Real situations.
Documented outcomes.
All client details are anonymised at their request. The challenges, methodologies, and results are accurate.
Rebranding a regional bank's digital arm for millennial acquisition
The Challenge
A leading regional bank had built a digital banking product that was functionally strong but commercially invisible. Despite significant product investment, new account registrations had plateaued for 18 months. The digital brand felt generic, indistinguishable from the parent bank, and completely disconnected from the 18–35 demographic it was designed to attract.
The Approach
I began with a three-week discovery phase — stakeholder interviews, customer research with lapsed users, and a comprehensive competitive audit across 14 digital banking brands in the region. This revealed a positioning gap: every competitor was competing on features and rates. None were building a genuine brand identity around the lifestyle and financial anxieties of young professionals.
From this emerged a repositioning strategy built around 'financial confidence' as the core emotional territory. This included a new messaging hierarchy, a tone-of-voice overhaul, a channel strategy weighted toward organic social and earned media, and a 12-month launch roadmap.
The Outcome
The repositioned brand launched 11 weeks after the strategy was finalised. Over the following 12 months, new account registrations in the 18–35 segment increased by 34%. Organic social following grew 4× without additional paid budget. Brand recall scores in the target segment improved from 18% to 47% in post-launch tracking.
Key Results
34%
Growth in 18–35 segment registrations
4×
Organic social follower growth
47%
Brand recall in target segment (up from 18%)
11
Weeks from strategy to launch
Engagement Detail
- Duration
- 14 weeks
- Stakeholders
- CMO, VP Digital, Head of Marketing
- Services Used
- Brand Strategy + Go-to-Market
Recovering £2.4M in misallocated marketing spend for a national retailer
The Challenge
A national specialty retailer with 80+ locations had seen marketing costs grow faster than revenue for three consecutive years. The CMO suspected poor channel allocation but lacked the objective framework to present a case to the board. Internal teams had become protective of their budgets and resistant to scrutiny.
The Approach
The engagement began with a six-week audit across all marketing channels: paid search, paid social, affiliate, print, in-store, sponsorship, email, and content. Rather than relying on platform-reported metrics, I rebuilt a multi-touch attribution model using actual transaction data connected to marketing touchpoints.
This revealed structural inefficiencies invisible in the standard reporting: affiliate partnerships generating traffic with near-zero conversion; sponsorships with no measurable brand-lift outcomes; paid social spend skewed toward awareness formats in a brand that already had strong unaided recall.
The findings were presented in a Board-ready format with a phased reallocation roadmap and a 24-month projected ROI model.
The Outcome
The reallocation of £2.4M from underperforming channels to high-performing digital and in-store formats was approved at board level within 6 weeks of the presentation. In the first 12 months following implementation, the marketing-to-revenue ratio improved from 11.2% to 8.4%. Revenue grew 9% year-on-year without increasing total marketing investment.
Key Results
£2.4M
Marketing spend reallocated
9%
Revenue growth without additional spend
8.4%
Marketing-to-revenue ratio (down from 11.2%)
6
Weeks to board approval
Engagement Detail
- Duration
- 10 weeks
- Stakeholders
- CMO, CFO, Head of Digital
- Services Used
- Marketing Audit
Launching a SaaS platform into three new verticals in seven months
The Challenge
A software company with a strong but narrow customer base in the logistics sector had developed a product capable of serving three adjacent verticals: manufacturing, warehousing, and distribution. Leadership was eager to move, but without a structured GTM approach, the business had been attempting all three simultaneously — diluting sales effort and stretching marketing resources with no clear wins.
The Approach
I was brought in to build a structured, prioritised go-to-market plan. The engagement began with a rigorous segmentation exercise — assessing each vertical on addressable market size, competitive intensity, sales cycle length, existing customer proximity, and implementation complexity.
Manufacturing emerged as the clear priority: shorter sales cycles, higher ACV, and a strong reference account that could anchor outbound efforts. The GTM plan for manufacturing was built first: ICP definition, buyer journey mapping, channel selection (primarily outbound ABM and trade partnerships), and a sales enablement toolkit.
Verticals two and three (warehousing, distribution) were planned with phased launches: warehousing at month 5, distribution at month 9 — dependent on manufacturing performance gates.
The Outcome
The manufacturing vertical exceeded its 12-month revenue target in month 9. Warehousing launched on schedule and closed its first enterprise account in week 3. The structured sequencing allowed the sales team to build confidence, refine messaging, and create replicable playbooks — rather than spreading attention across three unfamiliar markets at once.
Key Results
3
Verticals launched in 9 months
9
Months to exceed 12-month manufacturing target
7
Weeks to first enterprise close in warehousing
41%
Reduction in average sales cycle length
Engagement Detail
- Duration
- 12 weeks planning + 9 months advisory
- Stakeholders
- CEO, VP Sales, Head of Product
- Services Used
- Go-to-Market Planning
Unifying a five-partner consultancy behind a single coherent brand
The Challenge
A mid-size consultancy had grown through the merger of three smaller practices over four years. Each founding partner carried a strong personal brand, and the organisation had never resolved the tension between individual reputation capital and collective brand identity. New business pitches were inconsistent; marketing materials contradicted each other; prospective clients frequently described the firm as 'hard to explain.'
The Approach
The engagement opened with individual interviews with all five partners — structured to surface not just their stated preferences but the underlying assumptions and concerns driving the brand fragmentation. This was followed by a one-day facilitated alignment workshop designed to move the group from five individual narratives to a shared positioning thesis.
The workshop used a structured decision framework to resolve the central tension: personal brands could coexist and be celebrated — as proof points within the firm's narrative — but the firm required a dominant brand logic that worked without any individual's name attached to it.
From the workshop outputs I developed a full brand architecture: firm-level positioning, a messaging hierarchy, a naming convention for practice areas, and a tone-of-voice guide. A 90-day rollout plan covered website, proposals, and new business materials.
The Outcome
The new brand framework was ratified unanimously by all five partners — the first unanimous strategic decision the firm had made in three years. In the 12 months following the rebrand, new business win rate improved from 31% to 52%. The firm's average deal size increased by 28%, attributed in part to greater confidence in positioning during pitches.
Key Results
52%
New business win rate (up from 31%)
28%
Increase in average deal size
5/5
Unanimous partner ratification
90
Days to full rebrand rollout
Engagement Detail
- Duration
- 16 weeks
- Stakeholders
- All five founding partners, COO
- Services Used
- Brand Strategy + Workshop Facilitation
Facing a challenge like these?
The situations above are varied, but the methodology is consistent: honest diagnosis, clear strategy, disciplined execution.
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