This is the second in a series that details the key factors that have given rise to the need to nurture a purpose-driven brand.

Think for a moment about what’s available to us today. As the internet has grown, our options for products and services have exploded. That has had a huge impact on all of us.

From the book Big Audacious Meaning – Unleashing Your Purpose-Driven Story:

“This massive amount of information creates a much larger cognitive load for all of us. McGill University psychology professor Daniel Levitin illustrates the point for us in his book, The Organized Mind: Thinking Straight in the Age of Information Overload. “In 1976, there were 9,000 products in the average grocery store, and now it’s ballooned to 40,000 products. And yet most of us can get almost all our shopping done in just 150 items, so you’re having to ignore tens of thousands of items every time you go shopping,” says Levitin.”

You could call this the burden of choice. It can seem a little frivolous that too much choice is our problem, but it can become a challenge to our decision-making ability. It can cause us to become more miserly with our attention.

This overload of choice poses real problems for every brand today. It's no longer as easy as it was in the past to grab someone's attention. And it's even more difficult to sustain that engagement.

If your brand is stuck in the mode of talking about yourself (who you are and what you do), those you hope to serve will move on. And move on quickly. Because they just don't have the capacity to wade through your messaging to figure out why they should care.

The antidote to the overload

In order to overcome our collective attention deficit, your brand needs to provide something that everyone we hope to serve is longing for. Meaning.

From Big Audacious Meaning:

“Customers love meaningful brands. In fact, they will more willingly engage with these brands. And will even pay more for a brand because of its ability to align with what they consider meaningful and important.“

The good news is that this is available to any brand by simply clarifying the purpose it serves. It begins by asking the question, "What is the difference our brand can make in a life, a community, or even the world?"

Answer that with honesty (and meaning!) It will have a transformative effect. You'll no longer be just another choice in that ocean of options. You will gain preference. You will be welcomed by those you hope to serve. Because people want to feel like their time and dollars are connected to brands that are doing more than just providing goods and services. In other words, they want more than a transaction. They want to feel like their time and dollars are helping to make a difference. They want more meaning.

Your brand can become more than who you are and what you do. It can become something much more meaningful. It can become what your prospects are really looking for.