A question I often get from clients is,
"How long will it take before we start seeing results from a brand-forward strategy?"
While timelines may vary, depending on the size of the city, the volume of competitors, the quality of their messages, and your product’s purchase cycle, there is a general timeline to consider.
Before diving into this timeline, it's important to consider the pre-launch sequence, which typically takes 70–120 days, depending on what needs to be done to launch the brand. Whether you're changing your business name or determining the level of production needed. This process involves:
- Brand Uncovery: 15-30 days, including 1-2 days onsite, depending on travel.
- Market Research: 30–60 days, depending on the scope of work.
- Creative & Media Buy Process: 45–60 days.
- Offline Production: 15 days for radio. 30–60 days for television.
- Online Production (if switching): 60 days.
This means you should plan for roughly 90 to 120 days to develop a completely unique Marketing Strategy before anything hits the airwaves.
This is by far the most critical time for your brand strategy. It’s essential we take the time to get it right.
Months 1-3: Initial Launch (Live-to-Air)
- Early Feedback: Your ads go live and start catching the attention of friends and family.
- Brand Association: People begin to recognize and repeat your jingles and slogans.
Months 3-6: Gaining Traction
- Digital Growth: Direct traffic to your website and organic brand search begins to increase.
- Pay-Per-Click Performance: You'll notice higher click-through rates and lower costs for your ads as long as your digital provider is properly executing an aligned branding campaign.
- Lead Generation: Incoming phone calls and booked leads start to rise.
- Complaints: By now, some of your audience will be tired of the frequency, or upset that you’ve made them feel. The optimal number of complaints by this stage is not zero.
Months 6-9: Lift Off
- Virality: Elements of your brand begin to spread organically.
- Sales Impact: The average ticket size increases, and sales cycles become shorter. As demand grows, consider price optimization.
Months 9-12: Solidifying Success
- Team Morale: Employee satisfaction improves, attracting top talent to your company. Keep working at bringing the brand message inside your company to align your message.
- Growth: As customer load increases, you may need to hire more staff, buy more trucks, and look for larger spaces.
- Revenue Increase: Healthy growth in revenue compared to the previous year.
- Predictability: Growth becomes predictable and sustainable.
While these benchmarks provide a helpful guide, the timeline for each stage isn't fixed. A smaller budget in a larger city will slow things down. The uncontrollable events affecting consumer confidence will affect results. Capacity or staff and vehicles will affect results.
A brand fully matures around the 10-year mark, and definitive upward results are going to be most prevalent in the 3-5th year.
The key is to be consistent and monitor your progress, adapting things to optimize profitable growth along the way.
Are you ready to embark on your branding journey? Call Wizard Ryan Chute today.
Ryan Chute
Helping small businesses become BIG brands with a holistic marketing strategy that speaks the same language across all sales and marketing channels.
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