A New Marketing Framework for Modern Brands

© 100 Thieves

If you were to name three extremely hot consumer brands today, you might very well select Fortnite (Epic Games), 100 Thieves, and MSCHF. Each of these brands has a loyal and passionate community and leverages a different playbook than what you might typically see from other consumer marketers.

For those unfamiliar:

• Fortnite is a video game, entertainment platform, and social community that has amassed hundreds of millions of players. Just last week, Fortnite hosted a Travis Scott concert, and there were over 12M concurrent viewers.
• 100 Thieves is a “premium lifestyle brand and gaming organization.” 100 Thieves is as famous for winning eSports tournaments as it is for its clothing drops. Each member of its gaming squad is an influencer in their own right and they produce a ton of content.
• MSCHF started as a marketing agency and now creates product drops that sell out in minutes. Earlier this week, it cut up a $30,000 Damien Hirst dot print and sold each dot individually… and sold out faster than I could get my hands on one.

When I look at these brands and their success so far, I see them doing three things exceptionally well: product, partnerships, and community. I term this framework, PPC.

Product: each of these three companies has a product that feels premium, exclusive, and ridiculously social. Their product is made to travel the speed of the Internet and frankly, kinda sucks when alone. The more social the product is, the better the engagement. They all know the value of content… and have trained their users and viewers that the content will not stick around forever so scarcity is built directly into the model.

Partnerships: each of these companies uses the term “drop.” Their products drop usually when a partnership is announced or they are ready to release something to sell. They recognize that they alone have brand equity value but the value of another brand teamed up with their own is even more valuable. Fortnite x Deadpool, 100 Thieves x Stockx, and MSCHF x Inri Air Max are all examples of partnerships. They also all invest in business development, an underappreciated role in many marketing departments. BD is born out of the necessity of being scrappy and these organizations have mastered the craft.

Community: I never understood how powerful a community could really be until I spent time at Mozilla/Firefox. Each of these three companies has built communities that want to hear from them, wear their brands, and want to connect both online and offline. The multiplier effect of the community is tremendous — and enables these companies to sell products quickly and build deeper relationships with their fans.

Here are some useful articles about how these brands approach marketing and business strategy:

• CampaignLive article on MSCHF founder, Gabriel Whaley
• Business Insider article profiling how MSCHF sells out products in minutes
• NY Times profile on MSCHF, and it’s ten employees
• 5 marketing strategies we can learn from Fortnite
• The genius of Fortnite’s business strategy
• Forbes article on how Fortnite is changing YouTube
• Dexerto’s essay on 100 Thieves success
• Forbes piece on how 100 Thieves partnered with a brand to basically pay for its brand new HQ.

And, if you wanted to find some of the architects behind the genius of these brands, you should look at the following employees (and founders). Note, this list is not comprehensive or conclusive — just a starter to find great talent who “get it.”

• Andrew Watts, Product & Community, MSCHF
• Gabriel Whaley, Founder, MSCHF
• Nate Nanzer, Head of Global Partnerships, Epic Games
• Shak Khavarian, Marketing Lead — Fortnite, Epic Games
• Matty L, Head of Partnerships, 100 Thieves
• Doug Barber, VP Brand & Apparel, 100 Thieves
• Julie Wu, Senior Marketing Manager, 100 Thieves

When we think about excellent consumer marketers in the context of traditional business, we think of marketers who come out of Kellogg (MBA), Pepsi, Unilever, P&G, and other similar places. These factories taught people how to buy reach and frequency in smart ways, which used to be a barrier to entry in their industries. We then had a crop of companies come up and through the ranks such as PayPal, Expedia, Booking, Uber, and others who wrote the modern book on Growth Hacking. We then saw the rush of brands that were able to buy Facebook, Insta, and similar social platforms well… every DTC brand and DTC agency thinks they are the best. (truth)

Now we’ve entered the world of the fabric of product, partnerships, and community. Frankly, it’s not new. LVMH, Supreme, and others have been playing this card for years. What I specifically like about this particular playbook is the human interaction and badge value of the brand… the brand is not just advertising via a video spot and having it disappear in the commercial pod, but rather, consumers are pulling it, and they want to interact. I wrote about brands getting pulled vs. pushed back in 2016… read it.

This feels like the Absolut ads that I used to tear out of magazines and place on my walls. Maybe I’m dating myself… but it’s a similar feeling. I, as a consumer, want to feel closer to Fortnite, 100 Thieves, and MSCHF. I will wear their clothes, go to their meetups, watch their streamed and on-demand content, and go out of my way to buy their products.

PPC forces a marketing organization to rethink structure. While there is still demand harvesting components of buttons, banners, video, paid social, etc.; that is ancillary to the primary functions of partnerships, product, and community. How this is set up in the marketing organization will require a bit different thinking than the traditional paid media only culture.

For investors, thinking about this construct could help understand where marketing and brand equity lies. Running excellent social media campaigns is a skill that can be acquired with the right hire(s) and the right tools and process. Having a legitimate community is a powerful barrier to entry. Having companies who want to partner for no money is a barrier to entry. Having an incredible product that gets pulled is another barrier to entry. Have all three, and you are in the right spot.

This piece originally appeared in my weekly Operating Partner newsletter. If you are interested in similar content, you can subscribe here.