Do Consumers Want Authentic Marketing?

Note from Sarah: This article was originally sent via my newsletter. Newsletter subscribers receive essay style pieces like this before anyone else. Click here to subscribe!

Thank you so much for your wonderful responses to last week's newsletter! I am blown away by how it resonated with you all! ?

I was asked by one reader for thoughts on how the issue of "un-grossing" marketing and this maybe revelation that young people in particular are beginning to see right through overly-curated social marketing, as detailed in this Atlantic article:

“Everyone is trying to be more authentic,” says Lexie Carbone, a content marketer at Later, a social-media marketing firm. “People are writing longer captions. They are sharing how much money they make … I think it all goes back to, you don’t want to see a girl standing in front of a wall that you’ve seen thousands of times. We need something new.”

- Influencers are abandoning the Instagram look | The Atlantic

Like many things in life, the kids are right in being exhausted by all the perfection they see online: the perfect instagram grid, impeccably arranged product placement, everything curated to a "t." The visual of the perfectly curated grid feels, on a gut level, an extension of the dishonest—and yes, gross—marketing, again representing a product with a not-so-subtle visual promise of a perfect outcome that only their product can provide.

And, it seems like some companies are starting to push against this as well.

Poke around through the social marketing (especially the Instagram Stories) from innovative brands like Girlfriend Collective and Nooworks and you'll see photos with odd shadows, imprecise cropping and wrinkles. While this may seem like a small step, it's still a long way from the "influencer" marketing culture that's taken over in the last few years. (If you know me in real life, ask me for my stories about this!)

What do you think? Are these little signs that maybe the needle is shifting back a smidgen? Is this wishful thinking? Have you spotted brands doing their bit to ungross their marketing?