The Super Bowl — and all the commentary leading up to it — proves something important about how people make decisions:
At our core, people want to feel seen.
They want to believe that what they’re watching, engaging with, and buying is for people like them.
Take the halftime show.
Bad Bunny is headlining. Fans of his music, people of Hispanic heritage, and many people of color are excited to tune in — because they feel like the performance will reflect people like them.
At the same time, there are people who aren’t excited at all. They don’t feel represented by that choice, so they’ll opt for an alternative halftime show featuring Kid Rock. They’ll tune in because that feels more aligned with people like them.
The same dynamic plays out across the entire Super Bowl experience.
Fans root for their team and celebrate wins alongside people like them.
Viewers debate which ads resonated most — and which didn’t — based on whether they felt relevant to people like them.
This isn’t unique to sports.
Every day, consumers make decisions influenced by “people like me” thinking:
what to watch
what to wear
where to eat
what to buy
where to live
what to join
People don’t just decide in isolation.
They look for cues that say, this is for us.
This idea isn’t new.
Years ago, Seth Godin captured it perfectly in a short essay titled People like us do things like this. He wrote:
“For most of us, from the first day we are able to remember until the last day we breathe, our actions are primarily driven by one question:
Do people like me do things like this?”
He went on to explain that in a world no longer dependent on mass appeal, the most important job of a marketer is deceptively simple — and incredibly hard:
Define “us.”
This is where many brands struggle.
In the name of efficiency, they default to broad messaging meant to reach as many people as possible. But as consumers increasingly make decisions through identity — through culture, values, community, and lived experience — that approach introduces friction.
When people can’t immediately see themselves in what you’re offering, they hesitate.
They question whether it’s for them.
Or they move on.
As “people like me” thinking continues to shape what consumers watch, wear, and buy, brands have to evolve alongside it.
Because growth today isn’t just about reach.
It’s about relevance — and clearly signaling who something is for.
That question — who is this really for? — sits at the center of how growth marketing needs to evolve.
I did a deeper dive on this in the latest podcast episode, where I break down how brands need to evolve their growth marketing strategy to align with “people like me” decision-making — without defaulting to general-market thinking.
If you want to go deeper, you can listen to the episode here.
Why the traditional growth marketing model is failing in a fragmented market (and how to fix) | Apple Podcasts | Spotify
Word On the Street
Duolingo has been warming up fans ahead of the Super Bowl by rolling out a Bad Bunny 101 crash course — helping people learn the lyrics before the halftime show, in a way that feels unmistakably Duolingo.
It’s a smart example of a brand tapping into culture without forcing itself into the spotlight — and instead joining a conversation consumers are already having, in a way that feels useful and on-brand.
Vita Coco is doing something similar. After TikTok jingle creator Romeo went viral for a song she made with the brand, Vita Coco is sending her — and six guests — to the Super Bowl.
This wasn’t their first move like this. Romeo previously went viral for a jingle she created for Dr Pepper, which the brand later turned into a national commercial that aired during the College Football National Championship.
Talk soon,
Sonia