Global Storytelling: When Cultural Narratives Shape Market Entry

Ancestry, the family history experts, faced uncharted territory: eight 'amber markets' where their story hadn't yet taken root. They needed to understand how different cultures approach DNA testing and family history, stories that vary dramatically across borders.

Our journey began with cultural scoping, followed by online communities and group discussions that revealed each market's unique narrative landscape. We shared findings through a sensory workshop and proposition development training, collaboratively crafting market propositions.

These propositions were then tested both qualitatively and quantitatively, ensuring each narrative would resonate authentically. Our final debrief used Top Trumps to gamify an evaluation framework, ensuring insight was embedded insights across Insight, Communications and Marketing teams globally.

The research didn't just provide market analysis, it revealed the cultural stories that determine how families connect with their heritage. This insight has enabled Ancestry to prioritise launch plans and develop marketing materials that spoke each market's language.

‘Magenta have displayed an impressive ability to distill vast amounts of market, cultural and brand insights into an easy to understand an apply output. They have achieved this through the hard work at understanding our brand, business and briefs and through incredible creativity in our workshops. They have mixed traditional and unexpected/creative methods to ensure we, as a team, immersed ourselves into the data but always had the key takeouts in an easy to digest format.’

VP of International Marketing, Ancestry

Sensitive Marketing: Navigating the Most Delicate Conversations

Horizon Cremation understood that funeral services marketing requires exceptional sensitivity, one wrong message could cause irreparable damage. They needed to understand what brand stories were appropriate, when, and how to tell them.

We conducted individual depth interviews with Funeral Directors and Arrangers, alongside recently bereaved families across the UK who had organised cremations. These conversations revealed the complex emotional landscape surrounding end-of-life services.

Our detailed insights provided clear guidance on appropriate messaging, channels, and frequency, essentially mapping the boundaries between helpful information and intrusive marketing. We learned when families were ready to hear different messages and how to communicate with genuine empathy.

The insight culminated in a senior stakeholder workshop, supporting Horizon in developing a marketing strategy that honours grief while providing necessary services. This research demonstrated how understanding sensitive narratives can transform entire industry communication approaches.

Employer Brand Reality Check: When Perception Meets Truth in Fast Food

KFC faced an industry-wide recruitment crisis and needed to understand a fundamental disconnect: how public perception of their employer brand compared with employee reality.

We combined desk research, online surveys and consumer focus groups to map public perceptions, then conducted employee interviews to reveal the authentic working experience. Using semiotics, we deep-dived into the language, imagery, and narratives surrounding hospitality and fast-food employment.

Our research uncovered the gap between external assumptions and internal reality. Stories weren't being told about career development, team culture, and genuine opportunities.

We provide strategic recommendations for improving KFC's employer brand among both public and employees. The accompanying vox pop video captured authentic consumer perspectives, giving voice to assumptions that needed addressing.

This wasn't just brand research, it was narrative archaeology, uncovering the real stories behind fast-food employment stereotypes.

‘Our partnership with Magenta and this research has been a complete game changer for KFC and our employer brand. Going through the richness of data and insight we have had so many lightbulb moments that will help guide us on our employer brand journey over the next three years and implement actions to radically shift the narratives around working in fast food and attract new talent to the sector.’

Employer Brand & Experience Manager, KFC