London Agency Starts Spotlight Piece Like a Newspaper Story - The Psychology of Branding
- Snazz the Edit
- 4 days ago
- 5 min read
How Disrupting Expectations Makes Customers Remember You
Hooked? That’s because we disrupted your expectations. You thought this would sound like corporate comms. Instead, it reads like the morning paper. And yet, we haven’t lost authority, only gained your attention.
You weren’t expecting a news headline at the start of a branding article. That’s the point. We’ve disrupted the script (the order of how an article usually unfolds) and the schema (the format you thought you’d see). And yet, you kept reading because disruption, when done with precision, doesn’t lose trust; it creates attention.
I’m Ella, founder of The Bite Creative, a full-scale creative agency working with the principle of Creativity Backed by Science. We are based in London, specialising in disruptive marketing, internal corporate systems, and strategy. We work globally across the USA, Dubai, Europe, Australia, and the Middle East. Our clients are visionaries who know that conversion and results require more than good taste; they require cognitive precision.
That’s why we focus on the three most important Cognitive Science systems in branding. Branding is more than a logo suite, though… It’s the house style, the visual direction, the internal strategy, and even the culture that shapes how people experience your company. We specialise in strategising all aspects of branding with these three key systems that all companies should know:
Scripts - the steps people expect when they engage with an industry.
Schemas - the mental shortcuts and defaults they bring with them.
Prototypicality - the cues that signal something is ‘right’ for its category.
These three mental levers are overlooked by most businesses, yet they are crucial in engineering and effortless and memorable brand. Our campaigns, from Ovary Reaction’s viral launch (1.7M reach, 116k likes in 72 hours) to Bakehouse Blooms’ viral surreal winter collection, prove that strategically disrupting these patterns sparks attention, trust, and growth. So let’s break down the science behind branding and the three things most businesses miss…
Scripts: Why Your Brand Needs to Rewrite Industry Expectations
Every industry has an unwritten script. Disrupting scripts is powerful because scripts are invisible until you map them. They shape what your target audience expects from an event, a product launch, or a brand experience. If you don’t know the script, you risk either blending into the background or breaking trust by disrupting in the wrong place. But when you do know the script, you can decide where to lean in and where to twist it. That twist, the unexpected moment that shifts rhythm without sacrificing clarity, is what makes an experience memorable. It’s why the most effective branding strategies always begin with identifying your audience and their industry scripts. Without that, you’re designing blind. With it, you’re engineering impact. Take a look at these two examples:
Script 1: Thursday Afternoon in the Office
Emails → Meeting that overruns → Coffee run → Scroll LinkedIn for ‘research’ → 4pm ‘Time for drinks in an hour’ → Client call lands at 4:45 → Push drinks to 6 → Commute home and wonder ‘what am I doing with my life.’
Disruption:
Emails → Meeting that overruns → Brand drops a surprise ‘3:30 Reset’ activation in the office – cold-pressed drinks & branded playlists for a 10-minute break → Coffee run feels unnecessary → People post about it on LinkedIn → Client call feels lighter → Drinks at 6, but now with a story to tell.
Why it matters:
A brand that interrupts the fatigue script of Thursday afternoons imprints itself as refreshing. The visual of a branded reset kit or playlist creates a shareable moment. In branding, disrupting even one step in the expected sequence turns routine into a tangible and memorable experience for the brain.
Script 2: Corporate Conference with Product Release
Registration → Coffee networking → Keynote → Panel session → Lunch → Product release announcement → Applause → Drinks → LinkedIn posts next day
Disruption:
Registration → Coffee networking → Keynote → Unexpected interactive product demo woven into the keynote — visuals on every attendee’s screen in real time → Lunch → Audience buzzes, already talking → Panel feels more alive → Drinks → LinkedIn posts aren’t about the conference in general, but about your product demo
Why it matters:
Most launches follow the exact same conference script. By moving the reveal earlier, and delivering it visually and experientially rather than at the “expected slot,” you shift attention. The product then isn’t an item on the agenda, but it becomes the thing everyone remembers.
Schemas: The Invisible Frames Around Your Brand
If scripts are the steps, schemas are the frames. They’re the mental structures we use to make sense of the world: shortcuts that tell us what something is, how it works, and how to feel about it. For example:
Walk into a boardroom with leather chairs and a skyline view, your “corporate power” schema kicks in.
Order a flat white in Shoreditch and get served by someone in chunky trainers, ‘hipster café’ schema activated.
Open a wellness clinic’s Instagram and see soft pastels, eucalyptus, and the word “holistic”, you instantly know the category.
Schemas save the brain energy, but they also trap brands in sameness. Most companies copy what the schema dictates because it ‘feels right.’ Which is why every wellness brand looks identical, every law firm looks intimidating, and every fintech app uses the same blue. The science of branding is knowing how to lean into schemas for trust while breaking them just enough to be remembered. At The Bite Creative, this is where a lot of our disruptive campaigns live.
Take Bakehouse Blooms. The schema for a bakery? Flour, bread, rustic kitchens. We flipped it: turning food into clothing, and integrated surreal winter visuals. The result was a viral campaign that people couldn’t scroll past because it felt familiar and completely unexpected. The practical question for businesses: what schemas dominate your industry, and which small breaks could make you the brand people actually talk about?
Prototypicality: The Science of ‘What Feels Right’
The third overlooked lever is prototypicality, the degree to which something is seen as a good example of its category.
A red apple is prototypical. A purple apple isn’t. A lawyer in a navy suit is prototypical. A lawyer in tie-dye isn’t. A skincare serum in a minimalist frosted bottle feels ‘right.’ One in a ketchup bottle… doesn’t.
Here’s the paradox: brands need prototypicality for trust (if it doesn’t feel like a bank, you won’t trust it with your money). But they also need deviation from the prototype for memorability. That tension is where great branding lives.
In cognitive science, this is called ‘optimal distinctiveness.’ Too prototypical = forgettable. Too disruptive = confusing. The sweet spot is secondary prototypicality: enough to feel right, different enough to make a splash.
When we build campaigns, branding suites, and corporate systems, this principle drives everything from logo shapes to tone of voice. The key is to stay within the boundaries of the schema, but introduce just enough disruption that people pause. That pause is gold because it encodes memory.
The Science Behind Why Brands Stick (The Psychology of Branding)
Most businesses miss the three truths:
Scripts choreograph the steps your customers expect. Rewrite them, and you change how the journey feels.
Schemas frame how your brand is instantly understood. Disrupt them, and you stand out in a sea of sameness.
Prototypicality is the balance between fitting in and being remembered. Too much of either, and you lose. Find the sweet spot.
At The Bite Creative, this is why we exist. We partner with the CEOs, CMOs, and founders who refuse to leave things to chance, and create brands and strategies rooted in how people actually think and feel.
Follow The Bite Creative for more on The Psychology of Branding: www.thebitecreative.com @thebitecreative
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