is now working with influencers like Sophie Hinchcliffe to reach consumers
• This signals a major industry trend toward personalized, relatable content
• A blended approach of traditional and digital channels with user-generated content is showing good results
• Even the biggest spenders on traditional advertising are finding they need to invest more in social channels
• Brand studies are showing insufficient lift from traditional advertising alone

Thanks for tuning in to Brand News Today!

The Digital Horizons Podcast is hosted by:

James Walker - Managing Director WHD
Brian Hastings - Managing Director Nous

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:09):
Welcome back to Brand News Today.
Brian has a very excitingarticle for us to run through.
Yeah, this is a big shift fromone of the big, big super
companies, let's call it in themarket Unilever's shift to
influencer marketing.
So these guys I would havethought as being the forever
traditional, focused brandadvertisers.
Unilever has just about everyproduct you can think of on the

(00:32):
shelves FMCG products, fromdeodorants to body washes to
hairsprays, all the way throughto foods and ice creams and
cereals.
It's got everything.
Their job is to slowly butsurely build the brand's
presence of all of theirproducts in the hearts and minds
of customers so that whenthey're at the supermarket shelf

(00:55):
, they choose theirs overanother product.
They're not generally lookingfor online purchases.
This is not a performancemarketing strategy, is it?
Yeah, that's right.
So it's a brand.
It's a company that relies onthe development of brand.
So what are they doing?
Unilever has strategicallyincreased its investment in
influencer marketing to connectwith consumers, who are
increasingly sceptical oftraditional advertising.

(01:17):
By collaborating withinfluencers like Sophie
Hinchcliffe, unilever aims toleverage authentic voices to
promote its products, reflectinga broader industry trend
towards personal, personalizedand relatable content.
This is in the Times UK.
Do you know who that is.
No, miss Soph, no, no, I justreferenced it because it
referenced it.
Probably not the ideal audiencefor Miss Hinch or whatever her

(01:37):
name is, but this is huge newsfrom a company signaling its
shift away not completely, butits need to invest significantly
in the trusted, user-generatedcontent and social platforms.
Because they're finding fromall their spending like these
are the guys who are doing themost of that traditional brand

(01:59):
advertising TV print, outdoor,out of home they're finding it's
being seen as skeptical andit's not shifting the lever for
brand perception andrelatability and trust.
This is huge news for mebecause I'm finding, with brand
campaign activity, a blendbetween traditional and digital

(02:21):
channels and trusteduser-generated content is
getting a really good result.
But hearing the ones spendingthe most probably in market
across the world are findingthat it's not getting their
brand studies, it's not showingin their brand studies to have
enough of a lift and they needto invest more in these other
social channels, is huge news.

(02:43):
Okay, well, it'll be interestingto see how that plays out.
Okay, I'm glad you'reinterested.
Thanks for your voter supportthere, james.
Very exciting stuff.
Sorry, I don't do any brand.
We don't do any brand stuff,obviously, so I wouldn't know
how to measure it.
I guess over time we'll tellwhether that strategy actually

(03:04):
works for them.
I'm sure it will, yeah, and Ithink these guys are spending a
lot of money measuring it.
So if they're saying it's timefor a shift, it's interesting
news.
That's brand news for this week.
Thanks for tuning in.
Thanks for watching.