Should brand advertising put the product at the center or sell an aspirational identity?

Jeff Jordan · Jan 16, 2023

Sustained refinement of messaging is a core driver of marketplace success, and Airbnb's decision to message community rather than hospitality ('belong anywhere', 'live like a local') is what made a scary proposition enticing

Strangers staying in strangers' homes is alien and trust-and-safety incidents inevitably happen, so the brand has to convert fear into desire — Chesky's team honed this over years into a spectacular brand

Scope: Jeff notes messaging was not his own core strength

20:11 20VC: a16z's Jeff Jordan on The Ultimate Guide to Investing in Marketplaces, Two Core Features to Look for in All Marketplace Investments, Why Fragmented Supply is so Important & Lessons from Airbnb, Pinterest and Instacart on What Makes the Best Cohorts

Harry Stebbings · Jan 31, 2026

Wix's storytelling is too feature-focused; brands win by selling who someone can become, so a Wix Super Bowl spot should follow a child through life stages ('the company that powers families throughout all ages') rather than tout HTML5 or Flash

Nike wins by teaching everyone they can be an athlete; nobody cares about Flash or HTML5

41:13 20Growth: How Wix Built a $100M Marketing Machine | Why LTV is BS and Why Time Return On Investment is the Most Important Metric | How to 10x Your Growth: What is the Next Great Channel with Omer Shai, CMO @ Wix

Omer Shai · Jan 31, 2026

A Super Bowl spot should put the product and real users at the centre rather than celebrities or spectacle, functioning almost like a direct-response ad

They believed the product itself was worthy of the Super Bowl stage, so showing people using it is the strongest message

Scope: describing this year's Wix spot specifically

11:13 20Growth: How Wix Built a $100M Marketing Machine | Why LTV is BS and Why Time Return On Investment is the Most Important Metric | How to 10x Your Growth: What is the Next Great Channel with Omer Shai, CMO @ Wix

Omer Shai · Jan 31, 2026

Most marketers get storytelling wrong because they are afraid to put the product at the center of the story

People will criticize you for product-centric ads that don't say something bigger, but users ultimately come to you to use the product your team built

Scope: acknowledges storytelling is genuinely hard in a divided world where anyone can be offended

37:31 20Growth: How Wix Built a $100M Marketing Machine | Why LTV is BS and Why Time Return On Investment is the Most Important Metric | How to 10x Your Growth: What is the Next Great Channel with Omer Shai, CMO @ Wix

Omer Shai · Jan 31, 2026

Only a handful of companies like Apple can win by selling the 'why'; everyone else should be humble and communicate the product simply and directly

He lacks Apple's money, media attention and user attention, so his job was just to make users know Wix was no longer Flash-based but HTML5

38:17 Only a handful of brands can sell the why the rest must be plain

Omer Shai · Jan 31, 2026

Wix does run aspirational storytelling and its brand does not read as Israeli — American and British audiences assume the company is headquartered in New York or San Francisco

He points to spots like 'the bakery' showing a kid turning a kitchen into a restaurant entirely through a Wix website

42:06 Aspirational story told through the product in a users life