Growth Insights for CEOs

The Contrarian Brand Play: Why Right Now Is the Best Time to Invest in Brand
Executive Takeaways
- Most companies are cutting brand spend to fund rising paid acquisition costs. That is the wrong response.
- Brand awareness now drives AI citations, and AI citations drive Day One shortlist inclusion.
- Google's redesign of Search makes brand recognition more important; AI systems favor brands users already know.
- The companies investing in brand while competitors pull back are building advantages at lower cost.
Part 4 of our four-part series on the evolving AI search landscape and what B2B leaders need to know to stay competitive.
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An Inward Focus: How One Company Redefined Itself for Success
Mon, Feb 7, 2022 — It’s always interesting to me when the proverbial emperor is in search of new clothes. Like the time-honored fable, Cask – an innovative company that lives and works in the ServiceNow ecosystem – had done an outstanding job of enabling digital transformation for its clients. But when it came to telling their story and harnessing digital marketing tools to promote itself, it wasn’t quite as masterful. The story of how Cask evolved its brand and turned digital marketing into a dominant force in the ServiceNow space – leading to 40 percent year-over-year growth for four consecutive years – is an object lesson that is worth studying for any B2B leader.