EXPANDAP / INDEPENDENT CLIENT · B2B BRAND STRATEGY · 2024
Give finance teams room to think.
For venture-backed ExpandAP, I developed a brand strategy that connected accounts-payable automation with what finance leaders wanted to accomplish: less time consumed by routine processing, more capacity for judgment and planning.
ExpandAP · Brand book · Independent client work, 2024
The person making the decision
A CFO choosing financial software weighs more than features. The decision carries responsibility for sensitive data, the team’s work and the business’s ability to act. Trust matters because the person making the recommendation has a reputation at stake.
My audience work examined those pressures alongside the priorities of other executives involved in the purchase. It established the human context for the positioning and the way the brand would speak.
The positioning · Audience, proposition and reasons to believe · Open image
A reason to choose
ExpandAP’s integration with Salesforce offered a point of differentiation. I connected that functional advantage to a more meaningful promise: helping finance teams spend more of their time on the thinking that moves a business forward.
The messaging framework led with the human benefit, then supplied the functional reason to believe it. Integration became familiarity. Visibility into spending became the ability to plan and respond. Automation became room for higher-level work.
The messaging framework · Human benefit, supported by functional proof · Open image
A brand the team could use
I carried the strategy through purpose, positioning and messaging into brand personality, behavior, voice and visual identity guidance. The voice was straightforward, approachable and confident, suited to a consequential business purchase.
The resulting brand book gave the business a shared foundation for explaining the product and making consistent communication decisions.
The brand voice · A clear personality the team could put into practice · Open image
My role: Independent brand strategist. Audience research, problem definition, differentiation, positioning, messaging, brand voice and visual identity guidance.
Deliverable: Brand strategy and brand book, 2024.