By Guillaume Carrere, Executive Creative Director and Partner at mnstr
Cultural influence rarely arrives with much fanfare. More often it starts in smaller groups where people care deeply about a shared interest and spend time exploring it together. People contribute ideas, trade recommendations and develop their own niche references as they go.
Over time those conversations shape how any particular interest looks and feels. Language develops. Aesthetic cues settle in. Behaviours begin to feel familiar inside the group and the sense of belonging grows. When fragments of those ideas eventually appear across wider culture, they can seem to arrive suddenly, even though they have usually evolved within a community for some time.
This breakthrough moment is when most brands become savvy and get involved. Marketing teams track trends across social feeds in real time and brands can’t stop talking about communities – yet their definition has never felt so blurred.
The word is thrown around constantly, often incorrectly, and we still fail to grasp the real impact communities have on culture.
The first thing to understand is simple: these groups form organically, in spaces that are often informal, unexpected, and outside traditional structures. Communities, especially niche ones, do not need brands to exist. In reality, it’s the opposite. Brands need to understand communities if they want to play a role in those groups shaping culture.
Where does culture originate from?
Most marketing teams now have a much clearer view of what people are talking about online. Real-time dashboards show spikes in engagement, sentiment shifts and which posts are gaining traction across major platforms. Looking at those signals, culture can appear to move like a fast current, and brands keep pace with whatever rises to the surface.
What those systems rarely reveal is where many ideas first begin to develop. A surprising amount of cultural momentum starts in places that sit outside the largest platforms. Private groups, niche forums and specialist networks host communities that revolve around shared interests and ongoing discussion.
People in these environments are not scrolling past content in the background. They are trading advice, debating opinions and passing around references that only make sense within the group. Conversations stretch over time, and a unique language, tone, and set of signals gradually settles into place.
These spaces hold the most active audiences and ultimately influence the masses. Forget top-down relationships. They don’t work here. In a niche community, start with humility. You’re not leading the conversation – you’re just another member in the room, and that’s okay.
Participation always beats being performative
Communities organised around shared passions tend to operate according to different social rules compared to mainstream media.
Status within these groups often comes from knowledge and participation. Someone who contributes ideas, insight or experience tends to carry more influence than someone who simply has a large following elsewhere. Credibility develops through interaction over time rather than scale.
For brands used to measuring impact through reach, this dynamic can be difficult to interpret. In these spaces, authenticity and earnest contributions matter more than outside popularity.
Recent analysis in Fortune found that 66% of Gen Z and Gen Alpha now spend more time with fan-created content than official media, showing how communities built around shared interests increasingly shape cultural conversation. These environments revolve around shared enthusiasm, with members shaping the culture of the fandom together.
Those members are fans of the idea of being fans. The experience, the sense of belonging, and the act of creating are all integral parts of their passion, and sit at the very centre of the ecosystem.
What is the gold standard for brands?
None of this means brands should avoid communities. It does mean their role needs to be approached carefully.
Brands that succeed in engaging these communities usually begin by observing how people there interact, and spending time getting to know them. Understanding which voices carry credibility, what references matter and how people contribute helps avoid activity that feels forced.
McDonald’s recent engagement with anime fandom provides a useful example. The company revived the fictional “WcDonald’s” restaurant that appears across many anime series and built a limited menu and collectables around it. Fans recognised the reference immediately because it originated from within the culture they already knew.
Brands should ask themselves: How can I use my platform to create real value for this community? How can I offer symbols of pride and belonging? And most importantly, how can I celebrate and empower them in a way that feels truly authentic?
It’s time to get in the trenches
For marketing teams, the opportunity lies in recognising where influence begins. Social feeds show the moment ideas break into wider attention, yet the foundations of those ideas often sit in smaller environments, be it Discord servers or local hobby groups, where people gather around shared interests.
Understanding these spaces takes patience and curiosity. It involves paying attention to how communities organise themselves and why people remain committed to them over time.
Communities do not exist for the benefit of brands. They exist because people want to spend time developing the interests they care about with others who share them. When brands recognise that dynamic and contribute thoughtfully, their presence will feel welcome. Once they become a valued part of these groups, brands can start shaping culture from its inception.
