Mark Stevens at Unconventional Thinking gave us some wise thoughts on the lack of mystery in marketing nowadays. He mentions the song “Hey Jude”, by the Beatles, and how there was a lot of mystery around who the lyrics were about. This mystery helped to feed the fans´ curiosity and stimulated the song’s success even further (of course, it was also a great piece of music).

Where can we see mystery in marketing? Sincerely, it’s not that easy to find good examples. Mark mentions a post from Brand Autopsy about an innovation on one of Reef’s sandals, which has a bottle opener on the bottom. The detail is that Reef did not use this innovation on its marketing materials, and that led to the customer’s interest and intrigue.

Why is it getting harder to use or see mystery in marketing actions? My guess is because we’re in the information era. Knowledge is everywhere and easily accessible. Anything that begins to have some kind of success instantly spreads through the media and the internet, and millions of people begin generating information about it. Never before so much was known about products under development, and when they’re launched, we instantly find detailed information about everything the products can (or can’t) do.

Nevertheless, mystery can be a differential in a marketing strategy. The human being is curious by nature, and if you awake in him an authentic need of discovering more about your product or service, you will have a lot more buzz without heavy ad investments.

To make a comparison with “Hey Jude”, there was a recent case in Brazil (where I live) that shows how things have changed. A song by a Caetano Veloso, a Brazilian artist, called “O Sonho” (“The Dream”) praised a nameless woman. A Brazilian actress thought the song was about her, and mentioned this on the media and in her blog (in her own words… “I was eternized”). A few days later, Caetano said that she wasn’t his inspirational muse. The excessive information generated around this case turned the mystery into a joke, since the media in general preferred talking about her embarrassing situation than about who the muse really was.

This doesn’t mean mystery disappeared from marketing. It is just a bigger challenge for marketing professionals, since a badly told story badly can turn against the product it is promoting.