An article by Meredith Smith, Global Head of Future Strategies
The way to build brand relevance and true discoverability is evolving. Brand gravity can no longer be declared; it must be earned continuously across a fragmented landscape of platforms, touchpoints and moments.
The funnel and customer journey have fragmented
Gone are the days of a linear funnel. The funnel and the customer journey have fragmented across a social and digital universe with countless micro-journeys happening across multiple platforms, formats and technologies, often nearly simultaneously.
Paths are no longer linear, as audiences move fluidly across platforms, spending an average of 18 hours each week (GWI, 2025) discovering, validating, and even purchasing in non-linear ways.
Even ‘search’ is no longer an isolated behaviour. Rather than searching for brands, consumers search across platforms, assisted by AI, not to find links, but instead to find answers to their needs with nuanced advice in context.
Search and true discovery are increasingly…
- Social-first and community-led
- Conversational with LLMs and AI Assistants
- Multimodal: spanning text, voice, image, and video
In this landscape ‘Awareness’ is not enough. Brands must build both deeper cultural relevance and organic discoverability.
The result is a complex digital universe, where every touchpoint has meaning.
An ‘Interplanetary’ Model for Modern Marketing
In this AI-empowered, social-first Universe, audiences regularly engage with a vast constellation of ‘planets’ with different impacts on the customer journey…
Each channel like Instagram, YouTube, Reddit, ChatGPT, even billboards and earned media is a ‘planet’ in the consumer’s universe.
Each planet has its own ‘rules’ (its algorithm, its native content language, its user trust dynamics and its impact on discoverability) and unique role in the consumer journey:
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The Cultural + Desire Trigger Nebula
Highly visual, algorithmic platforms like Instagram, TikTok, Pinterest and Facebook that drivecultural relevance, discovery and desire creation. ‘I didn’t know I wanted this…’
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The Answer + Evaluation System
Deep information and interest-based sources like Reddit, YouTube (long-form), Google Search, LinkedIn and Wikipedia – PLUS the large language models and AI Assistants that scan them (Gemini, ChatGPT, etc.), where people seek, verify claims, make comparisons and reduce risk. ‘I’ve got specific needs, and need to understand, verify and de-risk my choice…’
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The Intent + Conversion Planets
E-commerce platforms, messaging tools, and transactional interfaces like Amazon and Google Maps reviews, Shopify notifications, e-commerce chatbots, even Google Lens image searches, are where intent becomes action. ‘Where should I buy…’
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Our ‘Outer Orbit’ Traditional Channels
Traditional comms channels across TV, radio, owned websites, OOH and retail that still matter – but in different ways when triggering consumer relevance and triggering / resurfacing discoverability. ‘I remember seeing this brand! I should dive deeper digitally…’
Because each planet has its own rules and unique role to play in how consumers y LLMs explore the digital universe, the brand comms that work on one planet rarely work on another. Brands MUST design the right message for the right planets.
Serving Two Audiences: Humans and Machines
In this complex, infinitely expanding universe of social, digital and AI-empowered channels, touchpoints and moments, this means brands now have two crucial audiences:
Humans: Seeking meaning, connection, cultural sparks and ‘for me’ relevance.
Machines: Evaluating authority, credibility, and gatekeeping organic discoverability..
As T&P’s Oliver Fenwick told WARC last month, this is a ‘Two-Audience Problem’ for brands. While consumers still need to feel a deeper connection and affinity with your brand, these audiences are now being assisted by LLMs and AI Assistants that compress your beautiful, living, breathing brand into a ‘data object’ within a mathematical knowledge graph. Brand building is no longer just storytelling; it’s also about being legible, credible, and discoverable by machines.
This shift means…
- We have to focus both on creating meaningful connection and relevance with humans…
- We also must design some comms for GEO (generative engine optimisation) to ensure we are discoverable and recommended by LLMs…
- Spreading one campaign across the universe will not drive either deep relevance or organic discoverability.
Brand relevance and discoverability necessitates the right signal, in the right place, for the right reason to make a true impact on the customer journey.
Building a Universe Strategy
How do brands navigate this complex and vast universe? Stop just building campaigns. Start building a Universe Strategy for relevance and discoverability:
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Choose the right constellation of planets
Your brand does not need to be on every planet! Choose the right mix of planets that together will influence discovery, validation and conversion.
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Create platform-specific signals
Content must be native to each platform, not repurposed. Ensure each planet – and its signals – will have a unique and last impact on the customer journey.
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Balance culture and conversion
- Build cultural relevance in discovery spaces
- Provide credible information in evaluation spaces
- Deliver clear pathways to purchase in intent spaces
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Optimise for discoverability everywhere
Visibility isn’t just awareness. It’s being present where algorithms recommend, communities discuss, and AI tools source answers.
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Design for humans and machines
Content must inspire people and be legible and trustworthy to AI systems.
The Future of Brand Growth and Relevancy
While this vast, social-first, AI-empowered world can feel like a complex minefield, we believe it opens up whole new ways for brands to drive – and measure – deep relevance and organic discoverability.
AI hasn’t totally compressed the brand; it has expanded the landscape. Consumers engage with more touchpoints, discover faster, compare more, and expect better answers.
Brands that stick to campaigns risk being invisible. Brands that think in connected, adaptive ecosystems, where signals flow across platforms and audience needs will earn relevance, influence, gravity and commercial growth.
In today’s social-first era, success isn’t about broadcasting at our loudest. It’s about showing up in the places and spaces that matter, in the right way, at the right time for humans y machines.
