Exploring Branding and Marketing Trends with Claire Carlile

Have you noticed how major brands are evolving amidst rising competition? This week, we dive into the fascinating world of branding and local SEO with insights from industry experts.

Marketing is an ever-evolving landscape that demands attention to both big-picture trends and granular tactics. In this week’s episode of the Dojo podcast, hosts Jess Persful and Tim Cameron-Kitchen are joined by local SEO specialist Claire Carlile to unpack how shifting consumer preferences, search engine features and viral cultural phenomena are reshaping the way businesses build their identity. From powerful lessons in pricing and brand loyalty to mastering your local knowledge panel and leveraging the “Brat Summer” wave, these actionable insights can help enterprises large and small stay ahead of the curve.

Branding and Pricing Lessons from Consumer Goods

Over the past year, some of the world’s largest consumer goods brands saw their market value tumble by more than 20%—a startling reversal of fortunes that underscores changing buyer behaviors and disrupted brand equity [verify]. In the podcast, Tim Cameron-Kitchen cites a Financial Times article by Brook Masters to illustrate why even household names like Coca-Cola and Procter & Gamble can no longer rely solely on their legacy status to justify premium pricing.

Traditionally, established consumer brands have enjoyed two key advantages:

• Pricing power in inflationary times: well-known names could raise prices without losing customers.
• Recession resilience: consumers often opt for familiar brands to feel secure, even if budgets tighten.

Recent data, however, calls both assumptions into question. A poll of American shoppers found that 62% explicitly blame large corporations for price hikes rather than external factors like supply chain costs [verify]. At the same time, forced experimentation with private-label alternatives during the pandemic revealed that two-thirds of customers consider supermarket own-brand items just as good as their brand-name counterparts. Meanwhile, a surge of direct-to-consumer (DTC) niche brands—from boutique skincare lines to specialized dietary supplements—has proved that you can achieve massive growth with targeted messaging and a relatively small marketing spend.

"If your customer doesn’t perceive a benefit to sticking with you, you’ll lose them."

Key Takeaways on Branding

1. Build emotional connections: Beyond recognition or nostalgia, craft storytelling and experiences that make consumers feel personally invested. Nike’s “Just Do It” campaigns, for example, tap into individual aspirations rather than simply athletic performance.
2. Focus on perceived value: Competing on lowest price is a race to the bottom. Instead, demonstrate a clear value proposition—like a smartphone brand bundling premium features to outshine generic devices.
3. Embrace niche marketing: Smaller brands can dominate micro-segments through precise targeting on social media and search ads. A vegan chocolate maker, for instance, can drive strong loyalty by speaking directly to plant-based communities.

Exploring the Local Knowledge Panel Beyond the NMX

Today’s local search results have evolved into a dynamic “new homepage” for businesses, displaying vital information such as hours, reviews, photos and Q&A snippets directly in Google’s local knowledge panel. As Claire points out, the ability to shape what appears here is critical for any brand with physical locations or region-specific services.

Unlike a simple website listing, the local knowledge panel aggregates data from multiple sources: your Google Business Profile, consumer reviews, structured data on your site and third-party directories. What’s more, the layout can change based on the searcher’s location, device and Google’s own feature tests. That means a user in San Francisco might see call-to-action buttons, while another in London encounters an AI overview or “people also ask” box.

"When consumers search for your brand, what do you want them to see?"

Steps to Improve Your Local Knowledge Panel

1. Monitor geographical performance: Use tools like MobileMoxy or BrightLocal to track how your brand appears in different regions and on desktop vs. mobile. Look for inconsistencies in address, phone number, or service listings.
2. Audit search features: Identify which SERP features—such as image carousels, review snippets or map packs—trigger for your brand name. Then optimize your content and metadata to feed those features.
3. Establish a canonical reference: Create a dedicated “About” page or structured data markup on your website that includes your official name, logo, operating hours, services and social links. This helps Google pull accurate info instead of relying on scattered third-party sites.
4. Encourage and manage reviews: Solicit authentic feedback on Google, and address negative comments promptly. Over time, positive, detailed reviews will dilute the prominence of any unfavorable snippets selected by Google’s algorithms.
5. Align on-site content with panel data: Ensure that any awards, certifications or product highlights you emphasize in the panel are also front and center on your website, reinforcing your authority.

What the Heck is 'Brat Summer'?

Walk through any social feed lately, and you might have been hit by vivid neon green backgrounds with stark black text hyping “Brat Summer.” This trend sprang from singer-songwriter Charli XCX’s creative marketing rollout for her album Brat, and has since ballooned into a cultural phenomenon among Gen Z and millennial audiences.

Rather than an impromptu viral moment, Charli XCX spent nearly ten months nurturing a private Instagram community called the “360 Brat,” granting access only to superfans, teasing snippets of music and hosting exclusive live streams. This close-knit group refined the visual motif—high-contrast colors, distorted fonts and blunt catchphrases—before the wider public ever saw it. When the campaign went public, thousands of fans hit social media simultaneously, flooding feeds with memes, dance videos and song clips all tagged #BratSummer, creating the perception of an overnight craze.

Key Insights on 'Brat Summer'

• Identify your core audience: Trend participation only resonates if your target demographic feels a genuine connection. A luxury skincare brand, for example, might skip meme trends but could leverage micro-influencer communities to similar effect.
• Engage authentically: Hollow mimicry is quickly rejected. Audiences can sniff out inauthentic attempts to appropriate a trend; they want to feel seen, not sold to.
• Build anticipation: Under-promise and over-deliver. Limited-access groups, countdown teasers and scavenger-hunt-style easter eggs foster a sense of discovery and ownership before any wide release.

Actionable Marketing Tasks for Today

Based on this week’s episode, here are practical steps you can implement right away:

• For branding and pricing:
  • Conduct a quick customer survey to gauge how your audience perceives price versus value.
  • Update your messaging to emphasize unique benefits, not just features or heritage.

• For local SEO:
  • Schedule a one-hour audit of your Google Business Profile and local knowledge panel across key territories.
  • Implement schema markup on your site to reinforce your primary business information.

• For trend engagement:
  • Identify two emerging cultural or social media trends that align with your brand values.
  • Test a small-scale pilot—maybe a meme or micro-video—for one week to measure audience response before a full-scale launch.

Conclusion

This week’s discussion reinforces a core theme: strong branding and accurate online representation are non-negotiable in today’s competitive marketplace. From pricing strategy to local SEO and viral marketing tactics, the brands that thrive are those that listen closely to consumer sentiment, own their digital footprint and foster genuine community.

Bold takeaway: Invest in at least one dedicated hour this week to updating either your brand narrative or local search presence—small steps now can trigger big gains in loyalty and visibility later.

How are you applying these insights to your strategy? Join the conversation with fellow marketers and explore the possibilities!