The empathy effect

The brands that feel vs the ones that fail

We’re seeing it everywhere: a single line in a campaign sparks outrage. A well‑intentioned gesture triggers a billion‑dollar backlash. Across industries, brands are missing the mark. Not because they lack data, but because they lack empathy.

Marketers today are flooded with dashboards, metrics and data. But beneath all that information, something essential is slipping: a real, human understanding of people’s lives by stepping into their world.

In this session, we’ll unpack why consumer empathy is eroding, how it’s shaping (and sometimes derailing) brand decisions and what leading organisations are doing to rebuild it. We’ll dig into real cases – including Samsung, Haleon and L’Oréal – to show what rebuilding that connection actually looks like in practice: the decisions it changes, the ideas it unlocks and the outcomes it drives.

Join us to start building the empathy effect today.