Introducing B.A.N.G. - Our Free Brand Effectiveness Diagnostic

3 Mar

Today we launched something we've been working on for a while…

It's called B.A.N.G. (Brand Assessment and Navigation for Growth) and it's a free tool that scores your brand's effectiveness across six evidence-based dimensions.

Here's why we built it

Many of the brands we work with come to us with a feeling that something isn't working, but they're not sure what. They know they need to do something about their brand, but they don't know where to start. And most of the tools that could tell them are either expensive market research platforms or surface-level quizzes that don't actually say anything useful.

We wanted something in between. Something grounded in real marketing science that gives you a genuine starting point without needing a research budget to get there.

What it actually does

B.A.N.G. evaluates your brand across six dimensions that the evidence says matter most for long-term growth. Things like:

How well your brand links to the situations where people actually think about your category
Whether your brand assets are as distinctive as you think they are (spoiler: most brands overestimate this)
Whether your advertising is following the principles that drive effectiveness over time
How visible and available your brand is when buyers are ready to act
Whether your investment split between brand and performance is setting you up for growth or holding you back

You answer 24 questions about how your brand operates. No data or metrics required. Just honest answers.

At the end you get a personalised scorecard showing where you're strong and where there's opportunity. Not vague advice. Specific observations based on the principles that come out of the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute, the IPA effectiveness research, and the work of people like Binet & Field.

Why 'evidence-based' matters here

There's a reason we keep coming back to this phrase. The advertising industry is full of opinions. Everyone has a view on what makes a good brand or a good ad. But there's a growing body of research that actually tells us what works, and most of it challenges the conventional wisdom.

Things like: brands grow by reaching more people, not by deepening loyalty with a small audience. Or that emotional advertising is almost twice as effective as rational advertising for long-term brand building. Or that most marketers significantly overestimate how recognisable their brand assets actually are.

B.A.N.G. is built on these principles. It's not our opinion on your brand. It's a framework for assessing how well your brand aligns with what the evidence says drives growth.

What it's not

It's not market research. It doesn't survey your customers or measure actual recall data. Those things are valuable but they're a different level of investment.

Think of B.A.N.G. as a strategic health check. It tells you where to focus your attention before you commit to deeper work. And if the results surprise you, that's usually the most valuable part.