“Are you not entertained?!”
The immeasurable cost of what we’re losing in the war between brand and demand
Hi there! You’re reading the Bonfire newsletter from Kevan Lee & Shannon Deep. Each week, we highlight brand, marketing, and creative learnings from our experience as in-house marketers turned agency owners who think a lot about creativity, our relationship to work, and how all of that impacts our identities. We’ll also feature insights from our digital community of super smart folks (which you’re welcome to join).
Wishing you a great week!
There’s a not-so-quiet war happening inside a lot of B2B SaaS companies right now. If you work at one, it’s probably happening at yours.
It’s a civil war, happening within the marketing org. It feels like this:
On one side, you’ve got the demand team: tasked with pipeline, obsessed with attribution. They’re chasing MQLs like their jobs depend on it (because…their jobs do).
On the other side: the brand team, tasked with shaping perception, building emotional connection, and earning a level of trust and attention that can’t be bought with ad spend or measured in clicks. They’re dying of discouragement as they’re hen-pecked to death by their data-driven, data-only, data-is-god leadership teams.
These two groups are technically on the same team. But more often than not, they’re running in opposite directions or pitted against one another for resources and strategy deference.
While there are always definite ebbs and flows in the harmony between these two teams, recent years of tight markets, general economic unpredictability, and the laser-fast rise of AI technologies that are replacing empowering confusing helping distracting all kinds of marketers has made the last 18 months a particularly contentious and trying time in the Beetoobi district of Saasiland.
Tensions are high. Consecutive hours of sleep are low. Budgets are tighter. Teams are leaner. Leadership is more skeptical of strategies as the landscape changes out from under them.
And, in parallel, the bar for customer attention is so much higher.
Enter…entertainment
In this environment, brand work often gets sidelined. Not because it doesn’t work—but because it’s harder to measure how it's working. And when the next board meeting is around the corner, ambiguity is a liability.
But here’s the thing: in a market flooded with similar tools, similar messaging, and similar (or just inconsistent, shot-in-the-dark) strategies, brand isn’t a nice-to-have. Brand is the only thing left to differentiate you that you can still control.
It’s one of the best levers you can pull to get that coveted customer attention, because brand is a vehicle for entertainment. And entertainment, as brand strategy consultant and lecturer Eugene Healy notes in this video, is everything today.
There are too many great insights to quote them all, so do yourself a favor and go watch his video, but the crux of it is this:
“All attention must be earned. In a culture where attention has become the most precious commodity, all advertising has to become entertainment. The viewer is taught that’s what they deserve in exchange for their attention. On this plane, attention is a world war, and everyone competes with everyone. You are not just up against your category incumbent. You’re against anyone from Mr. Beast to TikTok itself.”
When you give up on investing in brand, you forfeit your ability to entertain current and potential customers.
In our new course in our Campout community, Brand Impact You Can’t Measure, we talk about how and why stories and storytelling are so effective—and not just effective as entertainment. There’s real behavioral psychology behind how stories are more memorable, how they create a shared sense of identity and emotional connections, how they can persuade, influence, and build trust.
All that and a customer might actually enjoy something you make???
Yes, please.
A path forward (even in this market)
This isn’t just a resourcing issue. It’s a cultural one. Many execs—and even some CMOs—believe that performance is provable and brand is a gamble. (And if you want to see eyes roll? Mention “being entertaining” as a business goal.)
But all this leads to marketing orgs being structured around a funnel and not around the full customer journey. And maybe we've just forgotten that the customer journey does not always start with an ad click or a growth lever or lead magnet. You must get heads turning in your direction in order to do literally anything else. And what turns heads? (See above.)
So. If you’re leading brand work in a war-torn org and you know you need to start making peace in order to move forward, here are a few ways to start shifting the dynamic:
1. Connect the long-term to the short-term.
Don’t talk about brand in opposition to performance. Talk about it as the foundation for performance. Show how storytelling, consistency, and emotional resonance make every ad, every landing page, and every campaign more effective—even if you can’t draw a direct attribution line.
2. Package your brand work like a product.
Give it names, roadmaps, phases, and outcomes. Make it feel concrete and ownable—not just a set of vibes, but a strategic initiative with clear intent. This helps brand get a seat at the table during cross-functional planning, not just when someone needs a new tagline.
3. Use qualitative feedback as a secret weapon.
Quotes from high-LTV customers. Screenshots of social love. Unprompted Slack praise. These aren’t just warm fuzzies—they’re signals that the brand is making an impact in the hearts and minds of your audience.
4. Embed brand inside demand.
Sneaky! The most aligned orgs blur the lines. A nurture sequence that is telling a brand-led story is doing double duty: converting leads and reinforcing your brand. A sales deck that echoes your brand positioning language is doing more than selling—it’s anchoring trust, building consistency.
Demand work is a canvas; brand is what you paint on it.
We talk more about this, and managing up to leadership about these kinds of immeasurable brand impacts, in our course, so check it out!
Notable links, convos, and events
You can see all this and more in the Campout community.
We hosted our first digital co-working last week! Folks from 4 different countries chatted briefly about our projects and then got to work with some sweet synth music. We’ll be making this a regular event, so don’t miss the next one.
Speaking of events…our next free event will be Wednesday, May 7: Find Your Fit: Reshaping Your Work, Not Yourself with
! RSVP here.
As mentioned above, we have a new course in Campout for our All Access members. It’s called Brand Impact You Can’t Measure, and it’s a companion to our other course, Brand ROI 101: What to Measure and How. (We do know how to measure some things!)
We’ve also got a new channel for Pro and All Access members: Ask Anything! It’s for all your “stupid” marketing questions…which of course aren’t stupid at all! Come get or give advice on any practical, tactical marketing concern. Current questions include:
What is the present state of SEO best practices
How many jokes is too many jokes in a work presentation
What is everyone doing for their personal portfolios these days
But wait! There’s more…
Wanna be friends?
If you love this newsletter and wish it were more interactive, you’re in luck! Join us over in Campout, our digital community for creative marketers and the creative curious.
Wanna work with us?
If you need help with brand strategy and storytelling, fractional brand and marketing leadership, and bringing your brand strategy to life in impactful ways, send us an email at hello@aroundthebonfire.com to get in touch.
As always, you can find us on LinkedIn, Instagram, and Threads.
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