8 Inclusive Ecommerce Website Examples That Drive Growth

How to create a multilingual content strategy
with Selim Dahmani
We live in a global world, which means that more and more as we think about the brands that we
are managing and growing, we have to think more about and consider people who have the problem
that our brand solves, but who speak other languages and prefer to
get their information in other
languages.
I mean, there have been brands for decades, probably even more than a century, who have been
expanding their reach to other markets, whether that's through actually physically opening locations
or shipping their
products over to people who live in
different
parts of the world.
But depending upon what type of business you have now, thinking about engaging and reaching
consumers who have the problem that your brand solves, who live in other parts of the world or
sp
eak a different language than the primary language that you operate in,
there are
several
ways
that we can think about how to engage them effectively as we think about inviting them to be our
customers as part of our customer acquisition strategy.
So I've
been thinking a lot about various strategies for reaching people who speak other languages,
particularly for brands who want to grow and know that reaching people in other markets or who
speak other languages even within the country that they're primarily
operating in is a very important
aspect of that.
So I wanted to talk with someone who's in the trenches doing this day in and day out to get some
insights. So I sat down with Salim Damani,
part of the French growth team
at HubSpot. So day in,
day out, he
sits in Ireland and he's working to grow the consumer base of people who speak French,
particularly for HubSpot, which is a company that is based in the US and Boston. Right?
So Salim has a lot of really wonderful insights to share that are super helpful
for you as you think
about what is the most effective way to reach people and convert people who speak other languages
as you're thinking about growing your brand and acquiring a new customer base.
So after this short break, you will hear my super insight
ful, super actionable conversation with Salim.
Sonia:
Hey, Salim. Thanks so much for joining me today. How are you?
Salim:
Hi, Sonia. Thank you so much for having me. I'm I'm great. Thanks. How are you?
Sonia:
I'm doing well. I'm so excited about this co
nversation and really excited to learn so much
from you. But before we dig in to the topic we've got today, can you tell the people who are you and
what do you do?
Salim:
Sure. So my name is Celine Damani. My background is in localization. That's where I g
ot my
master's. I've been working for 10 years in localization as a linguist, as a project manager, and I
transitioned to marketing. So I'm now at HubSpot as part of the French, growth marketing team, and
I focus on the blog. I've done that for for the la
st, 5 years, and my area is really, editorial CRO, and
I also manage our newsletter.
IM_Ep 127_How to create a multilingual content strategy with Selim Dahmani.pdf
2
Sonia:
Very cool. That's a lot of good stuff. I I and I'm sure you've got so many wonderful insights
to share on all of that. So, hopefully, we can get a lot as much as possible out of you today.
But I wanna ask you a couple of things all about multilingual cont
ent strategy, and why should brands
even be thinking about in engaging and developing 1?
Salim:
Absolutely. I think, it's not something that's the first thought when building a company. You
know, it seems far away, and it's much later when there's an established market in the original
country that maybe even sales are being generated from other count
ries that the thoughts, starts to
form of how can we maximize that? How much revenue can be brought from the markets that we're
not focusing on at the moment? And it takes a few requirements to put that into practice.
But I think it is generally it happen
s when the company becomes profitable. It knows it's capturing a
large portion of, the original market, and then it wants to expand. So
One misconception, I think, is thinking a multilingual content marketing strategy is just localization.
And maybe we can
define that a little bit more.
I think, you know, the difference typically between translation and localization is that localization
takes into account all the technical aspects of making sure it's gonna render correctly.
I think it's now given that we
are working in the digital world. Everything needs to be, eventually
hosted on a website, on an app, somewhere digitally. So what's the difference there? And I think it's
really in reproducing what's been done usually in English or in the original language
for that target
market.
Sonia:
Yeah. Yeah. I think, as you said, a lot of people are thinking about localization or even just
using the term translation, and it's so much more than that. And I guess, what the thought or the
question that popped into my he
ad when you were saying, like, a lot of times you start down this
path whenever you've got pretty well established in the language or in the existing market that you
started in.
I'm wondering, is it like a chicken or the egg type of thing when it comes to
reaching out and starting
to engage people who speak other languages? Do you start seeing, oh, wait, like, people in France
or people who speak another language or in certain markets are interested?
So if we wanna get more, we need to start thinking abou
t strategies specifically for that market or is
it, oh, we want to be able to reach this market, and so if we actually sort of build something for them,
then they will come to us. Is it how do you decide, like, what comes first?
Salim:
Yeah. That that's th
at's a good question. And I think as soon as, you know, the the product
is going to be popular, is going to be successful, it will be talked about in other languages. It will be
talked about in other markets, and very likely, sales are going to be generate
d from other countries.
At that stage. And that's when, as a company, you have to ask yourself, like, what is the gap between
what I have and what I want? What's that small percentage of international markets that I'm currently
capturing effortlessly?
IM_Ep 127_How to create a multilingual content strategy with Selim Dahmani.pdf
3
Or maybe because somebody else is doing my own promotion. Agencies are mentioning my
products. Influencers are mentioning them.
And what is it what is it that I want? You know? Do I want to capture only the English speakers in
France, in Germany, in Ital
y? Or do I want to be able to capture so much more? And tap the the
total addressable market that lives in in that country.
Sonia:
Yeah. No. I love it. I love it because it also you talked about, like, your whole approach, the
where you're working right no
w is all about growth, and this is the essence of growth helping.
How can you find more people who have the problem that your brand solves in finding a way to
support and engage them and serve them?
So I like that framing that you have there. You mention
ed localization, and then there's also, like,
the overarching, you know, multilingual strategy.
What are the components of that? I know you work on blogs, newsletters, a lot of different
components, but whenever we're thinking about how to reach people wh
o speak different languages
in other markets, what is, like, the, I guess, mediums or the core levers that need to be we need to
be thinking about that need to be pulled to effectively reach them.
Salim:
So from having one market, and I think we can assume
, you know, for an American company
based in the US that wants to expand, you'll know already what are the channels that are working
for your current market.
So how much of social media is successful, how much of the blog is successful, how much of your
ne
w newsletter is bringing in terms of contacts, in terms of revenue? So very likely, you'll want to
reproduce these channels in the country.
And then it's about the how. How are we gonna do that? And I think a mistake is usually to try and
take the content
that's been created and just send that.
Get it translated, get it localized, and assume that individual pieces of content, when localized, are
gonna bring the same results. But that's counterintuitive if we really look at how we build that content
in the
first place.
Especially for the blog. I think the blog is where it is the most visible that the one
-
for
-
one equivalence
doesn't work. For a blog a blog to be successful, it means it's ranking well. It means I think a blog is
meant to bring organic traffic
.
Organic traffic means we have targeted keywords that we know are gonna bring that we know are
responding to an MSV. We know how much of that MSV is converting into clicks on the SERPs. And
we know out of these clicks, how many are gonna turn into a conve
rsion.
So the the conversion can be very different. It can be anything from turning into a subscriber. To
become a lead by downloading, a content offer using a free tool.
It could be requesting a demo. It could be res requesting a physical sample, but tha
t gives us, you
know, the objective of the blog. So if we start completely ignoring the key points, we start ignoring
the keywords that are bringing the results, and we just say it works in English. Let's do it in French,
in German, and Italy.
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4
Salim
:
Then
we're missing the th
e logic that made that success.
So we have to try and go back and
say, okay. What was the starting point? It was it was the keywords.
Maybe we can explore from what exists in English, which ones have the best potential, but really
st
art taking that native approach of saying, we want to look at the reality of search in that market.
We want to address the queries that people in these countries are looking for.
We want to give them that content and try to get the conversions down the li
ne. So the 1 on 1 match
is not gonna work already. You know? The reality of SEO tells us that.
Sonia:
Yeah. Yeah. I love that because I think that that's kind of the default that people take. Like,
let's just or maybe it's the path of least resistance or i
t feels the easiest, but the easiest because as
of what you're just explaining, it doesn't mean it's gonna be the most effective for you.
And ultimately, the reason why we're doing this is to be effective. I'm I'm curious. Also, you talked
about SEO and k
eywords and things like that to help you get organic traffic and address the
concerns that people who are in these markets are having.
I'm wondering also, do you have to do a lot of sort of planning of the overall customer experience to
sort of, I heard y
ou mentioned funnels before, like, to move them the way you want in the funnel,
keeping in mind what they're asking for and what questions that they need or what it is that they
need to move? Do you have to sort of design what that customer experience jour
ney is gonna be
like with the content you're producing as well as you're tying it to keywords?
Salim:
I think that's the natural progression. You know? If we're starting by saying we're gonna
create native content on the blog, we're gonna have clusters top
ic clusters that are different.
From what exists in English, then how can we convert for that specifi
c, subject we're talking about?
And that will often require creating assets that are very specific to that market
And gate them so that we request, you kn
ow, info to be submitted
to
download the content. If it's
booking a meeting, it could be just that the page for booking that meeting is different. If it's to request
a sample, that page can be different as well.
We know
the
search is different. User behav
ior is different, and it's surprising to see how much. I
think just from the phrasing, you know, a lot of English titles are often bas
ed on, like, mistakes to
avoid.
That's something we had a hard time with, and we conducted a study internally. The result
of
this
was very clear, like, the French audience doesn't make mistakes in their mind. So anything that
starts with the mistakes you should stop m
aking is not gonna get traffic.
And that needs to be rephrased into x advices to get that result. So the the t
he same then is going
to be true about how we convert the content, you know, the the the copy we want to use on the
CTAs.
And I think it speaks to how much freedom is required for international marketing teams to be
successful. If we look at going interna
tional only through the lens of localization. It is so restrictive.
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5
It's it's as you said, it's the easy path, but we're not looking at the return on investment that we could
get from having a truly native approach.
Sonia:
Right. Yeah. So if I hear what you're saying correctly, what you have to do is do not put the
primary market or the the original market that you're starting with, let's say, is English. English should
not be your center of the universe whenever it comes to
reaching other markets.
You have to have customer intimacy for all the people that you're trying to reach and develop what
you need to create for them to move them along that journey rather than assuming this is our starting
point, this is our North star
, and everybody else needs to sort of fall in line with that. That's not how
it works. So that's not the path to be successful.
Salim
:
100%. That's, that's true and I think it's it's even obvious from by the time the company goes
international, the level o
f maturity.
The
original market is so much higher than what it's going to be in the new markets it's going to try
to address. So even at HubSpot, we've seen the reception of the freemium model
a
s something that
needs so much more work
i
n our international
market.
It's it's, I think we're in a day and age where suspicion is so high of everything.
So something is free. That's fishy. Why is it? You know? And we had to explain so much more why
I think for the US market, it was much of of a given.
So many thi
ngs are free, and that's the way. It works. You you upgrade for, a certain amount of
money, but the freemium model was much more broadly accepted.
Sonia:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's true. That's true. And it just goes back to we have to sort of
abandon our as
sumptions.
You
know, one of the things that I like to say is this whole one salt one
size fits all is a lie. Right? Like, it's so you can't you have to sort of abandon the assumption that
because it works here, that it will work there.
Yes. We're all, you
know, people. We have similar goals
and
objectives, but the path that we take
to get there can be very different. Right? So we need to
consider that
.
Salim:
Yeah. And that's true for the content, and it's true for design. It's true for the microcopy. It's
surprising to see the differences. You know, adding an arrow Yeah. In a certain color on a certain
CTA is going to have a positive impact
Say for Germany or for Italy, and it's not. It's going to have a negative impact in France. Like very
neighboring
countries. So we have to accept that the original market or the US market is different
from international markets, but they are also all different and unique, and we cannot have just, like,
the one strategy we roll out for every other country.
Sonia:
Yeah.
Yeah. I love it. Okay. What feedback have you heard from consumers over the years
as you've been localizing content, creating new strategies for them? Have you heard, like, the same
common themes pop up as they now have brands from other markets now tryin
g to engage them?
Like, are there common themes or opinions or expectations that you have heard from them in their
in their feedback or just even their behaviors of how they respond?
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6
Salim:
Yeah. And I I think it comes, if if we're not going native enou
gh, we are already giving
arguments to the potential customers to say no to our sales team.
Sonia:
Oh, okay.
Salim:
If it looks like this is not for me. You know, if you come as an American company in France
trying to sell something and you you don't adver
tise it in a way that the French audience can say,
okay, that's gonna work for me, the assumption is that it's n
ot.
If all the examples that I'm shown are about,
you know, an American delivery
Company, American
fast foods, American train systems, booking
systems that don't exist, I'm like, okay. It works, but it
won't work for me.
And we have to break these arguments 1 by 1 and saying, okay. I'm showing that the the strategy
I'm advertising for is something that has worked for industries similar to yours,
for customers in
the
same region as you are
.
And really, like, tackled it that way. So showing that I'm speaking to you and that your market,
yourself are not an afterthought of my strategy, but that you are the center of the regional strategy.
Sonia:
Yea
h. Yeah. Basically, what you're saying is belonging takes center stage whenever it comes
time to reach people in various markets.
Like, you have to continue to give them reasons to see this is for me rather than supporting some
skepticism that this isn't for me.
Like, this is for people in another market. Right? And so you however you can go about removing
whatever friction might ex
ist that gets them from where they are to converting to be your customer
is what you need to be doing in your content, it sounds like what you're saying.
Salim:
Yeah. And it goes through there's different ways to achieve that. I think a big part of our job
is also to define
how we're going to write.
I think HubSpot in the US is se
en as, quite a fun brand.
And I think the the French market in particular, even the German market are so much more formal.
The way to address the readers is by default. The formal
way of of, addressing. We want to avoid
the superfluous. You know? If you have information to give me, give it to me straight to the point.
There's not much room for personal details. For how you came up with the story.
We just need the advice, and it need
s to be concise and to the point. And that's how we build the
trust. It's like I'm not, you know, wasting your time. I'm going directly to the point. And if I can get
your stress with the content, I'm more likely to generate a conversion.
Sonia:
Yeah. I lo
ve that. I love that. And it just kinda sounds like customer intimacy is at the heart
of this and which is great because this is one of the principles of doing marketing well and particularly
inclusive marketing.
I'm curious if someone wants to get starte
d with reaching people in other markets, where should
like, what what is this a good starting point for them?
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7
Salim:
So, ideally, we think about, going international way before we need to. And I think at the
early stage when a company is
going to consider what CRM
. To purchase, what, CMS, to purchase,
who to work with for content creation. We need to think about leveraging that. You know? If if we're
spending a lot of money on designs, do we own the designs fully? Can we modify them as we
will?
Do we have editable files as a Delivery? There's all all that part, and it's also creating a glossary,
like, making sure what language are we speaking, how are we talking about our tools.
And I think we need that in in any language. So in English, i
t's going to be necessary as well if we
do blog posts to put forward a specific approach
To whatever the industry, target it is. We need to make sure doing a search on that keyword that we
use is going to bring you to our product page where we sell that pr
oduct, th
at solution, that service.
So consistency is is super important, and to get consistency internationally, we need to have it from
the start. So I think there'
s a pre a few prerequisites
. That are very necessary, and it is difficult to go
halfway i
nternationally. You know, just having
the blog is is gonna be tricky.
It's going to be an
investment, and it's not going to lead to all the results that we expect.
So there are ways to test the watcher a little bit. And I think it it in some cases, it's wi
se to try what
can be done. So if we look at paid, if we do paid on social media, it means you don't have to have
your account.
You can just see what are the results I can expect with, like, a one off one off campaign on TikTok,
on Instagram, on LinkedIn
without creating a fully fleshed profile, having a strategy of having so
many publications every week.
If you don't want to create the blog immediately, you can also do, you know, sponsored content. On
third party websites, see what's the traffic you you
can send to maybe your English properties.
But see what it is that's realistic. See how many views you have on that article that's been published
on a good third party website that is, specific to your industry. You can leverage that a little bit to to
see
what you can expect and how hard it's going to be to stand out on that market.
Sonia:
Yeah. One of the things that you just brought up about social media made me think of a
conversation that I had with a client a while back. They wanted to reach Spanish s
peakers in the
US, but still Spanish speakers, and I was recommending to them that they needed a Spanish
language version of their social media channels. And they were like, we're not resourced. We don't
have the budget to, like, support to. You know?
And
my thinking was that it's hard to, like, have it mixed in, or you just need to think more so about
the customer experience of whenever someone sees an ad, if it's connected to like, where it's
connected to, and then where it's gonna send them.
So I'm cur
ious your point of view. Whenever you're thinking about even social media accounts, do
you need a different account for different languages or different markets?
Salim:
I think you do. And I think, that that's why paid is a good a good way to only, tiptoe
on social.
But we know we know the limits of paid. If if you do that, it's as long as you're paid, you're having
results, the minute you stop, you drop. And I think the the inbound methodology in general is try to
build a wheel that is self sustained. As m
uch as as possible. But with social, if we have too much of
a mix, it's a bad experience for everyone.
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8
It's it's very difficult to, you know, subscribe to a channel and then see a mix of languages in the
content. It's difficult to also have, like, publica
tions, and then if you want to comment on them, ask
follow
-
up ques
tions.
There's no replies. It creates
a poorer experience. So I think I go back here to my point of, like, not
trying to go for the 1 on 1. It's not because you have something in English th
at y
ou have to have it
in language.
It's
best to have less, but tailored a
nd fully fleshed solutions than to force the replication of what
exists in the original language.
Sonia:
Yeah. Yeah. Totally agree. Okay. One last question before I switch gears. The
role of AI, I
kinda have a feeling I know what you're gonna say, but how should marketers be thinking about how
AI could or should support them as they're thinking about engaging people from different markets?
Salim:
I think there's no doubt anymore. I th
ink AI is here, and the capabilities are just getting bigger.
So I don't believe there's an approach of of saying we have a 100% AI oriented workflow for anything.
The same way there's no way we can have a any process that fully excludes AI. I think we nee
d that
flexibility again to include
it when required, if required.
But it it can speed up so many tasks. I think, you know, I was mentioning if you work with designers,
you want to make sure that the design you paid money for
You can replicate, use them in
other languages. Maybe AI is the way to do that. In some cases,
maybe in other cases, you'll just want to take a a different, stock image. You'll want to create. A a
complete mock up, but you have to have that flexibility of using it.
And I think the the
parallel with AI and localization as part of multilingual content marketing strategy
is very similar. AI and localization are tools that you need to use when you decide to use them, when
it's relevant to use them.
So I think it shouldn't be imposed. It sh
ouldn't be rolled out for any of the processes. The the ask
should always be, like, we need that content to for that, objective. And then the content creation
team should be free to use AI if it's, relevant for a specific part of the of the process. Even i
f we say,
you know, we want a blog article that defines that very topic
And that differentiates all solution from that of competitors. Maybe there's a few paragraphs. We
can translate from English because they are good as they are. Maybe there's a meta des
cription we
want to generate generate with AI and then, go through maybe there's a few imag
es we want to
generate with AI.
So I think there's no denying it is a tool that can speed up a lot of the tasks. That belong to the
process of of content creat
ion, o
f even analysis. So
it just needs to be embraced, in my opinion, and
and part of the day to day.
And, again, giving that that flexibility, I think it would be counterproductive also to impose AI on
specific tasks the same way it would not make sense to im
pose localization of specific, pieces of
content.
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9
Sonia:
Yeah. Yeah. Totally agree. Totally agree. Salim, this has been super fun. I wanna switch
gears a little bit and find out, your perspective as a consumer. Can you tell me about a time where
a brand
made you feel like you belonged?
Salim:
I think there are there are a few brands that managed to make you forget they are not from
your country. I think in the in the b two c in particular, like, Green Giant, you know, Mr. Clean.
Nobody really thinks
about that as being, like, from somewhere els
e. I they
feel very native
everywhere, but I think there's a trend now in the tech industry to really go to the next level because
the consideration before purchase is so much more important.
We need to have t
he attract phase, you know, all the content that generates the the the attractions
of traffic, returning traffic, really detailing plays and solutions fully fledged, but it goes beyond that.
It's also all, the conversion content, you know, the the the tool
s I can use to see what would that
solution look like for me if it's anything from, software to, like, irrigation systems.
Like, can I have a mock up of what that's going to look like for me? But also the oldest part after
sales, the delight section. Like,
do I have docum
entation
to help me, find solutions? And I think more
and more user generated content.
You know, when we're talking about, social media, I think a big part of social is not what the company
is putting forth. It's the replies. It's the comm
ents. So can you provide that community for me, where
I see, for instance, IKEA had a great, way of of leveraging content from users, and you can see,
okay, he could build that furniture in less than an hour.
So c
an I? I'll go the next step.
I'll buy it,
and Yeah. It fits in nicely. I see you can, you know, put the,
I don't know, the angle so far on one end or the other. I think that part is key. So it's I think it's very
hard to convince the audience I'm doing that content for you.
It's more about avoidin
g the frustration of never pointing out th
at, oh, you didn't think of me.
Now I'm
looking for that piece, and it's missing.
You know, really from every stage of the process. You know, I first discovered the brand in my
language.
I convert into a leader, in
to a client in my language.
And when I need help, I have it in my language. When I need inspiration, I have it in my language.
And it it feels genuine. It feels true.
And and this I I think that this is the the way to go for content. I think more than us s
aying it, it it's
also what Google is doing. I Feel the e e a t updates. Have really pushed for building expertise. And
it's very hard for any company to say, hey, our CEO is r
ecommending this in 7 languages f
or 7
different markets.
So you need to really g
o native and have these teams look out for experts they can leverage in
country, maybe internal experts
But showing that they have authority to speak on on specific topics.
IM_Ep 127_How to create a multilingual content strategy with Selim Dahmani.pdf

1
Designing Inclusive Experiences for Neurodivergent Consumers
Welcome to Inclusion & Marketing, the show that’s all about helping you develop the skills and
insights you need to win
more consumers' attention, adoration, and loyalty. Especially those with
differences that are often ignored by brands.
I’m your host, Sonia Thompson
-
an inclusive brand coach, strategist, consultant
–
and someone
with a lot of differences. Let’s get to it
.
As mentioned
in
an earlier episode
–
1 in 5 people are neurodivergent. That means that it is very
likely that you and I will not only work with someone who is neurodivergent
-
which is why we focused
on
the first episode in this series
-
episode 57, Neur
odiversity at Work: How to Create a Culture
Where Everyone Thrives.
And now with this episode
–
I want to turn our attention to neurodivergent consumers
–
because it
is very likely that some of the people you serve will be neurodivergent as well
-
so it is
important to
understand various ways to consider and support them in the customer experience you deliver.
So back on the podcast are my resident neurodivergent experts Aviva, Ludmilla
,
and Caroline
–
they’ve shared their experiences as neurodivergent cons
umers along with some tips for you to think
about as you work to build more inclusive experiences.
Sonia:
I've got another treat for you today. Thank you so much for joining me, Aviva Ludmilla and
Caroline, a pleasure to have you for a
second time here on this show. How are you?
Aviva:
Thank you.
Ludmilla:
We're doing great.
Aviva:
How are you?
Sonia:
I'm doing fantastic. So let's go in. I'm excited to learn more during this conversation today.
Before we do that, just in case people
haven't listened to part one of the show that we did together,
who are you and what do you do?
Aviva:
Thanks so much. So I'll answer first on behalf of a group and then I'd love for Ludmilla and
Caroline to jump in an
d introduce themselves as well.
So m
y name is Aviva Legged. I'm a college admission and higher education expert with a particular
interest in neurodiversity from both a personal and professional standpoint. Our collective focus is
Ascend Talent and we are three neuro
-
diversion professionals
who have joined forces to help
organizations achieve exceptional outcomes.
And I've, I love bringing my background in academia and my past experience teaching on Coursera
and supporting all different kinds of l
earners to achieve their goals.
So I'll hand it over to my
colleagues to talk a little bit about themselves.
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Ludmilla:
So I'm Ludmilla and I'm a professor of psychology at Vanguard University. I have been
doing diversity work for most of my life and specifically for the last several y
ears I've been working
a lot in the area of neurodiversity. And I just submitted my first graph of the book on
the topic.
So
we're gonna talk about this anymore today.
Sonia:
Very cool. Congratulations. I know that's a very big feat.
Ludmilla:
Thank you.
Caroline:
It is a huge feat. Congratulations Ludmilla.
Ludmilla:
Yeah.
Caroline:
I know how much hard work is. It's, it, we've all written books and so we know exactly
how much hard work goes into it.
Ludmilla:
Oh goodness.
Caroline:
So huge.
Congratulations. So my name is Caroline Stokes. I'm the, I'm the third part of
the trio. I'm, I love working with this particular team because as, as, as it has been outlined, we're
three neurodivergent individuals.
We come from either educational or acad
emic backgrounds. And in my particular instance, my focus
is on and has
been in commercial, enterprise,
in organizations that create consumer products e
everything through to products, plastic products that you buy, services that you buy online, mobile,
mo
bile products hard, and obviously stuff that can be downloaded.
And I've also been involved in everything from PlayStation to, you know, really big brands of film
and entertainment and video games. So I have a very
, very different background,
to the team.
But
together we are, we were able to provide the insights that are necessary for organizations and
individuals to thrive.
Sonia:
Very cool. Very cool. Well, I'm excited to dig in more. Last time we talked a lot about
Neurodivergence as it related to team
s and working. And now I wanna switch gears to
Neurodivergence as a consumer. But befor
e we dive into those specifics,
just in case somebody
doesn't know what it means to be neurodivergent, can you just kind of ground us on what that is?
Ludmilla:
Sure. I
n general, when we talk about neurodiversity, just like biodiversity. So when Judy
Singer defined it, it was really thinking about all the different ways in which people think and feel,
and process information. But we also know that not every style of thin
king and feeling is equally
welcoming to society.
So when we're talking about things like the neurodiversity movement or understanding
neurodivergent people, we're talking about those who have not quite had the same opportunities as
everyone else based on
the way we think, feel, and process information. So it obviously started with
autism culture and in the late nineties that's where the conversation was, but it very quickly expanded
to ADHD dyslexia dyspraxia.
But now we can talk about all kinds of other w
ays in which people can differ from the neuro typicality,
let's say long covid influences some of the cognitive processing and a lot of things we're talking
about, let's say how to accommodate autistic people.
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A lot of that could actually apply to those
who experienced long covid or something that we talk
about, well that applies to
ADHD might apply to long covid.
So we don't want to just say, okay, you
need to have this particular label. There are
...
Sonia:
Right.
Ludmilla:
That are overlapping.
Sonia:
Yeah. And I, this, this is often what I call spillover, right? Cuz a lot of times whenever brands
are focusing on serving the needs of a particular customer group, they also end up serving the
broader needs of people who still appreciate whatever it is th
at the accommodation or whatever it
is that they're doing to serve a particular group of people.
It actually has a benefit to a much broader route as well. So it's nice whenever they, that spillover
effect happens and more people are able to be served and
get their needs met. So can you tell me
about what are some common challenges that people who are part of the neuro
-
divergent
community experience as consumers? Cause I imagine a lot of people aren't really aware of what
some of these challenges are.
Carol
ine:
Hmm. As a consumer it's, it, it's, it's a bit like walking into a war zone pretty much in
various ways for various people. And as Ludmilla expertly explained, there are just, there's such a,
a broad range of sensory and processing approaches that peop
le have. Every single brain is
different. So what is, what is acceptable or easy to manage for one person may be more challenging
for others.
I'll give you an example of my youngest son, for example, he's 16, he is on the, he has multiple
neurodivergent di
agnoses and when we walk into a restaurant, if the music is too loud if the
acoustics aren't acceptable, we have to say, I'm really sorry, but we have to go.
Sonia:
Okay.
Caroline:
Because they're no
t going to change it typically.
And so it's the, it's j
ust not sensory
appropriate for him. Another example, just the other day we were having to get his booster shot
because he's immune
-
compromised as well. We were, there's a new facility whereby you can click
on the options to find, a clinic, specifically th
e focus for people who have sensory challenges.
Sonia:
Oh wow.
Caroline:
We found four in all of Vancouver. But guess what? We made that one
-
hour round trip to
ensure that we went to an appropriate one because the impact is that he will have somatization
seizures if he is too overwhelmed.
Sonia:
Okay.
Caroline:
When that hap
pens, it can impact his education, it can impact his confidence in settings,
it can impact his communication skills, and so on.
So it's, it's a, and that's just one particular case if you think about my particular situation, which is I
have a DHD and I nee
d to, I am easily distracted and it can be overwhelming when that happens
because, you know, if I have a job to do, if I'm distracted, I'm unable to feel like I'm able to accomplish
what I need to accomplish.
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So for me, it's it if, if somebody asks me, yo
u know, do you need help? It completely, it can, it is an
odd thing to say I realize that, but it can overwhelm me. It can derail,
Sonia:
Okay
.
Caroline:
my mission and, and because I'll be thinking, oh, how can I make them feel comfortable?
How do I ensure that I'm being polite in this situation when really I need to hyperfocus cuz I will have
a 10
-
minute window where I will buy something?
Sonia:
Right
.
Caroline:
But that's just me. So there are just so many different experiences that people have. So
when they walk into a store, they go online or they walk into an environment. Often those
environments aren't, do not cater to the multiple divergences that
are everywhere.
Sonia:
Got it.
Caroline:
For everyone.
Sonia:
So when we talked last time, some of the recommendations that you had for ways in which
leaders can serve people on the
ir team who are neurodivergent,
is not to just give them special
accommo
dations, but to create a culture and environment that works for everybody, right? So you're
designing it so it works for everybody from the beginning.
Are there ways that you would recommend that marketers and people who are thinking about
customer experi
ence can design a customer experience overall that works for everybody, that works
for people
who are neurodivergent and not
because I imagine
as
someone said, well should we not
like say, can I help you?
You know, like, so when you, when would you know w
hen it's acceptable or not? So how did, how
should people go about thinking about creating experience? That one makes it, I don't wanna say
fluid for their team to be supportive of everyone.
Aviva:
I can take this one. So I think that the important thing t
o consider here for companies is how
do we personalize the experience to the customer. So
Sonia:
Yeah.
Aviva:
whether that customer has a disability or neuro divergence or just any particular need that
they're seeking to have met. I think that if companies are going out there and getting the input of the
custome
r, so I'm thinking for example,
before you shop in t
he store if you have the option to go
online and
check
-
in
and then request something, maybe it's like, you know, hey I just wanna really
quickly like have somebody show me to the pants section or you know, I'm looking for a quiet place
to you know, try on
my clothes.
You know, where can, when
I get to the store,
can someone help me find that? And that would
provide people a space and a voice to express their needs without them being overwhelmed by
walking the store, trying to self
-
advocate,
and
trying to g
et whatever support they need. So I'm
thinking about that in the retail environment. And then, you know, I think that the online environment,
I've found this for myself as somebody w
ith multiple neuro divergences,
that the online environment
is generally m
ore comfortable or most comfortable for me to shop in because
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Sonia:
Okay.
Aviva:
I can, you know, take my time picking and choosing things. I can research, I can compare
and it doesn't require me to, you know, have a specific interaction. I mean I inte
ract with people all
the time. It's not tha
t I have a problem doing that,
but there's something about the store environment
for me where I feel pressure if a salesperson is coming over to me to like to buy something because
I feel like I'm like obligated t
o buy something if they
Sonia:
G
ot it.
Aviva:
I know that that's not true, but it's just a sort of a feeling that, that you get, at least I get as a
neurodivergent pe
rson in a store where I'm like,
oh no, I don't even wanna like to build a tie with you
b
ecause I know I'm gonna wanna buy something if I like you and I don't wanna
like you so let...
Sonia:
G
ot it.
Aviva:
Just create a little distance here.
Sonia
: Right
.
Aviva:
So for me, that's why the online environment really tends to be the best. I know that in our
past conversatio
n, we were informally chatting,
I was talking about like how I love Instacart because
you know, you can go right into the app and then you can, yo
u know, compare shop with the item
that you want and then buy from that store and you know exactly when it's coming and you don't
have to see the person and you also don't have to
walk the aisles, which I mean,
I don't know, I
have other neuro
-
divergent f
amily members who love grocery shopping, but I don't so
Sonia:
Got it.
Aviva:
You know it's, yeah, for me, I just like something seamless and easy where I have as much
control over the experience as possible.
Sonia:
Yeah. Based on the example that you just gave, I'm thinking of two things in particular. T
here
was one where at Chipotle,
right, like soon Chipotle, you go in and you have to stand in line and
then you have to talk to the person on the other side and tell
'em what you want. So it sounds like
that could be overwhelming for people, it could be overwhelming for anybody.
But they do have this thing where you can order on
line and then you just walk in,
pick it up off the
cart and then go back out. So you can g
o in, get your food that you've already pre
-
selected, which
like you said, leads to a degree of control and you don't have to interact with anybody, you just go
in, pick it up and walk out. And the other one that I saw t
hat I experienced that kind of,
I th
ink a
similar need was at Best Buy you could select what you want and go in and they'll then you park in
the lot, say, Hey, I'm here online and the application, they'll bring it to you.
Again, you're able to do that retail shopping, and have an element of
in
-
person, but with minimal
contact if you don't want any.
So it sounds like those might be some examples of some ways in
which brands can create an experience that allows people to self
-
select what it is that they most
need from experience.
Aviva:
Absolutely.
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6
And I'll add to that sort of a, a similar theme of, of personalization, but kind of a different experience
would be, I've had positive expe
riences at Macy's where if you,
you get a personal shopper in
advance, you can tell them what your si
ze is, and what kind of items you're looking for, and then
they'll just go into the store and they'll pull everything for you.
And you're not, they're not on commission so they're not trying to sell you their specific, any like, as,
as many clothes as pos
sible, but they've already pulled all your sizes so you don't have to go running
around the store trying to find the exact thing that you want.
You can give your stylist the guidance and then they pick it for you and then you go into the room
and you try i
t on, you keep what you want and you take out what you don't want. So again, I think
emphasizing that personalization piece is important.
And then thinking about, the sensory experience and how everybody may
have a different need
when it
comes to that Ind
ian store way.
Sonia:
I know Caroline, you talked about there being times where let's say it's too much of a sensory
experience or like let's say it's too loud and you'll have to leave. Are there other impacts that you all
have found that the impact of a
brand not necessarily taking into account people who are neuro
-
divergent has on you as a consumer?
Like sometimes you might have to leave, but are there other things that ha other ways that impact
you and the choices that you make?
Aviva:
So one thing I would say, and I'd love to hear what the group has to say too, I think that one
of them, the challenges of, I think of branding that a lot of companies might have is sort of creating
that customer avatar and then how does the neurodivergent
person relate to that avatar?
So, you know, if you think about, you know, historically like the Victoria's Secret model or like the
Abercrombie model, I think there's like a certain lifestyle or culture or a set of beliefs that are behind
these images. An
d I think that, that when cust when companies fail to take into account the
neurodivergent consumer, they alienate them from a brand image perspective because neuro
diversion people don't necessarily want to feel or aspire to a specific standard that may b
e out upheld
there.
So I'd say there's, you know, when there's a, an identity clash and I think a lot of brands may alienate
neurodivergent customers
Sonia:
For sure. Caroline, did you have more to add?
Caroline:
Yeah, a few more things to add. So one of
, one of my friends, she's, she, she was
diagnosed with autism at age
45 and she couldn't understand,
for example, she would go into a
shop and there would be all of this imagery just, to continue with Aviva's point, which is that there
would be all of thi
s family imagery.
And it was so overwhelming for her that she just would crawl and want to crawl out and, you know,
get, move into a dif
ferent environment. It was not,
it just wasn't comfortable for her. And I said,
honey, just go to Whole Foods where the
re isn't that Ima that kind of imagery and, but it was just
not that accessible for her lines too much clutter. I can't, for example, go into Target cuz I look inside
and I'm just like, no, everything is not aligned appropriately. It's upsetting me.
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I, th
ere's nothing I wanna buy here. There's too much there, there things aren't packaged in a
particular way. They're not stacked in a particular way, they're not positioned in a particular way.
Things are not logical.
Things keep moving. Brands keep moving,
you know, into different places, different and, and what
have
you, from my sales background, you’d
, you'd have to create for retail, you would have to create
a, a design of, of how a product should look for each environment, you know, for electronics bouti
que
for, for, I'm just trying to think now, which stores are still available? They're still around Best Buy and
what have you. And you'd, you'd have these examples of exactly how it should show up.
And I don't think there is any coincidence that actually i
t shows up in that particular way because a
lot of people that play video games, and I don't know what the sta the data is here, but they're,
they're, they're usually pretty introverted. They may have, you know, specific, they may have specific
diagnoses a
s well where they focus on those kinds of environments
so they can escape from or get,
get involved in an area where they feel more secure.
Sonia:
Got it.
Caroline:
And what have you? So I think it's, I think it's very, very complicated and the opportuni
ty
for marketers is to really do a deep dive on different brains that are out there. It's not about, you
know, whenever I hear my
clients say, well, our
product focuses on the 18 to 35 market. I'm like,
okay, th
at is one particular area. What
do they think
about, what do they eat, what do they eat?
What, how would they describe your product? What is it that they like about your product? What do
they n
ot like about your product and,
and or the industry? What opinions do they have and how,
how do they process
that? How, what do they value? It's just such a complicated avatar to go back
to Aviva's point of, you know, what, what is the consumer and how are you ensuring that you're
touching all of these different aspects?
Sonia:
That's Right. Yeah. I think that
more and more as brands are starting to get more specific
with defining who are the people that
they're gonna choose to serve,
who have the problem that
their brand solves, right? Then they can start to say, all right, does it include this group of people
or
does it not? You know, for inclusive marketing, I always like to remind people that it doesn't mean
that you have to serve everyone, it's being choiceful. But a lot of times the problem is people aren't
choosing.
So because they're not making the choice
s, they are just by default excluding many people because
they are unaware that these differences exist. However, there are some brands who have been
making choices about specifically how they can serve this community and they've implemented
things like au
tism hour or sensory
-
friendly shopping. What are some examples? Like is this
something that you all have experienced and appreciate and what are some example
s of what this
might look like?
What is sensory
-
friendly shopping?
Ludmilla:
The typical definition would be turning the music off and turning the lights off. And usually,
it happens sometime in the morning. I'm really not sure what's happening with my son. I'm really
sorry about that problem. So it's something that happens in the
early morning hours because there's
just an assumption that your diversion, people want to use
early morning hours,
even though many
are night owls and it doesn't work. And it's further complicated because some people hate to sound
like me, but love light
.
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So if I go, I'm, I'm enjoying it, it's quiet, but then I'm looking okay where the stuff is because I can
see it saying and, and then I start falling asleep. So
it's more complicated. So yes,
it's taking care of
two major sensory sensitivities, especial
ly turning off the loud music, which does drive me out of
stores, which is why I never went to shopping malls.
I avoided them even when that was the only way to obtain things. But it doesn't quite solve every
person's issue again because of timing. Like y
ou're making assumptions that I'm eithe
r an early riser
or don't work,
neither of which is true
,
or don't have kids or whatever else people are doing. So it's
still kind of limiting like okay, there's your special hour, and if you can't make it too bad. So
ideally
we definitely want a little bit more of a flexible experience and so I know it is appreciated that at least
there's no music all the time.
Sonia:
Got it.
We talked a lot about the way in which brands can support people in a retail setting.
Are th
ere things that people should be doing and considering about the experiences that they're
delivering online? Especially if it sounds like a lot of people who are part of this community end up
shopping online, right? So are there things that people should b
e aware of about how to make sure
that they're delivering
an experience that works well
for people in this community?
Caroline:
I'll jump in on that. So in terms of the online experience, what people can do really well.
Amazon nails it, Amazon nails it, i
t doesn't provide you with distracting imagery. You go in, you know
exactly what you want to be able to buy, you type it in and up comes in. Incredible selection.
The choice is overwhelming, too overwhelming, but that's okay. At least you've got the choice
and
you don't have to go into 10 different stores to do that. As, as we all know, when you go onto a
website, let's just use Gap as an example. If you go onto a gap, they're, they're, they're trying to
communicate a lifestyle.
They're trying to make you t
he, the imagery, the connection, the emotional connection that they're
trying to create doesn't necessarily help an individual understand where to go.
Sonia:
Okay.
Caroline:
It's a little like the in
-
store shopping experience. So Amazon does a fantastic
job. It may
not give you the nice warm and fuzzies, but in terms of going in,
and
getting out
,
for example, I
bought some shorts this morning from Amazon, from Amazon. I wanted to buy some new Balance
ones because I knew New Balance was great. And so I cou
ld do my walks around the neighborhood
and I was in and out of that in five minutes. Had I gone into the store, they wouldn't have had them.
I would've had to have chosen another brand.
Sonia:
Okay.
Caroline:
And then I would've just walked out and then b
een disappointed and that would've taken
several hours. So in terms of being able to direct people to exactly where they need to be and where
they need to go, that's really, really helpful. Nordstrom does that well as well. They've just closed up
in Canada
unfortunately. But then, when going through that shopping experience,
I didn't have to go downtown to do that. Other websites, for example, from a B2B perspective that
is, are really good. For example, Google, Google's accessibility for example, when creating Google
forms, even compared to looking at something like Typeform,
Typeform has a nice glossy feel.
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9
It makes it very accessible. But in terms of being able to become hyper
-
fo
cused to get in and to get
out,
which I think is a priority for people that can hyper
-
focus Google
Forms
for example, is much
better and it enab
les both neurodivergence and neurotypicals to get in and out.
Sonia:
Okay.
Caroline:
And, and tick that box, not feel like they've, they've had that energy drained.
Sonia:
Okay.
Caroline:
And what have you?
Ludmilla:
The online experience really also
touches on many differ
ent forms of neurodivergence.
It
could be color and font contrast. So especially for people who are dyslexic in you, to pay a lot of
attention to the layouts and how easy it is to navigate. My personal pet peeve of pop is pop
-
up
video
s. You serve me pop
-
up videos, it literally gives me a jol that makes me sick. Like I can't work
because it scares me and it startles me.
So, I will never go to your website if you keep survey pop
-
up videos in my face. So there are a lot of
things that the
online environment, yes needs to be organized, but it also needs to be a just a little
bit more considerate of sensory experience.
Sonia:
So if I'm hearing what you're saying a
nd I wanna try to summarize it,
is that things need to
be simple and intuitive
so that people are very clear, I can get in for what it is that they need and get
back out in a short amount of time and not get distracted by all these other things that you might
have going on. And that is in maybe the user experience and flow, but also
making sure that we are
considering design.
And is the design, as you said, fonts, graphics, how those work together? Are those supporting that
same simplicity in ease of experience, right? Is that what you're kind of, is that kind of summarize
it?
Carol
ine:
Yes, Perfectly.
Sonia:
Okay.
Aviva: Yes. And, if I could add, I think that an important part of the customer experience is return
policies because
Sonia:
Okay.
Aviva:
You know, with online shopping especially, you don't always know exactly what you're getting
until it shows up at your door if it's not something you've ever purchased before. So I don't love to
promote them
because
I know they're a big giant evil corpora
tion, but Amazon is just so easy with
returns.
So it's a very natural place for neuro diversion people to
shop because you know,
maybe sometimes
you need a black shirt, but you're not sure which texture you're gonna like in person. So maybe you
buy three
black shirts, so you're gonna return two of those black shirts and keep the one.
So knowing that there is a return policy and also Amazon is very flexible, so if you accidentally get
out of the return window, you can chat somebody and they'll sort of say,
sure, you can still return
this. So there's a lot more flexibility and understanding I think.
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So I think there's, you know, I would say there's just a level of empathy in the whole customer
experience in Amazon, which is why I think they've managed to d
o so well and become the giant
that they are, is that they make everything convenient and easy for the customer.
Sonia:
Got it. What recommendations would you have for a brand that wants to get started, whether
they, that's in their online experience or th
eir in
-
person experience, what recommendations would
you have if they wanna get started supporting this community better?
Ludmilla:
Oh my goodness, that is a lot because it, it's everything. It's from the quality of the product,
the
disclosure, what it's
made of,
because let's avoid returns. Please don't lie to me about the fabric
content, for example. Cause
I'm allergic to polyester and I'll know if you'll sneak it in and not disclose
it, but why making me return it and just live at something that is natu
ral and it's not? So make sure
that the product is honest because we have a lot of stuff going on already.
And if somebody lies to us and just tries to put all kinds of psychological pressure on us, that's not
going to work. So just create a good, honest e
xperience and we're going to stick with you. Cause
you're not going to get
brand loyalty by bombarding us,
by emails with more, you know, with more
and more, more is less give us a good customer experience and we're going to keep coming.
Sonia:
Yeah, you
j
ust brought something up and
I feel like it connects to something that you all were
talking about earlier with regards to if you're interacting with a salesperson if you connect with them,
it's kind of like they wanna you, you wanna buy from them and there
's pressure there. Ludmilla, you
just talked about emails, and because I think sometimes in online
marketing in particular,
there are
a lot of persuasion tactics that are used to, of course, get people to buy and to get people to buy
more. Do those persuas
ion tactics have an impact on you as a neurodivergent consumer? And if
so, like how does it, how does it make you feel?
Ludmilla:
Well, I'm a social psychologist, so when I see that it's a huge turnoff because I know
someone is manipulating me.
Sonia:
Oka
y.
Ludmilla:
Even though sometimes it's still difficult to reduce and I'm like, yeah, like Avi
va
was
saying, there's a touchy feel. I also think it's predatory because some indi some neurodivergent
people are more vulnerable to this. Some elderly people a
re more vulnerable to this. Some other
groups of people are more vulnerable to this. So to me it actually feels unethical in many cases.
Sonia:
Hmm. Okay. No, I wanted to make sure that we got to that part. All right. As we wrap up
here, what is it that y
ou wish brands knew about neurodivergent consumers?
Aviva:
For me, the most important thing to emphasize, I guess two things. One is personalization
and two is empathy. I think if a company can
prioritize personalization and,
and empathy in their
marketing efforts and in their customer experience, then they will have a good framework from which
to welcome all different kinds of customers.
Sonia:
I love the word empathy around here.
Caroline:
And if I can add to that, you're o
nly gonna develop empathy if you really truly go out to
the audiences to, and to, to understand. And that includes the people on the sh on the shop floor as
well that say shop floor,
you know, in the store. It requires education, it requires systemic educa
tion
globally on, the different types of types of brains and to, and, and that's how empathy is formed.
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11
So that would be my strongest recommendation, which is to get out do that, and be curious. Just
like you would, you would need to be a marketeer and a
salesperson and somebody that's
representing your company
or just interested in learning.
I think that's the most fundamental thing.
Sonia:
Very cool. All right. Does anybody wanna share a specific experience where a brand made
you or showed you that you
belonged with them?
Caroline:
So, when I was thinking about this, I thought to myself, there is no one company that I
have come across, unless it's for, specifically for neurodivergent children in a neurodivergent school
that's a completely separate mark
et.
But outside in the real world where people are trying to find out or they're, they're learning in midlife
or in young adult life that they have a neurodivergent diagnosis. They are, they don't know that they
have it and they may just feel that a brand
is completely incongruent. There is no brand that I have
seen or maybe there's someone who is about to come out with something that is relevant.
But I have not seen a brand that will wholeheartedly accept and understand or attempt to understand
neurodiver
gent human beings. And I would love to be able to see a brand that goes outside of the
medical community or the psych or the organizational psychology
community that really embraces,
embraces all different types of brains and, and their approach for it rat
her than everything just being
a marketing sale from, you know, since, since consumerism began.
Sonia:
Yeah, No, it sounds like there are a lot of areas for the opportunity and for, for brands overall
across the board. So we're gonna put this challenge ou
t so that we have more leaders who will have
empathy cuz this is a pretty decent
-
sized population.
I think I heard one in five people are neurodivergent. So this is a pretty large chunk, right? So even
if it wasn't, it's still important to have empathy in
this regard. All right. Where can people find you if
they wanna learn more about your work?
Aviva:
Thanks. So please, you could follow us on LinkedIn ascend talent or you can email us at
ascendingtalen
tthree@gmail.com
.
Sonia:
Nice. All right. Any parting words of wisdom for marketers who want to show neurodivergent
consumers that they belong with them?
Ludmilla: Okay. Neurodivergent consumers actually care about a lot of other things. We tend to care
a
lot about justice in general. So there are some things, don't rely on your own empathy. Hire
neurodivergent pe
ople. Hire all kinds of people,
period and treat them right. So there's one brand
that I and my colleagues and always patronize and we do that be
cause they never do layoffs and
they haven't done layoffs in a tough economy and it's a pretty small, you know, chain and they just
kept all of their employees and we've been patronizing them for 10 for whatever, however many, 10
over 10 years since the pr
evious recession.
So, when you create something that we just think you are a just and fair brand like we don't even
care what yourself, we'll eat your food and we'll stay in your hotels. Cause that is, that's just an
important thing if you are in jail if y
ou treat people right, it doesn't even have to be specifically catering
to neurodivergent, but treat people right and be honest.
And that's really something that's much better than any kind of anti
-
H or diversion people.
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IM_Ep 58_How to build an LGBTQ+ inclusive brand.pdf
2
Sonia:
And you've learned the things to say and not to say and all that good stuff.
Hank:
And I mean, this is the beauty of your podcast, Sonia, like the fact that just week after week
you are delivering the goods to these people to not feel so overwhelmed when it comes to being
inclusive like that.
I, I just love that your podcast exists, hon
estly.
Sonia:
Thank You. Thank you. No, I know that there's just so much to learn and grow, so if we can
all be doing it together, all the better, right?
Hank:
Yeah, absolutely.
Sonia:
Okay, so what does it mean to be LGBTQ + inclusive as a brand?
Hank
:
It's a big question, and I think that what I want to start with is this misconception or
misunderstanding of the term LGBTQ + inclusive versus LGBTQ + friendly.
Sonia:
Okay.
Hank:
Because I hear that often, and if we're being really honest as well, if
you look on Google, you,
if you have like a Google business listing, you can actually tick a box to say that your business is
LGBTQ + friendly.
Sonia:
Really?
Hank:
Now I think there is a difference between being friendly and being inclusive, and I'm sure
that
you'll have some thoughts on this too. So I'm very curious to kind of just like bounce some ideas off
you as well, because I think like, to be LGBTQ + friendly is to say, you are welcome here. Like you
can come here, that's fine.
We'll, we'll put up
with you almost, you know, like there's, there's not, we'll, we'll take your money,
we'll take your business, we're not gonna make things hard for you. It's a level of acceptance, but it
doesn't really extend much further beyond that. Right?
Sonia:
Yes.
Hank:
And particularly in that business context, it, it is very much like, oh, you want to be a
customer? Great. We'll take your money. We love that. I think the difference in being LGBTQ +
inclusive is that proactive approach to creating safe spaces and e
nvironments and safe spaces and
environments are, you know, that's not just physical. You know, that's on your mailing list and on
your website and on your live calls in your podcast.
You know, how are you actually going out of your way to ensure that peop
le in the LGBTQ +
community are feeling safe, seen, and celebrated in your business? And if you can tick off some of
those boxes of safe scenes and celebrate, then I would say that's being inclusive.
Sonia:
Yeah. Safe scene and celebrated. I love it. And
would you say that safety is the primary need
of people who are part of the LGBTQ + community?
Hank:
Hmm. That's a real, I don't know. Like, I think that's a really good train of thought, whether
it's the primary need is probably like if we're talking abou
t, you know, Maslow's hierarchy of needs
and what is, what is the most fundamental thing. Yes, sure. Safety would be it. Yes.
IM_Ep 58_How to build an LGBTQ+ inclusive brand.pdf
3
And maybe this is where it's like to be LGBTQ+ friendly is, well, no, I don't even think to be friendly
is to be safe. So I stil
l think to, to offer safety is to be inclusive.
Sonia:
Yeah.
Hank:
But yes, starting at safety would be, would probably be the best place to start, especially if
you've not dived into any kind of queer inclusion strategy before.
Sonia:
Yeah. The reason
why I asked that question, I've talked to a number of people and I've heard
them just talking about like safety just being such an important distinction. Like, if I don't feel safe,
I'm not gonna go. And as I was thinking about it, it made me think a lot a
bout I'm, I follow a gluten
-
free diet for health reasons. And it made me realize that whenever I'm going to a business or a
restaurant or something, of course, I want it to be good. Of course, I wanna have options.
Hank:
Hmm.
Sonia:
But first and foremos
t, it's gotta be safe to where I'm not gonna get sick if I eat it. Right? Like,
if we can't do that none of the other stuff even matters. Right. So that was kind of what made me
think about like, we've gotta focus on the primary need that people have from
certain communities.
And not every community has it necessarily, right? But like, there are somewhere there are certain
things like we wanna be consumers, we wanna feel seen.
Sometimes it's quote
-
unquote, you wanna feel normal, but like at the same time,
there are certain
communities that have got things associated with them that cause that the businesses who want to
be inclusive of them, you gotta solve this baseline thing first and foremost before you can even think
about others.
Hank:
Yeah. I really like the way that you frame that, and I think that's absolutely right, Sonia. I think
that in order for people to even Yeah. Get over the line of being ready to spend with you, they've got
to feel like you are a safe place to spend that mon
ey. Yeah,
Sonia:
For sure. Okay. From your perspective, what's the difference between performative allyship
and authentic allyship specifically when it comes to the LGBTQ + community?
Hank:
Yeah.
Sonia:
We see this kinda allyship pop up in a lot of diff
erent places, but yeah, I think, like what's the
difference for you?
Hank:
So I have distilled down, I have a, I have an online course, authentic allyship academy.
And so in that course, I teach this framework of what is authentic allyship, because I thi
nk so often
one of those barriers for business owners and entrepreneurs, and I can't say anything because what
if I say the wrong thing? Or what if it looks fake or tokenistic? What if it comes across as awkward?
Sonia:
Yeah.
IM_Ep 58_How to build an LGBTQ+ inclusive brand.pdf
4
Hank:
So it's like I, I
have in conversations with people had to, I, I've had to figure out how to teach
people what that benchmark is so they can be the judge themselves rather than relying on me every,
like, almost on a daily basis, I get a, a message from someone on Instagram
, Hey, is this a funny
joke or a homophobic joke, you know,
that they wanna post on Instagram or you know, like, can you
give me advice on this thing that I'm doing?
I'm like, if we can equip people to know themselves, then you know, you don't have to ask
, expect
me to do free labor. You know, which I'm sure is, you know, something we've
probably both
experienced. And,
and so what's the framework for understanding authentic allyship? And so I would
break it down into three pillars and
Sonia:
Okay.
Hank:
Then, they all start with a, I love the letter A and everything I'm naming these days starts with
an A. So awareness is number one. So that's taking on that self
-
responsibility of educating yourself,
understanding the issues. It it's just being in the know
.
Right. Number two is around amplification. So at what point is your business prioritizing amplifying
the voices and experiences and perspectives of the group that you are supporting?
Sonia:
Okay.
Hank:
And so from a queer perspective, that's like, are
you elevating queer stories? Are you
celebrating, you know, queer events and queer holidays and, and doing it in a way that's like putting
them at the front rather than
just leading with your logo.
Right.
Sonia:
Okay. Yeah.
Hank:
So amplification is that
second one. And so that final one is action and action is about, you
know if you're happy to talk the talk, then you also need to be prepared to walk the walk. And you
and I both know Sonia, that allyship is a verb. It's about doing so
mething, it's about
showing up,
it's
about using your own voice. It's about, you know, where are you putting your, you know, putting
your money where your mouth is.
And so there are so many different ways that this action can play out. And I teach some of those
strategies in my course, but really, like, that's how I
would sum up is your, you know,
is your pride
campaign authentic? Well, I would ask questions about wha
t work
you have done regarding
awareness, amplification, and action.
Sonia:
Nice.
Hank:
And if you get all three together, then we're probably somewhere
close to being authentic
Sonia
:
Okay. This might sound like it's coming from out of left field, but
it popped into my head
and
I don't want it to pop out.
So great. Yeah.
Whenever you introduced yourself, you said your pronouns were
them. Right. And so most
companies that are collecting information, you know, sometimes depending on whatever company
it i
s, they might have gender on their form or whatever it is.
And it used to always be male, female. And then we started to see males,female, other, and then
we've started to see male females prefer not to say like there's been a number of different things.
IM_Ep 58_How to build an LGBTQ+ inclusive brand.pdf
5
Hank:
Yes.
Sonia:
And I wanted to find out, do you have recommendations for people on what that should look
like and when should they even be asking these types of questions for capture, for data capture.
Hank:
Yeah. I think it's really important to know why you're asking that question and whether that
piece of segmentation is relevant.
Sonia:
Okay.
Hank:
So let's do an example, a little thought experiment, say on this blouse that I'm wearing now,
you can see it, the listeners can't, but I'm just gonna describe it for a second and say, it's a very
bright floral blouse that's got puffy sleeves and I feel an
d look amazing in it. Trust me when I say it.
Sonia:
You do.
Hank:
So, I love to wear clothes that are bright and floral. That is just something that I've discovered
in the last six months that really helped me express my gender identity outwardly. I feel
like I'm a
bright and floral person. So
Sonia:
yes.
Hank:
Now when I buy this shirt, I will typically buy this from a quote
-
unquote women's store or
women's section of a store.
And if someone is capturing my email address to put onto a list and to, you
know, do some email
marketing to me and they ask me my gender and the option is male or female, well, I'm assigned
male at birth. And if I'm given that binary choice, which is an uncomfortable question for me
to get
asked a lot of the time,
I'll, I'll sele
ct male. Cause I've only been given one choice. That's not my
gender, but that is the sex that I was assigned at birth.
Sonia:
Okay.
Hank:
And so what that then means is this company can't actually market because they've obviously
made some choices in th
ere, in their marketing department and, and business model that there are
certain clothes that we market to men and certain clothes that we market to women.
We know, there are data showing that 25% of Gen Z, so this is people under the age of 25, and 20
5%
of gen, Gen Z is expected to change their gender identity at least once in their lifetime.
Sonia:
Wow.
Hank:
And so what that says is that gender is not fixed, and therefore the clothes that we wear are
also not fixed. And that the correlation between t
he clothes that we wear and our gender identity
shouldn't be so tightly held onto
that a marketing department or,
or a business is willing to lose
marketing to me because they only gave me the option of male or female. So to finish this thought
experiment,
I feel like I'm going on a, a bit of a tangent.
Sonia:
No, that's great.
Hank:
But I'm, I'm wrapping it up, is I would rather you ask me much more intentional questions that
are more relevant to the thing you're trying to sell me.
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6
Are you interested i
n dresses? Are you interested in suits? Are you interested in skirts? Are you
interested in handbags? Ask me those sorts of questions. They are not gendered, they're gender
-
neutral questions, but you get more insightful information that can then help you s
egment to send
me email marketing that is relevant to things that I might actually buy.
Sonia:
Yeah.
No, I, I love, I love this thought experiment and I think that you, you used the word
intentional in choice, those two words. And those are at the heart
of inclusive marketing. For me, it's
all about intentionality in choosing who you're going to serve and who you're, who you're not. Right.
Because the idea, the expectation isn't that people are gonna serve everyone.
That can often be a very tall order. Ho
wever, in a lot of instances, people don't make choices. And
because they're not making a choice, they don't realize that they really are. They're, and, and they're
not being intentional about making a choice. They do things like what you were expect sayin
g,
whereas you can be pushing someone away because you're asking questions in a way that doesn't
make people feel seen or like they belong.
And you just have the opposite impact. So instead of trying to understand more about them not
choosing or making a c
hoice about how you're gonna ask these questions or what information you're
gonna collect can have an impact on the way people feel as they're going through your customer
experience.
Hank:
Totally. And I just want to kind of jump in and add tha
t you made
that comment around,
obviously, you know, businesses and brands can't market to everyone and it's very smart to market
to a niche, but are you asking the question of, am I marketing to everyone in my niche or not?
Sonia:
Yeah.
Hank:
Because I might not n
ecessarily fulfill a demographic, you know, understanding of what you,
who you think you're marketing to, but it's highly likely that I do fulfill the psychographic needs that
you are marketing to.
Sonia:
Yeah.
Hank:
And so have you included me beyond jus
t very binary demographic questions and gone, but
who wants to wear floral bright clothes and are we marketing to everyone who wants to wear those
floral bright clothes
,
and 99% of the time the answer is no, you're not marketing to me. You're doing
a very
bad job of that. I do not feel seen or safe.
I mean, one of the brands that I absolutely love, I was down walking down the main street and they,
they have a store and I've never walked in. I've, if I've bought from that brand, I've bought it online
and
I've got a, I've got a very fun gender reveal party coming up. Sonia, I've, I've come out as non
-
binary and having a big gender
-
bending party.
Everyone's coming as whatever, you know, dress up, whatever affirms, your gender identity. And
so I know that I w
ant to dress up really, really fun for this. And I was thinking about this brand and
maybe I'll buy something brand new from them and I couldn't walk in the store because it's got like
literally on the front window, women's fashion.
And I go, I just don't
feel, you know, comfortable in that space. And Right. It's very easy for them to
make just some small changes and then maybe I would've walked out with a $300 dress. You know,
like, it's just,
IM_Ep 58_How to build an LGBTQ+ inclusive brand.pdf
7
Sonia:
yeah.
Hank:
Yeah. So, I don't know. I'm just like bri
nging in some examples
from very recently in my life.
But, you know, then I walked down the road and there was this beautiful vintage secondhand store
and I walked in.
And what I love about secondhand shopping, aside from the fact that it's, you know, a m
uch more
sustainable way of buying clothes is the clothing is not sectioned off by gender. You know, like the,
the store is the store and there's no labels anywhere to say This is men's pan
ts and this is women's
pants.
It's just, these are all the pants an
d
Sonia:
yeah,
Hank:
you just gotta go fishing. And I love that because it doesn't, it just breaks down some of those
barriers for me. And so I'm flicking through the dresses and the, the shop attendant comes over and
she says, Hey, do you want me to put these dresses in the
change room for you to try on?
And just
that single encounter, I was like, ah, I'd love that, thank you so much. And
Sonia:
great.
Hank:
It wasn't a big deal for her. She, it was just like, I'm helping you out. Clearly, you're looking at
dresses, let me
take them off your hands so you can keep looking. And I
found an amazing dress,
Sonia,
and I'm gonna look great on Friday night. It's gonna look hot.
Sonia:
Oh, I can't wait to see the photos of everyone. Right. So
Hank:
Yeah. Of everyone. That's right.
Yeah. It'll, it'll be all over my Instagram, that's for sure.
Sonia:
For sure. Okay. Well, we'll make sure to link it in so people can go
check it out in the show
notes.
Right. So, okay. Moving along, cuz there's sti
ll so much to cover within the
LGBTQ+
c
ommunity, there are several different identities that have unique needs and challenges.
It's kind of like whenever people are using the term bipo, a lot of people who are within the Bipo
community don't like that term because they're like, they're lumping
a bunch of people together who
have like very different needs and experiences.
So should brands be thinking about speaking and serving the different identities associated with the
different letters? Or is it okay for them to take an approach of, we're sup
porting the community as a
whole and like it's a community, like kind of, I don't wanna say lump together, but like, it it, do they
need to be thinking about them as individual or is it okay to do it more like as a whole?
Hank:
I think that the answer to t
hat question is probably very subjective to what resources are at
your disposal.
Sonia:
Yeah.
Hank:
But I think if I were to simplify that down to what's something that isn't too overwhelming that
helps me get my head around it is I'm gonna try and paint
a picture for people in their minds that if
you've got, we know what a Venn diagram is.
Yes. So we've got two circles that kind of cross over
in the middle. And so one circle on one side is gender and then, the other circle on the other side is
sexuality
or sexual orientation.
IM_Ep 58_How to build an LGBTQ+ inclusive brand.pdf
8
Okay. And so if we've got cisgender, so people who identify with the gender that they're assigned
at birth and then heterosexual straight people cross that over and in t
he middle where the overlap
is,
that is, what I would say, c
isgender, heterosexual cis, everyone outside of that little overlap is
part of the queer community.
Sonia:
Okay.
Hank:
I hope I'm describing this well for people who are listening. But that image really distills it
down to there being two brands. Two bra
nds, that's a poor choice of word, for the marketing podcast,
but I have two buckets.
Sonia:
Yeah.
Hank:
In which when they overlap cis het is the mainstream dominant default.
Sonia:
Yes.
Hank:
Anyone outside that is not mainstream, not dominant, not default. So we can look at it from
how are we speaking to people who are not cisgender? So gender diverse, trans people, intersex
people, that side of the equation. And then how are
we speaking to p
eople who are,
you know, not
heterosexual, so people who are bi people who are gay, that side of the equation. Right. That's a
very simplistic way of understanding it.
Sonia:
Okay.
Hank:
But I would say if you can apply those lenses of gender and sexuality to the work that you
do, then that's probably a really good place to start.
Sonia:
Okay. Okay. A
ll right.
Switching gears a little bit, because we are approaching Pride Month.
Hank:
M
m.
Sonia:
And there's a lot of like Black History Month and a lot of other Heritage Months and
celebrations, I think that people have some mixed feelings about the way in which brands are
engaging. So what recommendations do you have for brands who want t
o, or are thinking about
participating in Pride Month to do it in a way that doesn't make you all make you feel like please
stop?
Hank:
Mm mm Yeah, I think if we go back to that framework, that authentic allyship framework of
awareness, amplification, and
action, it's all well and good to just switch your logo colors to be
rainbow.
Sonia:
Yeah.
Hank:
But if that's all you do
Sonia:
Yeah.
Hank:
Like what level of self
-
awareness have you shown what I just did, lik
e a little icky face, you
know,
for contex
t. And then, you know, what, who are you amplifying in that? What marginalized
voices are you platforming to tell their story and their experience by changing your logo?
Not much. And then what action have you taken? Well, you've taken a bare minimum acti
on that
has very little repercussion for your brand. Right.
IM_Ep 58_How to build an LGBTQ+ inclusive brand.pdf
9
So I think it's just like apply
ing those principles and going,
well, what needs to be addressed within
our brand and our marketing campaign that's lacking? And it could be starting at that very
beginning
of awareness and go, well you know what, just for Pride month, rather than doing some external
campaign, we're just gonna do awareness training for everyone in our organization. We're just gonna
make sure everyone knows the basic LGTBQ + terminol
ogy.
We're gonna make sure that everyone, you know, we're gonna, we're gonna change all our
bathrooms to be gender neutral. Like maybe it's just understanding and educating your team and
that's all you do for Pride Month. Maybe you're not getting a lot of
kudos, but that's a perfect
opportunity for you to leverage a wonderful
month. Love it. Love June. But,
you know, and so that
could be a starting point for you is great, we're gonna use this month to educate ourselves.
Sonia:
Okay.
Hank:
If you feel like
you've already got that within your company culture, then maybe it's time to
move to that amplification stage, which is, you know, who are some of our customers who are also
queer and how can we elevate them and their experience with our brand?
And you kn
ow, I teach a lot of stuff around like gathering testimonials and reviews from queer people
and how do you go about like featuring that in, in your marketing, but in doing that you're saying,
look, we still want to talk about ourselves, but we want to do i
t through that queer lens or through
that qu
eer perspective.
So that would,
that could be another way that you do it just this month we're just sharing customer
stories and success, success stories from the queer community. And then, the final one in acti
on.
So you could go, great, well we've kind of got all our ducks in a row for, you know, how we run things
interna
lly and maybe our marketing is,
you know, got a lot of representation in it.
So now we're actually gonna say, let's support the queer communi
ty by running a campaign where
we are donating a certain amount of, you know, profit to this organization. Or we're gonna, you know,
run a campaign to, you know, lobby the senators from Texas or Tennessee or wh
oever's banning
drag this week.
You know, or
Sonia:
Right, right.
Hank:
Go to a drag show, that's an action you can take that doesn't cost a lot of money. Go take
your whole team to a drag show and support the queer economy. Like yeah, there's so many
different actions you can take, but I think it's
, yeah, don't just, I don't, I don't like seeing brands who
put that rainbow flag up and run a campaign th
at's just like,
we celebrate pride. It's like,
Sonia:
yeah,
Hank:
but what have you actually done? Yeah.
Sonia:
Do you feel like if you saw a brand
that you were interested in and they didn't have anything
for Pride Month, do you feel like he would feel some type of way? Or is it not so much because you
don't really know the other things that they might be doing internally?
IM_Ep 58_How to build an LGBTQ+ inclusive brand.pdf
10
Hank:
Well, I suppose,
you know, for those internal things, you know, you're reviewing your policies
and making sure that they're, you know, gender neutral or you're making sure that you're, you're
giving parental leave to everyone and it's not just like mothers only, you know,
like that sort of stuff.
As you can brag about it, you should tell me about it cuz I'll like you more if you do.
Sonia:
Yeah.
Hank:
But do it because it's the right thing to do. Don't do it because it's just a, you know, an
inauthentic, performative opportunity.
Sonia:
Yeah.
Hank:
But yes, I, I will, I will absolutely resonate with the brand more when they engage with what's
happeni
ng in the queer community. But the negative effect of doing it at a performative baseline
level and not actually getting into the meat of what it means
to support the queer community,
then I
might then start questioning, well why did you bother?
Sonia:
Ye
ah. So changing your logo to Rainbow and issuing like a special edition Pride Month
product, but talking about, hey, here's a policy that we rewrote that is inclusive of the community
and like, you know,
Hank:
Absolutely
.
Sonia:
Otherwise, how would peop
le outside of your
company know about it? So that,
those are the
kinds of extremes. Okay. I like that. Before we start to wrap up, do you have any thoughts on what
brands can do to demonstrate that they are LGBTQ + friendly? Right. Like that's what that's
the goal
that they're trying to
Hank:
Inclusive
Sonia:
get to, right?
Hank:
LGBTQ + inclusive. Yeah.
Sonia:
Okay. So I I Inclusive is the higher level one.
Hank:
Yeah.
Sonia:
Is that what you're saying?
Hank:
Yeah. That's what we wanna aspire to. Yea
h. Yeah.
Sonia:
Got it. Thank you for that correction. So what can they do to make sure that they're moving
beyond friendly to inclusive?
Hank:
So I would say, I mean I feel like there's, you know, there's a lot of examples that we've
chatted
through tod
ay and,
and there are so many ways that you can analyze your business, review
your business, and go, what can we do?
But there are probably like two really basic places to begin that also then have a really big flow on
effect every decision you make movin
g forward. So number one I would encourage every brand to
write an inclusion statement and make that public.
IM_Ep 58_How to build an LGBTQ+ inclusive brand.pdf
11
So an inclusion statement fo
r me looks like something like,
and I teach, I teach this in my course,
like how to write one that's also like very in your brand voice, very authentic, speaks to yours, your
value proposition as well.
Like you wanna, you wanna make, you know, make money doing this too. I get that but d
o it
authentically and you'r
e essentially saying, you know,
well, we will support and, and you know, we,
yeah, we celebrate and we support everyone regardless of gender, identity, sexuality, race, age,
religion ability, you know, like make it just explicit
that you aren't a discriminatory brand.
Sonia:
Yes.
Hank:
I come from a wedding industry background and you know, like people's body size is a big
thing of discrimination in the wedding industry.
Like, if you are not thin and beautiful, then there are b
rands that don't wanna work with you. So I
make that explicit in the wedding work that I do like, no matter your body size
Sonia:
Yeah.
Hank:
You're welcome.
Sonia:
Right.
Hank:
You'll be safe seen and celebrated. Right.
Sonia:
Right.
Hank:
So an inclusion statement is, is s
omething as simple as that and,
you know, make that really
abundantly clear on your website, put it on your Instagram every, you know, every six weeks, or put
it in the bottom of your emails, like make it part of your cul
ture that you let your customers know that
you're an inclusive brand.
And then the second thing that I would do is really go back and evalua
te, we touched on this earlier,
Sonia, but go back and evaluate your ideal market or you know, your ideal customer
avatar,
whatever, however, you've kind of structured that and defined that in your brand. And how much are
you relying on someone being a default gender or sexuality? Are you assuming or have you made
it explicit?
Sonia:
Okay.
Hank:
Are you assuming that
everyone is gonna be a sick woman or have you made it explicit that
no matter how you identify,
whether you are a cis
-
trans or fem non
-
binary person, we've got a
product for you
?
And then go deeper into the psychographics of their needs, wants and desire
s and their fears as
well and, and speak much more to psychographics than demographics because demographics are,
you know, when it comes to being discriminatory like that's where the discrimination begins is when
you have siloed your messaging to a single
identity.
Sonia:
Yeah. Love it. Okay. I think you, you gave an example already of whenever you were
shopping in the woman like open the fitting room for you. Do you have any other examples of a
specific time when a brand made you feel like he belonged?
IM_Ep 58_How to build an LGBTQ+ inclusive brand.pdf
12
H
ank:
I, yeah. Yeah, I mean I have so many. I was just like, what have
I got?
What have I got for
you? So there is an underwear brand here in Australia that has done, a year
-
long campaign, like
over several years, a campaign around de
-
gendering their underwear.
Sonia:
Wow.
Hank:
And they released a line of underwear that was de
-
ge
ndered and they hired all non
-
binary
models for that campaign. So everyone who was wearing the underwear was non
-
binary and the
y
were essentially saying like,
you can wear this or you can wear that. Doesn't really matter.
And so that in and of itself, I l
oved then when I actually went on their website, cuz I've been following
them for a long time and, really they're a very large brand. I'll, I'll name them, they're, they're, the
brand is Bonds.
So if anyone i
n Australia is listening
to
Bonds,
you'll know
it's a household name. And I went on their
website and I saw, I went to like, you know, buy some underwear and there was, I can't remember
whether it was in the dropdown menu or if it was in the description, but somewhere, oh no, it was
the button to purch
ase and the button said buy men's underwear.
I was like, wait, wait, wait. You've just done this whole campaign around the fact that this is de
-
gendered underwear and your button says bye men's underwear. And I put a thing up on Instagram
and I called them
out, I tagged them, I said, Hey, hang on, you're doing this campaign, you're trying
to be gender inclusive and you've got this button.
And within an hour they contacted me directly and said, we are so sorry we're getting this fixed. And
then a couple of h
ours later, I got another message, this has been fixed. It's, it doesn't have that
anymore.
Sonia:
Oh, fantastic.
Hank:
And so they are fantastic. They were just on it. And that same da
y, cuz then it got me thinking,
I'm like, I wonder who else is doing
this sort of thing. And Calvin Klein was doing this during pride,
so Calvin Klein was doing a pride collection and they, it wasn't as explicitly like, this is gender neutral,
but they just said celebrate who you are. But at the top of their campaign, it's
like men's
clothing and
women's clothing,
like those words.
Sonia:
Yeah.
Hank:
And I'm like, this is, you've not done the work. And, so I just contrast the two of like, bonds
have done the work. They made a mistake and then fixed it quickly. Right. And t
hen someone like
Calvin Klein, it's like, I called them out as
well, heard nothing from them,
there was no change, you
know, so yeah. I, it then builds just this level of loyalty to bonds to be like, I wanna support any, any
work that you do in this space
because it's really important and you speak to me.
Sonia:
Absolutely. I love those examples. Thank you so much for sharing. A lot of pe
ople can learn
a lot from this,
from those where can people find you if they wanna learn more about you, your work,
and
or even just follow along and see those photos from your party?
Hank:
Yes, So I'm at hank paul.co everywhere online. That's my website. That's my Instagram. It's
my TikTok. I'm having a lot of love on TikTok these days actually. So go, go see some of my f
ashion
journey on there.
IM_Ep 58_How to build an LGBTQ+ inclusive brand.pdf