Random bits and pieces of perceived marketing- and brand building wisdom, collected over a number of years in CPG and tech industries, Europe and America, operational and strategic roles. Mostly fun. Ask me anything.
curious | passionate | driven
Hi, I’m Nic Brandenberger.
I’m a versatile marketing leader and brand building professional with a proven track record of scaling businesses. I’ve grown everything from tiny, local niche brands in feminine hygiene to global, multi-billion-dollar e-commerce enterprises.
By connecting the dots between brand, product and consumer, I have helped realize hidden value for brands like eBay, Head & Shoulders, Gillette, Pampers, Noxzema, Infasil, Carrefour, and Procter & Gamble.
A broad range of experiences within both CPG- and Silicon Valley tech environments have afforded me to synthesize a unique blend of digital performance marketing and modern brand building. I’ve learned to stretch from strategy to execution, flex between insight, data and creativity, and deliver short-term results toward visionary future states.
I believe marketing starts with superior market-orientation and outside-in customer understanding. It collaborates with the product experience- and design teams as they transform customer needs into solutions. And it addresses critical gaps and growth opportunities across the end-to-end customer brand experience, by setting shared objectives, establishing a cross-functional vernacular, and building a coherent, integrated view of the customer journey. All in service of customer satisfaction.
Personally, I am driven by a child-like curiosity, a healthy dissatisfaction with the status quo, and the responsibility of building cross-functional teams through empathy, so they can thrive on solving complex problems and achieving tangible results — for the business, and for themselves.
Competencies
The strongest business leaders have a unique blend of skill sets across business-, and marketing management, brand building, experience design, as well as organizational development.
Over the years, I’ve been lucky enough to work with, and learn from some of the most accomplished professionals and thought-leaders in these domains.
My output is the sum-product of many brilliant minds at work, brought together through shared passion and expertise, diligent collaboration, and a bold vision to go after.
Core competencies across five domains
Business Management
Business strategy & -planning framework definition — based on deep customer insight; market-, competitor- and category analysis; consumption-, socioeconomic-, demographic- and technology trend analysis; corporate strategy and/or product-/innovation pipeline audit, and more.
Total P&L accountability and reporting — including end-to-end cost control (working, non-working, expenses & overhead etc.); profitability audit & optimization; trade-/customer-/agency contract & partnership negotiations (listings, promotions, scope/deliverables, fees, staffing, 3rd party production etc.), and more.
Marketing Management
Marketing strategy & -planning — including definition of marketing objectives, goals, and measurement frameworks (based on business- & brand imperatives); definition of acquisition-, retention-, migration-, customer lifetime value- and other strategies (designed to accomplish objectives); definition of marketing messaging strategy (grounded in customer research data on specific/evolving needs); definition of media- & brand partnership strategy; definition of content- & customer contact framework; working budget planning & -forecasting, and more.
Integrated multi-channel communication — design, development and delivery of cross-funnel marketing campaigns, including identification of consumer- & shopper receptivity insights and barriers; business- & creative brief development; asset-, channel- & customer requirements definition; criteria-based creative assessment; content design & development; content syndication & distribution strategy; communication context strategy definition, and more.
Marketing operations & media management — including high volume/frequency marketing campaign planning; daily, weekly & quarterly resource & capacity management (FTE-hrs/asset); campaign scope definition; runtime/slot/marimekko allocation; media planning & publication, and more.
Marketing tactics — including development & implementation of re-targeting engines, shopper marketing & engagement programs, loyalty- & points programs, volume driver & urgency promotions, competitive pro-fense & defense programs, distributed commerce engines, and more.
Marketing Analytics — including marketing mix modeling (spend allocation- & ROI optimization); media mix & channel effectiveness analysis; multi-touch attribution modeling; creative effectiveness qualification & -optimization; marketing messaging optimization, and more.
Brand Building
Brand strategy & -positioning development — including 5C analysis (building on business planning framework); customer target & -segment definition; total brand funnel/journey experience audit; definition of ‘moments that matter’ (incl. barriers/bottleneck identification); brand proposition & -messaging definition; brand activation & -manifestation design & development principles, and more.
Brand portfolio architecture and naming — including brand innovation strategy & -framework definition (connected to business strategy, brand positioning, product pipeline and investment prioritization); naming strategy & -conventions; naming, descriptor- & identity definition; trademarking, and more.
Brand identity definition — including definition, design & development of core brand primitives (logo, color, typography, photography, layouts and grids, iconography, illustration, sound, motion, voice and tone, depth etc.); brand creative platform development; digital and physical brand activation, and more.
Brand performance and -health controlling — including full marketing & behavioral funnel measurement; diagnostics monitoring (attitudes, associations, attributes etc.), brand switching analysis; choice driver- & brand differentiation analysis; distinctive brand assets design; database tagging, and more.
Total Experience Design
Commercial- and Product Innovation — including design, development, qualification/testing, optimization and delivery of communication messaging & claims (novelty, performance etc.); physical products (solutions, packaging etc.), physical services (authentication, grading etc.), digital products (user experiences, tools, apps etc.), and more.
End-to-end customer journey design — based on a total brand experience audit (grounded in 5C analysis, corporate & product strategy etc.); journey stage definitions; identification of ‘moments that matter’ (based on quantitative behavioral analysis and qualitative customer research data); touch point design & -impact analysis; pathway analysis & -modeling, and more.
Consumer concept design — including concept ideation based on consumer-, competitor-, technology- and market trend analysis; mega trend forecasting; concept- & use testing; concept car development; rapid test, learn & optimization drives; concept qualification; volume forecasting, and more.
Organizational Development
Integrative leadership — including sustained, frequent C-suite executive engagement for company-wide strategy definition & alignment; chairing roles in global marketing forum (Dir+) & global brand advisory forum (C-Suite); “Seen by many as a natural leader and decision maker” - Insights Discover Profile: conscious & unconscious 22 Reforming director; MBTI: Initiating, systematic INTP; iEQ9: Enneagram Type 8, Active Controller w/ SP instinct & dominant ‘action’ center, and more.
People-, team- & skills management — including leading teams of up to 12 direct reports (plus additional L-2); definition of RASCI matrix across organization; team management via work & development plans & 360 performance assessments; expanding team remit & size; up-skilling & hiring for skill, and more.
Training & development — development & delivery of bespoke in-person Marketing Academy curriculum (4 x 50 marketers, 10 modules); design & implementation of “tools over rules” digital brand guidelines; design, development & implementation of interactive brand training experience, and more.
Organizational design — design & development of end-to-en marketing workflow process & planning system; definition of cross-functional roles & responsibilities, (re-)design of information flow, gateway timings and collaboration principles, and more.
Agency- & partner relationship management — including global AOR pitch (RFI, RFP, chemistry, pitch process, rate card & staffing negotiations etc.); partner relationship management; reciprocal feedback & performance assessment process, and more.
Extracurricular engagements
Brand Positioning guest lecture (at INSEAD; 2014 to 2018) — covering brand basics & controllable factors; positioning analysis; equity modeling (perception-, driver- & pathway analysis); positioning development & compliance framework.
#artsci (at MIAMI AD SCHOOL; 2016 to 2019) — Marketing as interplay between art & science; connecting client- & agency-side terminology, insight and motivations; problem solving through integration of artistic & scientific talent.
Changing Brand Perceptions (at TMRE; 2017) — Short-term dismantling of undesired perceptions; rebuilding long-term memory structures via consistency in both messaging & application of distinctive executional assets; ALL/TURF based messaging framework.