The Dark Night of the Soul in marketing. Why you must break before you rebuild

At first, everything worked. The engagement was steady. The revenue followed. The strategies that once felt sharp and innovative became routine. Predictable, even easy.

There was a time when your brand had momentum. A time when marketing felt like forward motion, not just maintenance. But then something shifted. The audience stopped responding the way they used to.

What once felt like innovation now felt like sameness. The campaigns that once landed like lightning bolts now flickered dimly in a crowded space.

And then came the crash. Not all at once. A slow, creeping unraveling. A campaign that underperformed. A product launch that failed to resonate. A shift in the algorithm that sent your traffic into freefall.

The moment when the numbers stopped lying.

This is where most brands panic. They scramble. They try to tweak what they already have. Fix. Adjust. Patch. But you don’t need a patch. You need a collapse. Because what you’re experiencing isn’t failure, it’s the Dark Night of the Soul.

If you resist, you’ll stay in freefall. But if you embrace it, you’ll build something stronger than before.

The collapse (welcome to the Dark Night of the Soul)

In storytelling, the Dark Night of the Soul is the moment when the hero/ine loses everything. The mentor dies. The mission fails. And the protagonist is left broken, questioning everything, standing at the edge of the abyss.

The Dark Night of the Soul isn’t just a low point. It’s a reckoning, the moment where the hero/ine is stripped of illusions, forced to see the truth, and asked to choose: cling to the person they were or burn it all down and rise from the ashes.

Marketing follows the same arc.

Every great brand reaches a moment where the playbook no longer works. Where past success is no longer a predictor of future relevance. Where the strategies that once defined them become the very things holding them back.

The ones who refuse to change will fade. The ones who embrace the fall? They come back as something new.

The brands that had to break before they could rebuild

IKEA’s sustainability pivot

For decades, IKEA was synonymous with affordable, stylish, disposable furniture. The very thing that made them successful (accessibility) became a liability as consumers turned against fast consumption.

The shift was slow at first. A few murmurs of concern. Then, a full-blown backlash agains throwaway culture.

IKEA’s breaking point was the realization that a brand built on affordability could not survive a future demanding sustainability. They had to burn the old playbook. They pivoted to buy-back programs, circular economy initiatives, and a commitment to eco-friendly designs.

What resulted wasn’t mere survival. Rather, they led the shift.

Nokia’s identity crisis & reinvention

Once upon a time, Nokia was the mobile phone brand. Then, the iPhone happened. Then Android. Then, irrelevance.

The fall was brutal. The brand that once owned 49% of the global market became a relic, a cautionary tale about failing to adapt.

But here’s what mattered: they didn’t try to claw their way back into the mobile phone industry. The reinvented completely. Nokia became a 5G and network infrastructure powerhouse, rebuilding not as a failed phone brand but as a leader in the very technology that now fuels modern mobile communication.

They didn’t just recover, they became something new entirely.

Lego’s digital expansion

In the early 2000s, Lego was on the brink of bankruptcy. The world had shifted. Kids weren’t only playing with physical toys, they were moving into digital spaces.

Lego could have fought back. They could have doubled down on their core product. Instead, they embraced the future. They expanded into video games, movies, and augmented reality, making Lego not just a physical product but a hybrid storytelling experience.

And that’s why, today, they’re bigger than ever.

The turning point (why you must burn the old playbook)

The Dark Night of the Soul isn’t about fixing what’s broken. It’s about rebuilding from first principles.

Kill your darlings
What worked before is likely what’s killing you now. The strategies, slogans, brand messages that once felt sharp are now dragging you down like dead weight.

Get brutally honest
What assumptions about your audience are outdated? What do you need to stop doing immediately? What does a real comeback look like? Not just a slight tweak, but an actual rebirth? (Mine looks like Narrative Spin.)

Rebuild from the ground up
The question is not “how do we fix this”. The question is: “What should this brand look like if we were starting from scratch today?” The companies that survive crisis don’t just pivot. They destroy and rebuild.

The rebirth (how to come back stronger than before)

What comes after the Dark Night of the Soul? What does reinvention actually look like?

Transparent, bold, unapologetic transformation.

Burberry’s luxury reinvention

Once associated with counterfeit culture and outdated designs, Burberry was losing its high-end reputation. The brand’s reinvention was a hard pivot to streetwear collaborations, limited drops, and a younger, edgier brand identity.

Volvo’s safety to sustainability shift

Volvo was always known for safety, but in a world shifting toward climate consciousness, safety alone wasn’t enough. To reinvent, Volvo became a leader in electric mobility, pivoting from just “safe cars” to “sustainable, future-focused transport”.

So what’s the lesson here? Brands that refuse to evolve become artifacts, mere things. Brands that embrace the collapse become the stuff that legends are made of.

Your Dark Night of the Soul isn’t the end. It’s the beginning

If your marketing feels stagnant, disconnected, or irrelevant, you’re not failing. You’re at a breaking point. This is the moment where you decide:

• Cling to outdated strategies and watch them erode.
• Burn the old version of your brand and build something stronger.

The brands that make it through don’t return to what they were. They become something else, something greater.

There is no safety in stagnation, no comfort in clinging to what’s failing. Burn the old playbook. Let it collapse. Build something worthy of the future. Or don’t, but know this: brands that cling to the past tend to fade into irrelevance.

Your story isn’t over. It’s about to get interesting.