Guide
1 min read
Agency or consultant: who should develop your brand strategy?
If what you mainly lack is implementation – design, campaigns and website – an agency is the right choice. But if it is still open what your company stands for, it pays to bring in an independent strategist before the agency. The strategist clarifies the positioning with management, and the agency then implements on a solid foundation.
When an agency is the right fit
The positioning is in place and shared across the team.
What you need is design, production and ongoing channels.
You want everything from a single source and have the budget for a team.
When an independent strategist is the right fit
Something has changed: an acquisition, a new line of business, funding, new leadership.
The leadership team has different ideas of what the company stands for.
You want a strategy that does not depend on what an agency will sell later.
How the two work together
I work before and alongside your agency. It receives a strategy paper with guiding principles from me and, on request, a page structure with wireframes. Your agency implements, as it should. You then no longer decide by taste, but by whether a draft carries your positioning.
You work directly with me, not with a junior team.
The first step
In the free 30-minute Outside View, we clarify whether you currently need strategy, implementation or both.
— Tim Alexander Söther
About SÖTHER
I am Tim Alexander Söther, a brand and communication strategist in Berlin. I help companies say clearly what they stand for, in a way their customers understand and can pass on. With me, strategy and implementation come from a single source. After the positioning, I develop the core message and the rules for copy and design, and on request I design the first wireframes for the website and channels. I work directly with management, without intermediaries and without a team in the background.
