The clarity to move forward
Clarity that moves people. And your market.
I help brands and organisations get clear on what makes them different and why people should care. Then we put that clarity to work.
Clarity that
moves you
Most brand challenges come down to clarity – or the lack of it.
You know your business, but you can’t quite say what makes it different. Or you can, but it’s not landing. Or a strategy exists, but nobody’s using it.
That’s where I come in. With the clear focus and articulation that makes your strategy stick. Words your people can use. Ideas your customers can feel. That’s clarity that moves you forward.
Senior-level international brand (and agency experience) focused on solving your challenges…
More about Garrett →
Define where you’re headed
(and how you’ll get there)
I work across brand strategy (clarity) and expression. Sometimes that’s a complete journey. Sometimes you need one or the other. But even when working on just one, I’m thinking about how it connects – because strategy that can’t be clearly expressed does not work, and messaging without strategy is just noise.
Brand strategy
Getting clear on what makes you different and why people should care. Positioning, narrative, and the organising idea that gives everyone a North Star to inspire and motivate.
Brand messaging & voice
Finding the words for it. The messaging to cut through, brand naming, hard working taglines, and voice principles that help you stand out – and show up consistently.
What you get
- Clarity on what makes you different and why people should care
- Messages your audience connects with
- Language your people can actually use
- A way to show up that makes sense across sales, marketing, recruitment (and everything else).
Working with me
Direct, collaborative, creative.
I listen first, challenge constructively, and focus on what works in the real world.
Who I work with
I work directly with organisations at pivotal moments – scaling up, entering new markets, repositioning after a merger, embracing an opportunity or recovering from a crisis.
Moments when getting the brand right really matters.
I also work as strategic partner to top agencies who need c-suite level brand thinking.
My experience with national and global brands includes senior roles with industry giants FutureBrand, Landor, and Brand Union. Now, I’m independent – you get the thinking without the overhead.
What I help with
I get the call when:
You’re growing, but the brand hasn’t kept up. What worked when you were small feels stretched. The story’s muddled. You need to figure out what you stand for – and make it stick.
You’re entering a new market or launching something new. Different audience, different context. You need positioning that works there, not just a translation of what you've always said.
You’re merging, acquiring, or restructuring. Two brands becoming one, or one becoming many. Someone needs to make sense of the architecture – and find the thread that holds it together.
You need to say what you do, clearly. The message is lost in the fog. Nobody outside the building knows what you actually offer or why it matters. You need words that land.
See previous examples and how I work →
Brand thinking – Articles
You have a business strategy. It’s ambitious. Well-conceived. The board, on-board. So why isn’t everyone moving in the same direction? Because strategy on paper isn’t strategy in action. And the gap between the two is where most good plans fall apart.
You have a great offer. Your customers love it. But new prospects aren’t biting, every conversation drifts to price, and your own team describe what you do differently every time. Sound familiar? These are symptoms. The problem probably isn’t your marketing.
When people talk about tone of voice, they often mean some basic word choice. A vocabulary. Maybe a list of ‘words we use' and ‘words we don't.' That’s not wrong, exactly. But it’s not where to start.
Brand thinking
Do you have a positioning problem? Six ways to tell.
Filed in:
Positioning
You have a great offer. You know it’s good. Your customers know it’s good. But something’s not clicking – growth has stalled, the pipeline’s sluggish, or conversations end up being about price. The temptation is to fix the marketing. New website, better campaigns, sharper creative.
But what if your marketing’s not the problem?
Most of the businesses I work with don’t come to me saying ‘we need positioning.’ They come with symptoms. Here are six of the most common – and if three or more sound familiar, the issue probably isn't your marketing. It's what's underneath it.
1. You can’t explain what makes you different
Someone asks what you do. You answer. Their eyes glaze over.
Maybe you deliver a long and complex explanation. Same result.
Perhaps you give a solid answer, but it could describe half your competitors.
Or – the most common version I see – you give a different answer every time, depending on who’s asking and what mood you're in.
I think it’s fair to say, if the people running the business can’t say what makes it different in one clear, compelling sentence, nobody else stands a chance.
2. Your customers love you. New prospects don’t get it.
Your existing customers are loyal, enthusiastic, even evangelical. But when you try to win new ones, it’s hard work. The penny doesn’t drop. Demos and sales calls take too long to land. You find yourself over-explaining.
This is one of the most telling signs. It means your customers have discovered your value through experience – but that value isn’t being communicated upfront. The good news is that your best customers are often holding the key to unlocking it. How they describe you is usually closer to your real positioning than how you describe yourself.
3. Every conversation drifts to price
Not because you’re expensive. Because your prospect can’t see clearly what they’ll be paying more for. When the only visible difference between you and the alternatives is cost, cost is what people negotiate on.
Strong positioning takes price off the table – not by ignoring it, but by making the comparison irrelevant. Take the phenomenon that is Nespresso: nobody compares the (high) price per gram against supermarket coffee. Why? Nespresso has repositioned the comparison entirely. They’ve convinced you that you’re not buying ground coffee. You’re replacing a daily barista brew.
4. You’re spending on marketing but the pipeline’s not moving
Campaign content is going out. The creative looks good. But leads aren’t converting. You can't work out why.
Nine times out of ten, this isn’t a media problem or a creative problem – it’s a message problem. If the core proposition isn’t clear and compelling, better targeting and prettier ads won’t fix it. You’re turning up the volume on a message that isn’t landing.
5. Your own people tell different stories
Sales describe you one way. The website says something else. The CEO’s pitch is a third version entirely. They're all telling a version of the truth. But without an agreed foundation, every touchpoint is slightly different. The cumulative effect is confusion.
You’d be surprised how often I sit in on a leadership meeting and hear three different descriptions of what the company actually does. If the people inside the building can’t agree, imagine what it sounds like from the outside.
6. The market has moved and your story hasn’t
New competitors. New technology. Changed customer expectations. You’ve scaled up. Something’s changed. And, what got you here isn’t getting you there – but you’re still telling the same story because it used to work.
This is the only sign on this list that comes from outside rather than inside. But it’s often the trigger for addressing all the others. A market shift forces the question you’ve been avoiding: do we actually know what we stand for now?
So, what are you going to do about it?
If you recognised your business in any of these, that’s not a marketing problem. It’s a positioning problem. And it’s fixable.
Positioning isn’t about slogans or spin. It’s about getting clear on what makes you different, why the right people should care, and finding the words that make it stick. Get that right, and everything downstream – your messaging, your marketing, your sales conversations – gets easier.
Discuss your challenges: get in touch →
Client and partner reviews...
