2016 pres­i­den­tial can­di­date Don­ald Trump is on the verge of what could be the ulti­mate viral mar­ket­ing coup: From hum­ble begin­nings as a real estate tycoon, Miss Uni­verse pageant over­lord, deodor­ant ped­dler and board game inspi­ra­tion to leader of the free world. Here’s how the cir­cus side show act of polit­i­cal can­di­dates, which the Huff­in­g­ton Post said it would only dis­cuss in its enter­tain­ment sec­tion, turned his polit­i­cal brand into a force that just might change the face of the Repub­li­can par­ty – and the U.S.

Disrupt The Competition

‘You have to think any­way, so why not think big?’ While it’s hard to call a man with a net worth of $4.5 bil­lion an under­dog, in pol­i­tics at least, Trump is arguably a dis­rup­tor, who, in his own way, has rede­fined the elec­tion expe­ri­ence, not unlike many suc­cess­ful young brands in their own indus­tries. To wit: With count­less con­tro­ver­sies to date – includ­ing but cer­tain­ly not lim­it­ed to Fox News Chan­nel anchor and GOP debate mod­er­a­tor Meg­yn Kel­ly and New York Times reporter Serge Kovales­ki, he’s con­jured a scrap­py per­sona in part because he’s not afraid to mince words or back down from a fight – even with the Pope him­self. In addi­tion, he’s been able to pitch him­self to the Amer­i­can pub­lic as an out­sider with fresh ideas – and not sim­ply anoth­er dynas­tic Bush or run-of-the-mill Repub­li­can. “Trump’s brand is heav­i­ly built on irrev­er­ence for the cur­rent polit­i­cal sys­tem,” said Cody Sim­monds, strate­gist at cre­ative agency Struck. “The appeal of Trump lies in his lack of adher­ence to polit­i­cal author­i­ty.” Michael Heili­gen­stein, man­ag­er of con­tent mar­ket­ing for small busi­ness resource provider Fit Small Busi­ness, agrees Trump’s pol­i­tics rely on out­rage. “When he says some­thing out­ra­geous or attacks anoth­er politi­cian, he moti­vates peo­ple who are fed up with pol­i­tics to sup­port him even more,” Heili­gen­stein added. “He’s sur­prised every­one by mak­ing it this far. He’s still a usurp­er and he knows how to act like it.”

Create A Message That Resonates

‘I think the only dif­fer­ence between me and the oth­er can­di­dates is that I’m more hon­est and my women are more beau­ti­ful’ What’s more, Trump has a clear mes­sage for his rabid fans and he’s not afraid to alien­ate those who don’t agree with him – so much so that he has inspired a #Nev­erTrump hash­tag among his Repub­li­can rivals and detrac­tors as talk swirls about a poten­tial Repub­li­can par­ty splin­ter should Trump get the nom­i­na­tion.

#Nev­erTrump. Agree?

Add your name here: https://t.co/NmPHhsu5Ik — Mar­co Rubio (@marcorubio) Feb­ru­ary 27, 2016

If noth­ing else: Trump has remained con­sis­tent­ly on brand for his audi­ence – and he knows pre­cise­ly who he is tar­get­ing. “Mar­keters often talk about defin­ing their tar­get mar­ket, but we’re much less inclined to clear­ly define what is not our mar­ket,” Amber New­man, vice pres­i­dent of mar­ket­ing for real estate soft­ware provider AMT­di­rect, wrote in a blog post. She used the exam­ple of Trump’s “great, great wall” between the U.S. and Mex­i­co, which he announced along with his intent to run. Rather than “secure the bor­der,” which is a broad state­ment with wider appeal, “build a wall” is much more divi­sive. “I think it shows he under­stood what his mar­ket want­ed and wasn’t afraid to make it clear that his prod­uct is for them and only them,” New­man wrote. “It’s a leap that many mar­keters won’t make.” Indeed, online mar­keter Chris Boulanger agrees savvy brands – Trump includ­ed – speak to their bases and don’t wor­ry about res­onat­ing with every­one. In the con­sumer realm, he points to Taco Bell, which cre­ates con­tent and prod­ucts “very much geared toward young peo­ple look­ing for a quick meal and pos­si­bly under the influ­ence,” as well as Old Spice, which, he says, has “been killing it for a cou­ple of years now with [its] very strange ads,” includ­ing a recent batch with Ter­ry Crews, which “seem to have been cre­at­ed specif­i­cal­ly to appeal to guys that love video games, MMA, and read Max­im.” Look no fur­ther than jour­nal­ist Matt Taibbi’s Rolling Stone piece, which likens Trump sup­port­ers to those who indulge in auto­erot­ic asphyx­i­a­tion, for proof the Trump brand does not inspire luke­warm sen­ti­ment. Sim­monds agrees Amer­i­cans are drawn to his blunt mes­sages and speak­ing style and points to com­pa­ra­ble enti­ties like retail cloth­ing brand Diesel and beer brand New­cas­tle, which he says have also “cre­at­ed high­ly impact­ful cam­paigns that focus on coun­ter­cul­ture, “fuck the man”- [type mes­sages].” That includes Diesel’s Be Stu­pid cam­paign, which he says heav­i­ly revolved around a lack of respect of soci­etal norms and author­i­ty. “By chal­leng­ing the sta­tus quo, Diesel’s cam­paign drove home a mes­sage of empow­er­ment for indi­vid­u­als to be who they tru­ly are, regard­less of what oth­er peo­ple may think,” Sim­monds said. And then there’s Newcastle’s 2014 Super Bowl spoof with Anna Kendrick. “The cam­paign was a viral suc­cess and drove home a high­ly irrev­er­ent, snarky mes­sage that focused on the NFL’s approach to adver­tis­ing and trade­mark­ing,” Sim­monds said. “In 2015, New­cas­tle con­tin­ued its tongue-and-cheek approach to the game with Aubrey Plaza’s Call for Brands ask­ing small brands to band togeth­er and buy a shared [30-sec­ond] TV spot dur­ing the game. The unique cam­paign went viral for its focus on the insane cost of adver­tis­ing dur­ing the Super Bowl.”

Push The Right Emotional Buttons

‘Sor­ry losers and haters, but my IQ is one of the high­est’ Trump appears most com­fort­able with these extremes. His great wall speech also likened Mex­i­cans to crim­i­nals and rapists – and rad­i­cal char­ac­ter­i­za­tions and col­or­ful lan­guage have since become hall­marks of his polit­i­cal per­sona. Indeed, as Taib­bi put it, “In a Trump pres­i­den­cy, there will be free tar and feath­ers pro­vid­ed at the exec­u­tive’s every pub­lic address.” In oth­er words, Trump almost mas­ter­ful­ly taps into emo­tion, ral­ly­ing his fans around anger and trep­i­da­tion. “Fear is an emo­tion that peo­ple rarely ignore. Stud­ies have shown that peo­ple are more like­ly to act out of fear of los­ing some­thing they already have than to gain some­thing new,” New­man said. “That’s why blog posts with neg­a­tive titles like, ‘Don’t make these 10 huge mis­takes,’ do much bet­ter than posts with pos­i­tive titles like, ‘10 great new ideas.’” Trump’s abra­sive style has had the added bonus of flum­mox­ing his com­peti­tors who strug­gle to respond as he surges ahead in what could be some­thing of a self-ful­fill­ing prophe­cy.

Be More Authentic

‘Part of the beau­ty of me is that I’m very rich’ Even though the punch line to the joke, “What’s the dif­fer­ence between a UFO and an hon­est politi­cian?” is, “A UFO might actu­al­ly exist,” there is a cer­tain amount of per­ceived hon­esty in the man among Trump’s sup­port­ers. This results in part from his unique, unwa­ver­ing per­sona, which has evolved from real estate mogul to author to real­i­ty TV star to Repub­li­can fron­trun­ner. In fact, an entire para­graph on vet­er­ans in his offi­cial bio is sure­ly meant to beef up his street cred as the lat­ter and extend the Trump brand sto­ry even fur­ther. In oth­er words, where can­di­dates like Mar­co Rubio have been crit­i­cized for sound­ing too rehearsed, Trump has con­nect­ed with vot­ers because he says what’s on his mind. Vot­ers, in turn, see Trump as hon­est and authen­tic. That’s accord­ing to Heili­gen­stein, who says the same is true for any brand: Don’t rely on tropes, but rather authen­tic­i­ty and con­tent of sub­stance to con­nect with fans.