The Food and Beverage Marketers Scarcity Mindset Breeds Scarcity of Results | Phoode (2024)

Instead, their “creative marketing” ideas revolve around clichés, and they are usually fixated on a specific look or style of content they saw somewhere, or maybe a look that sold products for other brands. They think they can replicate it with the same success. I dare to disagree. Whenever I can, I try to talk them out of this mindset, but it’s pretty much hopeless. They proceed with their ideas and more often than not achieve nothing in return. Frequently, I hear discussions about moving on to another creative “strategy” without any real strategy behind it. It’s just pure trial and error, the most costly and time-consuming method of all!

Many marketers and creative directors representing smaller CPG brands and startups I work with don’t seem to reflect on such crucial principles. They allow their fears or external pressures to deliver immediate results to overshadow strategic fundamentals.

To me personally, it feels like borderline insanity. “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” This phrase highlights the irrationality of repeating the same actions while expecting a different outcome. I’ll be honest. I wouldn’t pay a dime for this kind of thinking if it were my brand or project. I consider it a total waste of resources!

Relying on Data Scraps vs. Learning What Motivates Consumers

Many food and beverage brands also struggle because they hire marketers who struggle with understanding the consumer’s mindset —a double struggle!

An entire generation of social media marketers has grown up believing that basic data—age, demographics, preferences—is sufficient for effective marketing. Social media platforms only provide surface-level insights, retaining the more valuable data for themselves. These platforms feed brands/sellers scraps of data and keep the real data to themselves. This reliance on superficial metrics is extremely limiting, as it fails to capture deeper motivations, needs, or the life contexts of consumers. Social media was effective until it became saturated with brands and ads that, for the most part, all look the same. Now, strategies must evolve to engage more deeply, akin to TV advertising, focusing on the psychological and sociological contexts in which consumers operate. Getting deep into their minds and engaging with the internal dialogue consumers are having with themselves is essential.

When I go on Instagram and (usually out of pure professional curiosity) click on a somewhat interesting ad that appears in my feed, I instantly get targeted by 1000 similar brands and products looking for lookalikes. Ironically, even though I devise ad campaigns and produce content for a living, I don’t buy things I don’t need, but I constantly observe how these things work in the wild, so I can do my job better. When faced with very similar products, which one do I choose to buy (if I even decide to buy)? If I already bought something that I needed, why would I want to buy another one from a different brand if I already got something similar? Most consumers won’t buy another piece of a similar product, at least not instantly, but the ad retargeting starts working instantly. The way campaigns are distributed on social media is pretty random and inefficient.

Food and beverage marketers often hire natives to social media platforms to produce videos of recipes using their products or to inject items into their lifestyles. It’s always obvious when this is happening because they almost stick that product into the scroller’s eye. These influencers are typically chosen because of their follower counts, interest niches, or whatever other predictable metric matters to the brand. But do these creators and the people choosing them even understand what matters to consumers and how they think? Rarely do I see this kind of thoughtfulness. This leads to a hamster wheel cycle of volume content and copycatting format, where brands miss the point and opportunity to connect with their consumers and spark any type of loyalty. Why? Because they hire random people who know how to make a social video but don’t understand what triggers consumers and have no interest in nurturing relationships with brands’ potential customers. Most social creators know what they know, which is how to make a mediocre reel, story, and post on Instagram or TikTok.

Sometimes, when they are more expensive and creative, they produce drool-worthy images or very entertaining videos, but that’s about all they can do. There is no strategy behind it—it’s random, and randomness breeds randomness.

🥩 Case in Point: The Steak Ad a.k.a. “Flash in the Pan” Ad

A recent example involved a social media ad that one of my creative friends showed me. He produced it for a cookware brand trying to sell a new frying pan. The content was beautifully and professionally produced, displaying a delicious, perfectly cooked steak and other foods being cooked to perfection 🍳. However, as a viewer, my immediate thought was about wanting to eat the steak, not to buy the pan. It made me very hungry, and I thought about how I would love to cook the steak right then—using the frying pan I already have at home. There were no elements in the ad that compellingly highlighted the product, triggered me to buy it, explained why this new pan was superior or gave me a reason to consider purchasing it. Nothing in the ad triggered me to buy that pan—zero. If I hadn’t been told it was a cooking pan ad, I wouldn’t have even noticed. This ad would have been more effective for a company selling steaks, a restaurant, or a cookbook, but not for a cookware company. Period.

This is a prime example of how failing to incorporate psychological triggers can result in a missed opportunity to drive sales. It wasn’t my friend’s fault; he did his job perfectly as an ad producer, following the directions he received. The problem was the lack of strategic thinking on the brand’s side and a basic understanding of consumer psychology. But in the end, they will likely blame it on the creative content, even though it’s their fault.

On another occasion, I consulted with a company that had licensed a major celebrity’s brand name for their cookware product line and was trying to enter the market by selling pots and pans directly to consumers (D2C). They failed miserably, even though I warned them about what not to do. The influencers and creators they hired got a lot of likes and comments like “Oh, I love the color of that pan” and “Oh, I need that set,” but almost no one was buying them! It was a total flop. They were too “frugal” to invest in certain aspects of what I advised on and had to shut down the operation.