Branding is Not About the Deck—It’s About the Decisions
Recently, I ran across a social media post from someone frustrated that brand strategy has become more about production and pitches than purpose. I understand their lament. Brand strategy is supposed to guide decisions and drive action.
Too often, however, it’s reduced to “the deck”: a polished, sprawling document of diagrams, statements, personas, archetypes, and other marketing buzzwords.
These documents are well-designed and well-conceived. In many cases, they get applause, but they don’t get used.
As a result, clients feel underwhelmed and confused by what was meant to create clarity. Agencies feel burnt out or burdened, frustrated to see their hard work have little lasting impact. Worst, brands stay paralyzed and stagnant because their leaders don’t know how to activate their brand for growth.
At its best, brand strategy is not a thought exercise or an art exercise, but it’s about creating alignment that creates action. This article is designed to demonstrate how brand strategy must be developed and implemented to facilitate decisionmaking. It’s not about the deck, or the deliverables; it’s about the decisions that brand strategy allows the organization to make.
If you’re tired of seeing brand strategy filed away and instead want to see it followed through, join me in exploring this topic more.
Understanding the Problem
One major problem with how brand strategy is promoted and presented is that strategists can fall in love with the craft of strategy-making. When strategy becomes more about the people crafting it than the people it’s meant to serve, something is off.
As a designer, I understand the enthusiasm agencies and consultants have for the strategic and creative process of brand building. I’m aware they give awards for brand strategy and design, but ultimately, brand work should be judged on how well a client can use it to make important decisions that align with the business goals and strategy. If the brand strategy (or any strategy) doesn’t move the organization to make bolder, better decisions, it hasn’t done its job.
Too often, brand building has become about the people building the brand, rather than who the brand is for. And too often, brand work prioritizes how things look over how things work. Instead, branding should drive the everyday choices that define the business—from how teams show up to what they say yes (and no) to.
Why is This Important?
Ineffective and misaligned brand strategy wastes time, money, and momentum. Brand strategy, just like every other kind of strategy, must help direct and facilitate decisions being made by key leaders.
- Overcomplication: Strategy decks are crammed with frameworks, lingo, and layers—so much that clarity gets lost. If the client walks away wondering “What now?”, the strategy failed.
- Passive clients: Many clients sit through long presentations rather than actively engage in making decisions. That turns strategy into performance rather than progress.
- Momentum lost: So much time can be put into developing and pitching the strategy, but once the deck is done, and the pitch completed, the process often fizzles. Without support to bring the strategy to life, even the best insights become shelfware.
- Disconnected work: When strategy isn’t built for real-world application, it becomes detached from the day-to-day decisions it should inform. It ends up filed away instead of followed through.
How do we fix the problem?
Here’s some advice for everyone involved in the brand strategy building process:
For Clients:
- Your brand is not what’s in the deck. It’s in the thousands of decisions your team makes each week—what to build, how to show up, who to serve, and what to say yes or no to.
- Consider what you really need to be able to actualize the plan the creative team gives you. Ask your agency or consultant: What will help us act on this?
- After the pitch and handoff, ensure that you have the tools, support, and understanding to bring the ideas to life and turn the strategy into action.
For Agencies and Consultants:
Your value isn’t in how many slides you make. It’s in how many smart, aligned decisions your strategies help your clients to make.
This is the shift: Stop selling decks. Start enabling decisions.
- Strip away excess. Remove jargon. Prioritize clarity over cleverness.
- Build with, not just for. Strategy should be co-created with clients, rooted in their challenges, culture, and context.
- Tie ideas to action. Map strategy directly to business decisions your client will face. Make it real. Make it usable.
Remember, your goal is not to impress, it’s to empower.
Conclusion
Decisions > Decks
A brand strategy is a compass, not a crown. It’s not a trophy to be admired. It’s a tool to help leaders navigate decisions.
Brand strategy achieves its greatest and highest purpose when it is used to facilitate strategic decisions within an organization.Yes, the decks, deliverables and designs matter–but only if they move people toward action. Strategy should be understood, used, and felt across the organization.
Resist the urge to make brand building all about the deck. Remember that the essence of brand strategy isn’t the deliverables—it’s the decisions they enable. Brand strategy should be a decision-making engine that helps move the organization’s leadership to make bolder, better decisions.
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Enthuse Creative develops brand strategies and creative solutions that enable businesses to make decisions that keep them growing and profitable. Contact us today to learn how we can help your organization.
