How to Kill a Brand | The US ARMY

On the US Army's increasingly successful effort to destroy itself and what that shows us about Purpose in marketing.

In a world where branding can make or break an institution, the U.S. Army's recent marketing efforts have been resolutely mocked, and for good reason. The attempt to diversify their recruitment pool with progressive propaganda campaigns has backfired, alienating the core audience that actually fights in the wars our elites seem to constantly be getting us into.

The first thing you need to understand about this is that the US Army’s core demographic is this guy:

Let’s call him Matt Grunt.

He lives in rural Arkansas and loves football. He would like to be the first person in his family to go to college. If he does, he will probably study engineering or something hands-on. His dad served in the military, and he saw how well-respected his father was in the community. He is a Baptist in the Bible Belt, and his family celebrates the Fourth of July and Memorial Day with as much religious fervor as Christmas and Easter. His family is lower middle class, and he has always liked the idea of serving in the military.

In 2005, people like Matt made up a whopping 64% of Active Duty members.¹

By 2023, the percentage of white recruits had fallen to 44%.² Not only that, but Entry level service members declined by 200k between 2012 and 2022.³

A lot of people much smarter than me have discussed the various factors around this politically it’s impact on USA Readiness. I’m interested in looking at this from a brand equity vantage point.

The trajectory of their branding efforts shows a pattern of tone-deaf decisions:

An early attempt to “challenge gender stereotypes,” this campaign set a precedent for addressing social issues that already started to poop on the traditional military audience.⁴

This was also the same time that Social Media began to take off.

Before social media, it was possible to lie about your identity. You just didn’t put the “hit like a Girl” poster with the tranny guy on it anywhere where the high school dude could see it and paint a mustache on it. Once Facebook and Twitter took off, there was no more pretending to be something you’re not.

But maybe the Matts of the world aren’t paying attention too much yet. Maybe they see some “hit like a girl” ads or some crap while watching Mash with grandma and think, “Well, that’s stupid. I guess they are trying to get more women in there.”

By 2019, Matt is very much on Twitter, and is DEFINITELY paying attention.

That’s when General Milley, an Army General and the highest-ranking officer in the entire military, decided to let the world know that troops castrating themselves has no impact on readiness.

Then Biden was… um.. elected? And then we happily handed over $7 billion worth of U.S. military equipment to the Taliban and made sure that veterans knew that it had all been for nothing. Also, there never were weapons of mass destruction, joke’s on you Matt!

And then in 2021, just a couple of pride months later, they pushed the gayvelope with this ad celebrating a same-sex couple. They presumably thought that pissing off their core demographic to appeal to the 2.66% of the population that identifies as lesbian was a good call.

One year and one pride month later, in 2022 some staff seargant named Sergeant Tamez heard about this thing called “influencer marketing” and thought they would give it a whirl.

Who did they get to hawk the latest Army recruitment benefits? Tim Tebow, Tim Mcgraw? Maybe Tim Allen if they were particularly desperate? Any Tim would have been fine, really.

Instead, Tamez went for the more Antifa drug addict vibes.

The public reaction could easily be summed up by the letters “wtf.”

This is either complete ineptitude or a willful desire to destroy the Army and usher in the new world order, depending on your Alex Jones consumption level.

By this point, the Matts of the world have wised up to the fact that the US Army is a complete joke.

And that, my friends, is a problem because a disproportionate number of Combat positions are filled by white boys like Matt Grunt, and World War III seems like it’s about to pop off any minute now.

So the head of US Army recruiting thought to her cis self:

Uh oh, we need some more white boys for this Russia-Ukraine thing, oh and this Israel, Hammas thing we’ve got going too!

Then, she got the team back together for a brainstorming session.

Here’s what they came up with:

And yes, if it seems eerily like the ads that the army ran before they went woke, you’re right. Be All You Can Be ran from 1981 to 2001. It’s admittedly a great ad. It’s just too little too late.

As John Carter of Postcards from Barsoom puts it:

The ad likely emerged from a long series of interminable and extremely awkward committee meetings, in which everyone danced around the obvious fact that years of messaging aimed at the college-indoctrinated neurodivergent socially conscious zillennial demographic had manifestly failed to attract the hoped-for diverse army of the future, but had quite successfully alienated the long-standing core recruiting pool."

The reception by Matts (who now go by names like “Eight Century Woodchipper”), was, as you can imagine, hilarious.

So what happened here?

Well, the easy thing to do would be to blame it all on progressivism and call it a day.

Obviously, you should not alienate your base by being completely disingenuous. I doubt anyone reading this article is at risk of doing that unless you are in private equity.

The more interesting question is WHY this did not work when it has worked so well for other federal government initiatives and what can we learn from this.

The Army Forgot It’s Purpose.

Most conservative marketers like Isaac Simpson tell their audiences that “purpose” and “changing the world” are stupid. Nick Asbury, another marketer famous for his opposition to purpose in marketing, discusses the failure of purpose in a viral Marketing Week article. They are calling out bad marketing and you should 100% read and follow them, but their assessment of the root cause (purpose) is incorrect. The problem isn’t “purpose,” per se, but lying about one's purpose. That’s the cause of weak, woke marketing campaigns.

Make no mistake: authentic purpose in marketing is vitally important.

For instance, the Army’s purpose is to make war in defense of the American ideal.

Discipline, excellence, brotherhood, and sacrifice—all traditional masculine values—are essential to achieving this purpose.

The identity of the Army flows from its reason for being, or its—say it with me dissident marketers—PURPOSE.

The problem in marketing is not purpose. It is fake purpose.

Fake purpose is when Delta Airlines tells us that their cause is to end carbon emissions by 2050. If you think about that for more than a second, you know that they are bullshitting because their purpose is obvious. They exist to transport you across the world with minimal risk of doors blowing off mid-air, and to make money doing it.

The Army is not a women’s rights NGO. Its purpose is war, so when it spends several decades celebrating values that are traditionally feminine and antithetical to warfare: inclusivity, caring, egalitarianism, and individual self-expression, it experiences a recruiting crisis.

The Army Forgot What War Means

As Napoleon Bonaparte once said:

"A man does not have himself killed for a half-pence a day or for a petty distinction. You must speak to the soul in order to electrify him."

People’s souls aren’t electrified by a list of features and great offers.

In Army language, that means tuition assistance, retirement, health care, etc.

Great marketing is storytelling, and great stories reveal the essence of a thing. That is to say, they mean something. Successful movements, brands, and businesses all do one thing well.

They articulate their purpose in a way that no one can help but pay attention.

So, how do you do brands achieve meaning in their marketing?

They achieve this by creating ads that connect the audience’s core aspirations and the company’s core purpose.

That’s what electrifies your soul.

With this in mind, what would a great Army Ad look like?

Well. Russia did it.

• Russian Military Purpose: War

• Russian Men’s desire: Become heroic, become manly

• Ad’s meaning: You weren’t meant to be just a regular, boring, insignificant man boy. Become a man through combat the way your fathers and your fathers fathers did.

Now let’s look back at the Army’s Emma ad:

• The American Army’s Purpose: Validating LGBTQ people?

• Audiences presumed desire: Be validated for being on team LGBTQ?

• Ad’s meaning: True heroes aren’t putting your life on the line for your country; it’s braving social ridicule for publically defining yourself according to your unique sexuality or celebrating others who do the same.

They broke their core audience’s narrative about what the army is about. Young men want to become heroes in service of a worthy cause, not be validated as heroes already for being on team LGBTQ. Not only this, but the ad undermines the bravery of combat veterans by portraying being a lesbian as equally as sacrificial.

Total Fail.

The other thing about meaning is that meaning is deepened over time.

If you’re doing it right, the more time you spend in a relationship with someone, the more meaningful it is.

That’s why consistency in messaging is so effing important. It’s not just because it helps you be remembered; more importantly, consistency helps you to be meaningful.

That is why the Army’s return to its old “Be All You Can Be” message was met with such incredulity and ridicule.

Final Words

The Army’s recent recruitment strategies have been a stark lesson in the importance of understanding and respecting:

1. One's core audience and their values

2. The purpose of your organization

3. The meaning inherent in the space between your audience and your purpose

The Army has failed because they:

1. Alienated their core audience by promoting values that their core audience was opposed to.

2. Stopped promoting their purpose (war and heroism) and promoted something else (softness and validation).

3. Told an incoherent story that was disconnected from both their purpose and their audience’s desires.

As the great Elon once said:

“Brand is just a perception, and perception will match reality over time.”

On a long enough timeline, authenticity will always prevail.

So don’t be anyone else. Be yourself.

If you want help with this in your marketing, please reach out. I’d love to help.

“As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame;

As tumbled over rim in roundy wells

Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell's

Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;

Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:

Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;

Selves — goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,

Crying Whát I dó is me: for that I came.”

GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS

1. "2005 Demographics Report," Military OneSource. Accessed June 3, 2024. Link.

2. Stephen Losey, "Army Sees Sharp Decline in White Recruits," Military.com, January 10, 2024. Accessed June 3, 2024. Link.

3. "Is Military Enlistment Down?" USAFacts. Accessed June 3, 2024. Link.

4. Desmonda Lawrence, "Like a Girl and Its Cultural Context," Prindle Institute for Ethics, November 2014. Accessed June 3, 2024. Link.