IN BRIEF
This is one of the most common misconceptions we hear "We don't need a brand when we sell to other businesses"
21 Feb 2025
The brand is important, even if you don't sell to consumers
But that's exactly why you do need one. Because businesses do not buy from companies. They buy from people. And people buy from those they remember and trust.
Many B2B companies think that professionalism means being bland and flavourless. Websites are full of jargon and logos. But no one cares if you don't evoke any feelings.
- A brand doesn't just mean colours and fonts.
- It means feeling, trust, and recall.
- buyers often compare multiple options
- the final decision is often made based on feelings, not just data
- a good brand sticks in memory and makes decision-making easier
- a brand builds long-term trust
- your customer wants to look good in their choice, and a good brand makes that easier
When your brand looks consistent and convincing, it provides security for those making decisions. If websites are confusing, the logo changes across channels, and the message hops around, it raises doubts, and the customer moves on to the next option.
A brand is the support that gives the buyer the feeling that this company knows what it is doing.
Often in B2B, there is a fear that branding makes the company seem too “youthful” or “hipster” But it's not about that.
- It’s about your message being clear
- The appearance is consistent
- And the brand feels reliable and human
A brand does not exclude credibility. It builds it.
- define what your company represents
- clarify the messages and tones
- build visual templates that work across all channels
- create content that supports the brand and delivers results
If you feel like your brand doesn’t really stick in people's minds or if you haven’t even thought about branding properly, then get in touch and let’s discuss the topic.
What a brand actually is
A brand is not a logo, a colour palette or a slogan. Those are signs of a brand, not the brand itself. A brand is the memory and the expectation a buyer holds about you before they have spoken to anyone: what the company does, for whom, and whether it can be trusted. All three form whether or not you work on them.
The practical difference shows in a sales meeting. When the brand has done its job, the meeting opens with "how would this work for us". When it has not, it opens with "who are you". The first leads to a deal more often and faster, and that is the entire business case for brand work.
Three signs the brand has been forgotten
- Sales has to justify the company existing before it can get to the solution.
- Price enters the conversation within the first five minutes.
- A competitor’s name shows up in requests for proposal more often than yours.
- Your content could be posted on a competitor’s account and nobody would notice.
Building a brand without a million-euro budget
Brand work is assumed to be expensive because it gets confused with an ad campaign. For a small or mid-sized company a brand is built from three cheap things: saying the same thing everywhere, having a human being as the face of the company, and appearing repeatedly to the same group. None of these needs a media budget, but all of them need a decision and repetition.
Say one thing, and say it everywhere
Pick one sentence that says who you are for and what you are known for. Put it on the front page, the sales deck, the email signature and everyone’s LinkedIn profile. Consistency makes a brand memorable faster than creativity does: three different phrasings of the same idea slow the memory down.
Give the company a face
People remember people. An expert who appears on video and comments on the industry’s questions under their own name builds recognition faster than a company account posting the same things anonymously. It is also the cheapest way to stand out in a field where everyone looks alike.
Appear to the same group again
Recognition comes from repetition, not reach. A hundred people who see you ten times will remember you; a thousand who see you once will not. Narrow targeting over a long horizon therefore beats a broad one-off campaign in brand work.
How to measure brand work
Brand is thought to be unmeasurable because people try to measure it with campaign metrics. Clicks and conversions describe capturing demand, not creating it. The effect of brand work shows in four numbers, all of them in tools you already have.
- Branded search volume in Search Console: how many people look for you by name.
- Direct traffic: how many type the address straight into the browser.
- CPM and cost per click: a known brand pays less in the auction.
- Win rate on proposals: brand shows in how often you make the shortlist.
Look at these quarterly, not weekly. Brand work acts with a lag of months, so a weekly review shows only random variation and leads to the work being stopped before it can take effect.
