When I was a brand manager, every September I was tasked to lead the annual brand planning process.  It was met with anticipation because we looked backwards at brand performance and addressed business decisions made anticipating growth.  

Before brand decisions were made for the upcoming year, a “landscape analysis” was conducted to understand the category, competition, consumer and company (brand).  From the analysis, findings were presented with implications and recommendations for how to grow the brand in the upcoming year.

Based on the landscape analysis, findings and implications, a brand plan with recommended actions for winning in the marketplace was presented to senior executives.  In front of a long wooden table filled with senior C-level executives, I presented the brand plan for the upcoming year.  I kicked off the presentation with an executive summary of the situational analysis and a brand plan for how we win the marketplace.

The “job to be done”?  Get the brand plan and budget approved.  It was during the approval process where I witnessed executives trading and rationalizing outcomes that did not reflect our growth ambition for the total addressable and serviceable markets. Instead, it became a platform for rationalizing why it was best to focus on retaining base customers and optimizing growth ambitions. 

For brand and growth leaders, below are three organizational barriers to growth and value creation to avoid in your 2027 brand plan:

(1)  The chief financial officer takes a “top down” approach and assigns your 2027 growth target.

Brand planning is a financial event that helps meet Wall Street commitments. The Chief Financial Officer (CFO) with corporate strategy (if there is one) helps organize the annual process. This is a common approach organizations take to build enterprise wide value creation.  Often it’s a “volumetric” exercise that does not reflect its total addressable and serviceable markets.

Why is this a barrier to growth acceleration and value creation that reflects the total addressable and serviceable markets?  A volumetric “top down” approach does not reward risk taking.  Meaning after several rounds of reviewing a brand plan before it is financially locked (FinLock), audiences outside its base customers are negotiated out of brand plan for growth.  They are often perceived as a risk because the investment level required to engage and acquire them may not return in year one.  A “bottoms up,” consumer led approach to growth is a better because it accounts for emerging audiences or its total addressable and serviceable markets.

(2)  Using a segmentation that does not reflect your total addressable and serviceable markets.

For brands, a customer segmentation is a commitment to growth because of the level of investment in first-party data.  It can be an expensive proposition to design, field and report back findings to brand marketers.  However this is changing with artificial intelligence and the use of digital twins.  

Why is this a barrier to growth acceleration and value creation that reflects the total addressable and serviceable markets?  The unfortunate truth I’ve experienced is many segmentations do not account for a representative sample size that reflects their total addressable and serviceable markets. For high growth audience segments, they are under sampled across most categories.  This presents a barrier to growth because key consumer insights go missed.  Whereas brands that do include audiences that reflect their total addressable and serviceable markets have a marketplace advantage.

(3) Brand marketers limited to buying marketing services that do not reflect its total addressable and serviceable markets.

Once the Executive Committee (ExCo) approves the brand plan and budgets aligned with the finance team, a decision has to be made about who executes the work.  Prior to submitting the brand plan budgets, agencies submit a budget to execute the go-to-market plan.  Agency partners who are identified to execute the work usually fall within the “general market” or “multicultural market” designation.  I always wondered what if an agency partner(s) could execute the strategy, plan and go-to-market execution that reflected our total addressable and serviceable markets?  

Why is this a barrier to growth acceleration and value creation that reflects their total addressable and serviceable markets?   Until 2010, there were only two options for marketing services.  At the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) Conference the Total Market Approach topic was introduced.  When it was re-introduced, there were early adopters, however operationalizing the change approach was unproven.  Because of the disruption and miseducation within industry associations, adoption was slow.

What was unknown at the time and not proven with evidenced based outcomes, when forced to choose a “general” or “multicultural” approach may not reveal cross-cultural and poly-cultural insights required to differentiate the brand and effectively communicate its value for their total addressable and serviceable markets.  

Which gets us back to the question, does your 2027 brand plan meet the needs of your total addressable and serviceable markets?  Be mindful of the three barriers to growth and value creation that reflect your total addressable and serviceable markets and reference this article when met with the challenge.

About The Author

Jeffrey L.Bowman is founder and CEO of Reframe.  A Different Kind of Growth Agency, an award winning Wiley published author, Reframe The Marketplace: The Total Market Approach To Reaching The New Majority.  He pioneered the $1T marketing and communications industry modern approach to value creation, The Total Market Industry Vertical and Approach. This is a summary of the latest Reframe White Paper:  The Total Market Industry Vertical, A Modern Approach To Value Creation.