Upgrade your Customer, not your Product

The NEEDS -> WANTS -> ASPIRATIONS Ladder

Nov 20, 2024

How would you describe what Sarah is doing below?

She is scrolling through Williams-Sonoma's website.

She adds a high-end stand mixer to her basket. It’s the same brand and model she's seen used on the many cooking shows she’s following.

The price makes her wince, but the reviews are stellar (and, anyway, she's fed up with her hand mixer splattering batter everywhere). And, there's a sale on.

She hesitates before clicking "buy." Does she need something this pro-grade?

(Some Buyer Remorse?)

What Sarah is doing is:

★ Buying a better mixer for baking

But Sarah's ‘need’ isn't "to buy kitchen equipment."

Nor about saving time (“time saved”).

It's a means to an end.

Because Sarah wants to be better at baking.

She's discovered something: creating beautiful, delicious treats brings her family and friends joy, and she's starting to dream. Perhaps she can do this!

So, a better way to explain what's happening is that Sarah has a higher-level "need”—to be a better baker. Getting the mixer is just one step, not the end itself.

In this sense, it's still a "need" but lower on the "ladder."

What Sarah wants is:

★ To become a skilled home baker

→ By buying better baking equipment

Sarah never aspired to buy a mixer.

She wants to be a better baker.

Consider how this plays out: When a company like MasterClass offers comprehensive baking courses taught by world-renowned pastry chefs or Sur La Table provides hands-on baking classes in its stores, it directly focuses on Sarah's needs ladder. They sell baking equipment but lead with the real need—skill development.

Meeting the higher-level need of "becoming a better baker" means selling a cooking product becomes irrelevant.

Now it gets interesting.

Sarah's true aspiration isn't just about being a better baker.

She wants to create moments of joy and connection through food. She sees herself hosting fabulous dinner parties where her handcrafted dinners and desserts become talking points. She wants to see people’s eyes light up when she brings out her signature dishes. She wants to be known as "that amazing cook" in her social circle.

And maybe start a small custom business someday.

Now the Needs ladder becomes:

★ Create connection and joy through food expertise

→Become a skilled home cook

→ Buy better baking equipment

The stack keeps going.

It always keeps going.

While creating meaningful connections through food is meaningful to her, Sarah's ultimate aspiration is to build a life that combines creativity, nurturing others and potential entrepreneurship. She dreams of leaving her corporate job to do something authentic to her values and desires.

Her ladder now looks like this:

★ Build a fulfilling life centred around creativity and nurturing others

→ Create connection and joy through food expertise

→ Become a skilled home baker

→ Buy better baking equipment

This expanded understanding reveals why some brands thrive while others struggle.

Williams-Sonoma or MasterClass succeed with experiences that support higher levels on the ladder through classes, recipes, community, and inspiration.

But.

Today, changing consumer behaviour adds another layer of complexity. Consumers are now "identity fluid," moving between self-expressions based on context, situations and self. Sarah might be the ambitious home baker on weekends, but she’ll flip to being the health-conscious meal preparer on weekdays and the adventurous global food explorer when she travels.

My earlier article explaining Consumorphosis - consumer’s identity fluidity, disrupting brands as they switch loyalty to themselves is here.

This fluidity is another insight: The Needs ladder isn't static.

Sarah's aspirations and needs shift based on context, mood, and the identity that is prominent in her moment. If you’re only addressing the functional bottom of the ladder—"buy equipment"—you miss the opportunity to connect with these fluid identities and multiple aspirations.

In this example, our mixer brand might think its competition is other mixer manufacturers.

They’re wrong. They compete with every way Sarah might fulfil her higher-level needs: cooking schools, food tours, subscription recipe boxes, social cooking platforms, and even live coaching services that help people transition to culinary careers.

See the pattern here? Up the ladder, customers connect with their more profound aspirations; down the ladder, they deal with functional necessities to get there.

Understand this, and you, too, can create more prosperous and meaningful customer relationships.

Consider how this affects your positioning and marketing

At the functional level: "Our mixer has a powerful motor and ten speeds."

Higher up: "Create perfect cakes and biscuits every time."

Higher up: "Become the baker you've always wanted to be."

At the aspirational top: "Transform your life through the joy of creating."

Each level speaks to Sarah's journey and her different facets of identity.

In today's landscape, identity loyalty has replaced brand loyalty - people don't stick with brands as much as they stick with their evolving self-concept.

How To Meet This Complexity

1. Map the Full Ladder:

Understand all possible levels of customer needs, from functional to aspirational.
Don't stop at the first "Why."

2. Create Flexible Entry Points:

Different products and services can meet customers at different levels of the ladder, ones that match both fluid identities and laddering-up needs.

3. Build Aspirational Ladders:

Help customers move up the stack by connecting functional benefits to emotional and aspirational outcomes.

4. Embrace Identity Fluidity:

Customers might engage with your brand differently depending on which identity is prominent.

Expand Your Definition of Who You Are Competing For

Look beyond functional competitors to anyone who might help customers achieve their higher-level aspirations.

Example: our mixer manufacturer might:

- Partner with online cooking schools

- Create a community platform for home bakers

- Offer business startup guidance for customers interested in professional baking

- Develop content about the joy and therapy of baking

- Host events that celebrate creativity and connection through food

The critical insight is that brands that limit themselves to functional benefits or one category are missing opportunities.

As consumers become more fluid in their identities and more focused on personal aspirations than brand loyalty, the winners will be those who can connect functional benefits to higher-level needs and aspirations.

This doesn't mean abandoning functional excellence - Sarah still needs that mixer to work as promised.

But it does mean understanding that the mixer is just the beginning of a much larger story about creativity, connection, and personal fulfilment.

Expanding the Needs Ladder: From JTBD to Identity-Driven Aspirations

Now we understand that Sarah’s journey from buying a mixer isn’t just about a functional need like baking efficiency but fulfilling her aspirations to become a better baker and, ultimately, expressing her identity as someone who creates joy and connection through food we can also see the necessity of expanding the traditional Jobs to Be Done (JTBD) framework to accommodate identity-driven, aspirational needs, and how today’s fluid consumer behaviours demand a more comprehensive, dynamic approach.

Expanding Traditional JTBD Thinking

The JTBD framework focuses on uncovering consumers' functional goals—what they’re trying to accomplish by “hiring” a product or service. The classic example is: “People don’t want a quarter-inch drill; they want a quarter-inch hole.” But whilst powerful and providing great insight, this model often stops short of understanding why consumers need the hole and how it ties into their deeper aspirations and identities.

Let’s revisit the "quarter-inch hole" example. The hole might be for hanging a picture frame, but the frame is there to display family photos. Why? To create a sense of belonging and identity in their home. The higher-level job isn’t drilling a hole; it’s fostering emotional warmth and connection.

In Sarah’s case, JTBD thinking might identify her “job” as buying a mixer to make baking easier.

But that misses the larger picture.

The mixer serves a much higher purpose: enabling Sarah to express her creativity, bring joy to others, and nurture her aspirations of becoming an expert baker—or even an entrepreneur. Each step up the ladder reveals deeper motivations and richer opportunities for brands to connect.

Why Single-Category Companies Lose to Multi-Category Brands

Brands focusing solely on one category or functional benefit can miss out on consumers like Sarah, whose aspirations transcend single-purpose solutions. Multi-category brands excel by addressing multiple facets of consumer identity and accompanying customers across different levels of their needs and aspirations.

Take Amazon. They don’t stop at functional product offerings. They provide baking books, online baking tutorials, and even access to forums where Sarah can connect with like-minded bakers. These additional touchpoints broaden Amazon’s audience and deepen its relationship with consumers.

They create a larger engagement ecosystem.

Creating a Larger Audience Through Multi-Level Engagement

Multi-category brands create wider audiences by addressing consumers' functional needs and aspirational goals. Here’s why:

Reaching Multiple Consumer Identities: Consumers like Sarah switch roles—weekend baker, weekday health-conscious meal preparer, or global food explorer. Multi-category brands can serve each role, while single-category companies risk irrelevance when Sarah shifts identities.
Climbing the Needs Ladder: Multi-category brands offer pathways for consumers to move up their aspirations. For Sarah, this means starting with a mixer, progressing to advanced cooking tools, and eventually accessing entrepreneurial resources.
Meeting the Messy Middle: Single-category brands often struggle in the “messy middle”, where consumers bounce between exploration and evaluation. Multi-category brands can capture attention by offering resources that guide consumers through this messy middle at every decision-making stage, from inspiration to execution.

Examples of Brands Leveraging the Needs Ladder

Williams-Sonoma: By selling high-end mixers alongside baking classes and curated recipe collections, Williams-Sonoma addresses consumers' functional and aspirational needs like Sarah's. The company creates an ecosystem where consumers can climb the ladder, from buying equipment to mastering their craft.
Peloton: While Peloton fulfils the need for home exercise, the brand’s real value lies in its aspirational offering—community, health transformation, and identity as part of a fitness tribe.
IKEA: IKEA doesn’t sell furniture; it creates aspirational narratives around making homes functional, beautiful, and reflective of personal style. Its in-store experiences, room displays, and online design tools help consumers climb from functional purchases to emotional satisfaction.

How Brands Can Compete in Multi-Level Categories

To compete effectively in today’s landscape, brands must expand their focus beyond functional benefits. Here’s how:

Map the Full Needs Ladder:
- Identify all levels of consumer needs, from basic functionality to aspirational outcomes.
- Use research to understand how consumers’ identities shift across contexts.
Expand Offerings Through Partnerships:
- Collaborate with complementary brands to address higher-level needs. For example, a mixer manufacturer could partner with online baking schools or recipe subscription services.
Leverage Content to Build Engagement:
- Offer content that supports consumers at every level, from tutorials to inspirational stories.
- Help consumers see themselves achieving their aspirations with your brand as the enabler.
Foster Communities:
- Build platforms where consumers can connect, share, and learn. A baking brand, for example, could host forums for sharing recipes and successes.
Innovate Around Aspirational Goals:
- Develop services that align with your consumers’ broader aspirations. For instance, workshops on styling spaces for different moods and identities.

Upgrade Your Customers, Not Just Your Products

By expanding your thinking, you can meet today’s identity-fluid consumers where they are and help them achieve their evolving aspirations. The starting point is by understanding that consumers borrow your brand to fulfil their current needs and identities, you can build ecosystems that enable them to climb their ladders.

Ultimately, your brand can become a partner in helping consumers achieve their ideal selves, whether baking the perfect meal, creating cherished family memories or launching a business.

So your real question to answer isn’t, “What do our customers need?” It’s “How can we help them become who they want to be?”

Here’s how to get going

1. Deep Customer Research: Look beyond usage patterns to understand aspirations and identity expression.

2. Experience Extension: Create services and touchpoints that support higher-level needs.

3. Community Building: Facilitate connections among customers who share similar aspirations.

4. Content Strategy: Develop content that addresses all levels of the stack, from functional how-tos to aspirational storytelling.

5. Partnership Ecosystem: Collaborate with companies operating at higher stack levels.

The Needs Ladder isn't just a framework for understanding customer behaviour - it's a roadmap for brand evolution, extending JTBD in an age of fluid identities and shifting loyalties.

By understanding and addressing the entire ladder, from needs to aspirations, you can create more profound, meaningful connections that transcend functional benefits and tap into aspirations.

You stop just selling products - you become partners in your customers' journeys toward their ideal selves, whatever those selves might be at any moment.