Why rewonderment needs to be on every CMO’s agenda

Cutting through. It’s a concept that preoccupies the mind of every marketer. How do brands stand out? Create connections? Be memorable?

And cutting through is only becoming harder. In a world where the average Tik Tok user watches up to 300 videos a day*, that’s an awful lot of competition for attention. And the same-old digital routines and predictable brand experiences are leaving consumers yearning for more.

Enter rewonderment.

Rewonderment is a concept reshaping how companies can reconnect with their audiences. For today’s CMOs, this trend of rewonderment – the deliberate creation of awe and emotional resonance – is an opportunity to capture attention in an overstimulated market.

Rewonderment is the antidote to modern life

Rewonderment taps into a primal need: the desire to experience a spectrum of emotions that transcend everyday life. 

We emerged from Covid-19 with our senses dulled and numbed, and as the pendulum inevitably swings in the opposite direction, people are looking for ways to provoke a myriad of emotions. 

Brands have an opportunity to facilitate transformative experiences, delivering moments of joy and meaning amid the mundane. Yet, according to VML’s trend report, 70% of people say they can’t remember the last time a brand did anything that excited them.  That’s a significant gap aching to be filled.

Discomfort is okay

A little bit like the over enthusiastic parent, we have a tendency to want to coddle our consumers and help them feel safe and happy and loved. But that’s not what consumers want, according to VML. 

Dark and dystopian themes are on the rise. So too are discomforting, surreal collaborations with artists like Yayoi Kusama for Louis Vuitton, where an incredibly human-like robot Kusama fixates her eyes on you while she paints, or the HAUS NOWHERE project by Gentle Monster, a fictional experiential tale of a 10,000-year relationship between giants, insects and animals. These brands are tapping into the consumer desire for novelty and emotion, and creating powerful, lasting brand connections​.

And, according to Gartner, as AI becomes more integrated into content, brands will increasingly need to differentiate themselves – surreal experiences that feel both authentic and unexpected (and indeed even augmented by AI) are worth considering in the marketing mix.

Emotioneering marks a shift from rational to emotional brand value

A staggering 67% of people globally expect brands to facilitate awe, wonder, and surprise. Emotioneering – the art of crafting brand experiences, products, or interactions to engineer emotional responses – represents an opportunity for brands to evoke that awe and wonder. 

Rather than focusing on what we want customers to do, the question should be ‘how do we want customers to feel?’. Brands like Daybreaker are setting KPIs around the ability to evoke ‘tears of joy’(although one does wonder how the KPIs are measured – number of tears per consumer?).

Play and kidification aids connection

At the heart of wonder is play, and play is something we’re biologically hard-wired to do. The trend of kidification sees adults diving into fun and reconnecting with their inner child. It’s about embracing the silly and abandoning judgement. And for marketers keen to connect with consumers, they should remember: nothing is sacred.

Even traditionally serious brands can benefit from levity. Whether it’s a traditional publisher like Penguin Books dancing through their office, or NRMA taking a childlike approach to some of our country’s greatest disasters, with sprinklers playfully putting out bushfires in their Until Then campaign, embracing our inner kid has never been more celebrated.

Rewonderment: where to start

As marketers continue to seek new ways to cut through and build brand love, rewonderment offers a unique pathway, by weaving joy, play, and emotional depth into brand narratives, products and experiences.

So how do you get rewonderment on the agenda? Rewonderment starts with your people. It starts with engaging your team in a way that inspires awe, emotional resonance and curiosity. And marketing teams are uniquely placed to be the champions of creativity throughout the business. 

We run workshops that are designed to cultivate wonder and creativity in teams. Learn more here.