How Defining a Brand Purpose Can Build Consumer Trust

Looking beyond profits and toward connection

Photo by Balázs Kétyi on Unsplash

In his 2022 letter to CEOs, BlackRock founder Larry Fink called on companies to articulate their core values during this era of stakeholder capitalism and eroded consumer trust.

“It’s never been more essential for CEOs to have a consistent voice, a clear purpose, a coherent strategy, and a long-term view,” writes Fink, who leads the world’s largest asset management firm. “Your company’s purpose is its North Star in this tumultuous environment.”

His message is so relevant that Wharton marketing professor Patti Williams refers to it in the beginning paragraphs of her co-authored paper on brand purpose, a topic that is gaining attention as academics, marketers, managers, the media, and the public all struggle to define what it means and how it differs from corporate social responsibility (CSR).

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Corporate dishonesty is the reason for distrust

"during this era of stakeholder capitalism and eroded consumer trust."

Stakeholder capitalism is the reason for eroded consumer trust. Instead of competing for consumer dollars by meeting people’s needs, corporations compete for investment dollars by advancing the radical social/political agenda being foisted on the public by oligarchs like Larry Fink.

Fink’s power comes from managing the retirement money of Americans who would never, on their own, impose such requirements on the companies they own shares in. ESG/CSR is a trojan horse to replace something that everybody can understand and work around (corporations seeking to maximize shareholder value) with priorities that are intentionally distracting and amorphous.

It’s just a smokescreen. A company that’s permitted to appear to act against its own interests is just a waiting vehicle for market manipulation, social engineering, anti-competitive behavior, and other shenanigans. The ultimate outcome is, unsurprisingly, a brand that people do not trust.

Like with cable news... a newsman sensationalizing to get eyeballs is untrustworthy, but we can understand the phenomenon and live in the world with it. It is much more difficult to live in a world where the cable news networks take money from a pharmaceutical company and then run apparent "news" coverage vilifying people who don't use that company's products. Such backdoor collusion and naked contempt for the public is bound to make one cynical, especially when the richest people in the world are pushing so hard for corporate behavior to be even less comprehensible to the public.