How to Integrate Brands After M&A with Megan Adler

1 - > Morgan McLintic: M and A is back, but the real work from a 2 - > marketing perspective starts after the deal is signed. Today 3 - > we're talking to a brand specialist who's going to walk 4 - > through her playbook about how to integrate the brands you've 5 - > acquired. Hello, everyone. 6 - > Welcome to Fired Up, the podcast for marketers working in early 7 - > and late stage startups.

Hello everyone. Welcome to Fired Up. 8 - > My name is Morgan McClintic, and today I am joined by the 9 - > wonderful Megan Adler, who is the CEO and founder of Sublime 10 - > Designs Media. Megan, welcome to Fired Up.

11 - > Megan Adler: Thank you. Great to be here today. 12 - > Morgan McLintic: It's great to have you. It's great to have 13 - > you.

So, M and A is back, and you are an expert on helping 14 - > companies after the deal think about their brand strategy and 15 - > their positioning, which brands they should keep, which brands 16 - > they should merge. How do you even go about that? I guess 17 - > that's the top of the show here. 18 - > Talk to us a little bit about how you approach a roll up from 19 - > a brand perspective.

20 - > Megan Adler: Absolutely, so first of all, I just want to say 21 - > that the world has shifted towards this consolidation 22 - > mentality, and most industries, everything from physical 23 - > security, gardening, dentist office, everything is starting 24 - > to consolidate, and it's leaving companies with a bunch of 25 - > unanswered questions. So we roll up a brand, we roll up two 26 - > brands, three brands. What happens to those brands? Do they 27 - > all roll up under the same umbrella company?

Is there 28 - > enough brand equity to keep those separate, so what we do is 29 - > we come in and we start to take a look at each of the companies. 30 - > What kind of brand equity do they have in the market? Do 31 - > people know them? If that brand goes away completely, will it be 32 - > something that will harm the new umbrella company?

So we need to 33 - > evaluate that. We also need to look at marketing budget. If you 34 - > have to maintain five different brands, that's expensive. If you 35 - > roll them up under one brand and everyone is sharing the same 36 - > brand, that will help you save money and resources, and you get 37 - > more bang for your buck.

Another thing to consider is to think 38 - > about what happens with cross selling, so when you have 39 - > different brands, sometimes you can't cross sell because you 40 - > can't cross sell to another company. So rolling them up can 41 - > help you come up with a clear cross selling strategy that can 42 - > open the doors for more organic growth. And then we also want to 43 - > look at what's going to happen in the future. Are you going to 44 - > acquire more brands?

What will that look like, and how will it 45 - > all fit together? So we start to look at all these individual 46 - > pieces, and it feels like a brand puzzle. I always talk 47 - > about how we go into these trying to solve a juicy brand 48 - > puzzle, and that's what we're doing, we're pulling together 49 - > all these pieces, asking these questions to create a strategy 50 - > that will work 51 - > Morgan McLintic: excellent. So that's the overview, and I want 52 - > to dive into all those different elements, because I think this 53 - > is super pertinent today, and a lot of marketers that we talk to 54 - > have faced these these challenges, and right at the 55 - > very beginning there you said, okay, there's been an 56 - > acquisition, there's a number of brands here, we need to decide 57 - > which ones to keep and which ones to absorb, and you're 58 - > trying to work out, okay, what is the brand equity, and of 59 - > course each of these companies have customers and have invested 60 - > in their brand, so it's not zero, how do you even go about 61 - > deciding which ones to keep and which ones to absorb?

62 - > Megan Adler: So, when we're looking at a brand and we're 63 - > trying to decide whether we should keep it or not, it's 64 - > really important to start with the customer and market 65 - > perception. So, we'll always do a series of interviews with 66 - > customers, partners, vendors to understand how the brand is 67 - > perceived in the market, and how deep the connection to the brand 68 - > goes. We often have local brands that are tied to their 69 - > community, so you need to look at how that change will disrupt 70 - > it.

From there, we also do market analysis to understand 71 - > who the competitors are, and how this brand fits into that space, 72 - > and what share of market they have that helps us evaluate to 73 - > see if they've already captured a big share of that market. They 74 - > have really deep brand equity and connection to customers. 75 - > Often we'll keep that brand if we're looking at a brand that 76 - > people aren't very connected to, maybe has small market share, 77 - > oftentimes we'll be like, okay, let's roll it up, because we're 78 - > stronger together.

I think the other thing to consider is just 79 - > thinking through what the benefits are of letting go of a 80 - > brand, because when you let go of a brand, you have to do a lot 81 - > of change management, so there's risk. Asks to that, and there's 82 - > also big rewards on the other side, and you have to weigh 83 - > them, and if the rewards of being able to cross sell across 84 - > a unified brand, so you change the brand, if that outweighs the 85 - > negatives, then that can be another thing that that factors 86 - > into your decision.

87 - > Morgan McLintic: I think that brand is very personal, often to 88 - > the founders, I've been involved in some acquisitions on the PR 89 - > side. We, my last agency, we acquired a number of other 90 - > agencies, and it's a brilliant process, but one of the sort of 91 - > tricky parts up front is, what are you going to do with the 92 - > brand? Sometimes it's even named after the founder, right, like 93 - > it's their name above the door, it's personal, you mentioned 94 - > dentists or whatever, but who tends to fight the hardest to 95 - > keep their brand, and how do you get them to sort of let go?

96 - > Megan Adler: That is such a good question, Morgan, and it sounds 97 - > like you've experienced this firsthand, but founders are 98 - > often the most attached to their brand, but you create a business 99 - > and it becomes like your baby, and then having to change that 100 - > is something that's really hard. 101 - > We also are working with a company right now that is named 102 - > after the founder and has had really deep roots in the 103 - > community for 20 plus years, and so we're considering what's 104 - > going to happen in this community.

This is an insular 105 - > community where everybody knows each other. I interviewed some 106 - > customers, and they said with some other competitors, their 107 - > brands changed and the quality went down. So, if I saw that the 108 - > name changed, I would know that the quality was going to change 109 - > of the services provided, and so that's coming into play before 110 - > the decision is even made, so I think talking to the community 111 - > is really important as well, because sometimes with local 112 - > businesses like that, that brand connection and the perception 113 - > and the fear of change can be really big.

114 - > Morgan McLintic: Yeah, it's not just about the founder, yet it's 115 - > the customers, everyone's sort of pretty well, it's all going 116 - > to change now, and they've even changed the name, and I quite 117 - > like the last name, there's a lot of factors that go into 118 - > that, but I guess you had said yes, you know the cost of it, 119 - > but there are also benefits, because if you clean up the 120 - > brand and you don't have that anymore, you're not paying to 121 - > support a multi-brand strategy, 122 - > Megan Adler: that's exactly it, and the other thing is really, 123 - > you know, the second part to your question is, How do you 124 - > convince someone to let go of the brand.

It's really about 125 - > having a good story, and Morgan, you know this better than anyone 126 - > from the PR side, but having a great story can change 127 - > perception. And so, if you come to an employee of a company and 128 - > that employee is really attached to the brand, and you say, I 129 - > hear you, I know you're really attached to this brand, but look 130 - > at all these amazing things that you're going to get out of this 131 - > brand change, or you go to a customer and you do the same, 132 - > telling a great story where you're really putting forth the 133 - > benefit and value of the change, that's where you can start to 134 - > get people excited, tell them what's in it for them.

135 - > Morgan McLintic: I think that leads us on to our next topic I 136 - > want to talk about which is messaging and creating this sort 137 - > of an umbrella messaging from the disparate parts, because 138 - > often in a roll up one of the primary drivers is just to 139 - > acquire new customers, right, and then maybe try and do some 140 - > sort of integration with the products on the back end, which 141 - > can be a real challenge, but you end up with a bit of a grab bag 142 - > of different messaging that might not always fit nice and 143 - > neatly into that puzzle, as you say, you know, there might be 144 - > pieces missing.

How do you just sort of even go about creating 145 - > that umbrella messaging, so it all ties together? 146 - > Megan Adler: Yeah, absolutely. 147 - > So that also starts with a great story, right. What we're trying 148 - > to do is figure out how all of these companies work together.

149 - > What's the thread that ties them together, and how can we tell 150 - > that story in a way that really connects with customers, so that 151 - > it's effective, right? And that messaging needs to be able to be 152 - > the foundation for your sales efforts, for your marketing 153 - > efforts, for all of your go-to-market efforts, and so it 154 - > needs to connect with customers, it needs to connect to the pain, 155 - > and it needs to put forth the value of all of these companies 156 - > together, and this is a really important step that we often see 157 - > overlooked, so we see companies that are continuing to roll up 158 - > companies under them, but they haven't set that parent level 159 - > messaging, and it's a huge mess, because what ends up happening 160 - > is people go into sales calls, they can't accurately or in any 161 - > beneficial way talk about how the brands are connected, or the 162 - > benefit of them, or how they can cross sell, and when it's not 163 - > defined, you're just leaving money on the table, and that's 164 - > why it's really important to take the step of creating this 165 - > umbrella messaging that ties everything together, and then 166 - > bringing it down throughout any of the sub-brands that you 167 - > decide to keep.

168 - > Morgan McLintic: Yeah, I think a good acquirer. Has their own 169 - > messaging locked down, and then has a good thesis beyond we're 170 - > going to acquire more customers here about why these two 171 - > companies are going to be better together, because what's the 172 - > story? How do you make a how do you make a bad company take two 173 - > good companies and merge them together? Because if that is 174 - > missing, I find that's a real challenge.

If it was part of the 175 - > ethos of we're buying this company because they're in an 176 - > adjacent space, they're going to buy our products, our customers 177 - > are going to buy theirs. It's great. The messaging sort of 178 - > falls into place if it's just sort of, well, I want to buy 179 - > some SMB customers and sell them my enterprise product, that's 180 - > Megan Adler: not going to work exactly. And that's why it's 181 - > really important to tell a story that's connected to the target 182 - > audience, to your customers, to your prospects, and to the 183 - > market.

And the other thing I think that's really important is 184 - > to evolve that story over time. 185 - > What we see a lot of companies do is they're rolling up 186 - > companies really quickly, they set a message, and then they 187 - > look at it two or three years later, and they're like, this 188 - > doesn't work anymore. Why are our sales slowing? Why aren't we 189 - > acquiring new customers faster?

190 - > All of that has to do with your messaging, so you want to make 191 - > sure that you're continually evolving your messaging, that 192 - > you should constantly be looking at it, making sure that it's up 193 - > to date with the companies that you've rolled up, how you're 194 - > going to market, how customers are responding, and what's 195 - > happening in the world. Think about AI, right? A couple years 196 - > ago, there was no AI, and then it was AI, and then it was 197 - > agentic AI.

It just evolves really quickly, and so you need 198 - > to make sure that your messaging is keeping pace with what's 199 - > happening in the world, as well. 200 - > Morgan McLintic: I think that's a great point. And you had 201 - > talked about, okay, we need to build a brand platform here, 202 - > because we're going to be making other acquisitions down the 203 - > road. What is a brand platform?

204 - > Megan Adler: That's a great question. So, a brand platform 205 - > is something that ties together all of the companies that you've 206 - > acquired into a neat package that explains to the market how 207 - > they're all connected and the benefit, and as you start to 208 - > get, you go upstream to bigger and bigger markets, what you 209 - > find is the platform expands. 210 - > Downstream, you might have a company, for example, that their 211 - > platform is cybersecurity, and they've rolled up several 212 - > adjacent cybersecurity companies, but as you get bigger 213 - > upstream, it might be services for your home, and they might 214 - > have rolled up cleaning services, gardening services, so 215 - > it's not necessarily they're all adjacent verticals, and they're 216 - > connected, and so the platform can get bigger and bigger as you 217 - > start to roll up adjacent verticals, so you stay with one 218 - > vertical, and then you expand it from there, but the platform 219 - > really has to tie everything together into a neat package, 220 - > and that's what gives you the ability to scale.

That platform 221 - > is the differentiator, and that's what private equity is 222 - > looking for, that's what gives you growth, 223 - > Morgan McLintic: and is there a timeline behind this? Because 224 - > they get acquired, and then they keep their brand, and they're an 225 - > acquirer code company, and then suddenly they become the whole 226 - > company becomes a product line, maybe under the master brand. Do 227 - > you normally find there's a bit of a life cycle to this process, 228 - > or is it better to just wipe the old brand off the table at the 229 - > beginning and just go, okay, we're just taking the pain up 230 - > front.

231 - > Megan Adler: It's different for every company, and I think it's 232 - > really hard, also because holding time for private equity 233 - > really varies. So, some private equity firms might want to hold 234 - > companies for three years, some for eight years, some for one 235 - > year, and they're expecting a certain result within that time 236 - > period, so you need to align to the holding period, and then you 237 - > need to align also to what it will take to complete the change 238 - > management and to roll out the brand, 239 - > Morgan McLintic: that's a great point.

In the PR field, when 240 - > you're acquiring a company, there's often a sort of 241 - > transition phase, like an earn out period, where an acquiring 242 - > company will buy, let's say, 50% of the business, and then over 243 - > the subsequent two or three years acquire more if they hit 244 - > certain numbers, but of course, if you come in on day one and 245 - > then change the brand, that becomes a touch point, because 246 - > that could inhibit the selling company's ability to hit their 247 - > numbers, and so that does become a bit of a discussion point.

Let 248 - > me just say, a factor, and so I think the fact that you're 249 - > saying, "Hey, the commercial part of this on the marketing 250 - > side, it's a big thing to factor in that people might not 251 - > normally think about. 252 - > Megan Adler: It really is, absolutely. And going through 253 - > this type of process is expensive, and it God, think 254 - > about all of the different pieces that your brand touches. 255 - > There's digital presence, there's in-person presence.

If 256 - > you have an office, there's so many things to consider, and you 257 - > have to do a thorough job, because you have to go forward 258 - > with a very cohesive brand strategy of. Otherwise, you're 259 - > kind of shooting yourself in the foot. 260 - > Morgan McLintic: How do you find that you can get buy-in for the 261 - > new messaging that you've got, so that it brings the company 262 - > together culturally? 263 - > Megan Adler: Yeah, that's a really great question, because 264 - > often what we see is that companies roll up other 265 - > companies and they have very different cultures, and so what 266 - > we do is, as a part of our process, we bring people along 267 - > at every step of the way, we make lists of all of the 268 - > stakeholders, we figure out how to engage them in different ways 269 - > at different steps, and then once the brand is ready, we make 270 - > sure we get buy-in on the other side in the appropriate way from 271 - > the appropriate stakeholders, and we also put together a 272 - > really comprehensive change management and rollout program, 273 - > so that it's not like sending an email to the company, "Hey, 274 - > there's a new brand, enjoy it.

275 - > Okay, this is a phased approach. 276 - > We're going to get people excited with the drip campaign, 277 - > we're going to put out a video, then we're going to have a town 278 - > hall, then we're going to have smaller working session groups 279 - > where the CEO is going to personally join and ask 280 - > questions, email drip, then we're going to incorporate it 281 - > into our company party or newsletter, so we really make 282 - > sure that we create a comprehensive rollout plan 283 - > that's multi touch over the appropriate amount of time, and 284 - > that's just for the internal rollout.

You need to get 285 - > everyone on board, 286 - > Morgan McLintic: and anyone who's developed a brand within 287 - > one company and been in the room when we're deciding logos and 288 - > visual identity, et cetera, will know that how hard that is, and 289 - > how you need to be a real expert to get everybody on the same 290 - > page, because everyone has an opinion. This becomes much more 291 - > complex when you're talking about multiple companies, right? 292 - > This is multiple management teams.

It's AI, and you talked 293 - > about the change management process. Tell me a bit about 294 - > that process. How long is it normally, and what have you 295 - > learned from it. 296 - > Megan Adler: Yeah, absolutely.

297 - > Getting people to change is not easy, getting them on board, 298 - > getting them on the same page. 299 - > But I have to tell you, it's something I love personally. So 300 - > I actually, my dad was a diplomat, and we moved to a new 301 - > country every three years when I was growing up, and so I had to 302 - > start over, understand people really deeply, pull ideas 303 - > together, and it's something that's a part of who I am and 304 - > how I grew up, and it's really helped me.

So, when we go into 305 - > these branding processes, I actually lead them personally, 306 - > especially at a bigger scale. 307 - > So, I'm able to go in and bring all that experience working with 308 - > different types of people and helping to get them on the same 309 - > page, and I think a lot of it is listening, showing people that 310 - > you care, and also making sure that we're running the process 311 - > in a way that's inclusive. We take a lot of care with that. 312 - > There's a lot that goes into it, and it can take a long time.

313 - > With one company that we worked with, it took almost a full year 314 - > to create the brand and roll it out with smaller companies. 315 - > We're working with a smaller one right now. There's only 10 316 - > people, that's a lot quicker. 317 - > Morgan McLintic: Yeah, I'm interested in that.

I mean, I 318 - > can well believe it will take a year, although many will be 319 - > thinking, I, you know, that's incredible, because it is a 320 - > gradual process. And do you tend to know what the destination is 321 - > going to look like in your mind, and you're trying to convince 322 - > people to your perspective, or is it much more.. hey, I don't 323 - > know. I know where we need to get to, and I know what it's 324 - > going to look like at the end, but I have no preconceived 325 - > notions of what the brand will be.

Tell me about your 326 - > philosophy there. 327 - > Megan Adler: That's exactly where I go in, Morgan. What I 328 - > find is the more preconceived notions I have the worse we end 329 - > up doing. So, it's good to go in with a completely open mind.

A 330 - > lot of times, we'll just go in. 331 - > I think having that kind of outsider perspective is what our 332 - > customers value. So, we try to really go in within just the 333 - > perspective of, hey, we're going to be listeners, and we go in. 334 - > We do a lot of interviews, we try and deeply understand 335 - > customers, we deeply understand the company, we listen, we ask a 336 - > lot of questions, and we start over the course of all of our 337 - > work understanding and getting to know the company, that's 338 - > where we start to think through different scenarios, and we come 339 - > to the workshops with a few scenarios in mind, and then we 340 - > go through the process as a group to decide what works, 341 - > because ultimately the people in the room at the workshop, 342 - > they're the experts, and they're the ones that need to live with 343 - > this brand every day.

Bring these different paths together 344 - > with their expertise helps us get to a really great outcome 345 - > that works for everyone. 346 - > Morgan McLintic: I love that. I love that. So, it's very much a 347 - > - you've got the process, but it's very much a sort of 348 - > discovery for everyone, and that keeps it nice and open, and 349 - > everyone can get there, but it feels heard and gets their 350 - > input.

Yeah, slightly to agree with the outcome. You talked a 351 - > little bit about the rollout of the new brand internally. There, 352 - > we're going to. You know, a little drip campaign, and 353 - > there's workshops, and you're getting the CEO do the do a Q 354 - > and A, and there's maybe some sessions on how to use the new 355 - > brand, etc.

Just tell us a little bit more about how you 356 - > should roll out the brand, I guess, inside out internally, 357 - > and then to partners and customers, etc. 358 - > Megan Adler: Yeah, absolutely. 359 - > So, I think internal rollout is something that skipped a lot, 360 - > and we went through some of the things that you can do, but it's 361 - > important to tailor a plan to your company and your culture, 362 - > because every company is different, and so we want to 363 - > make sure you get all the appropriate touch points.

One 364 - > company that we worked with a few years back, we actually 365 - > rolled out the messaging to the entire company, and they had 366 - > 2000 employees, and so we put together a stand and deliver 367 - > program for the entire company, where they had group leaders, 368 - > and then those group leaders led workshops, and by the end of it, 369 - > every single person at the company was singing the same 370 - > song, and that is the way to do it. You need to get people on 371 - > the same page, you need programs, and you need to make 372 - > sure you're doing it in a methodical way.

Once you have 373 - > your internal team excited, they become brand evangelists. 374 - > Everyone goes to barbecues, everyone has networks, everyone 375 - > posts on LinkedIn, and so getting people on the same page 376 - > about this message can help. It can really have a multiplying 377 - > effect for your brand. Once you get that, it's time to think 378 - > about the outside world.

Talking to customers is really 379 - > important. Nobody likes change, so we need to talk to customers 380 - > and tell them what's in it for them. Hey, we have this new 381 - > brand, but look at all the great things that are ahead for you 382 - > because of that. Same with partners and vendors, we want to 383 - > communicate the benefits for each individual group and make 384 - > sure that's clear, and then for there just thinking about the 385 - > greater market to prospects when we're going to market and we're 386 - > rolling out a brand and announcing it, usually what 387 - > we'll do is put together a launch campaign, and what will 388 - > that look like?

Social media posts, sometimes there's a media 389 - > PR component, there could be video blogs, and we're really 390 - > bringing together a multi-touch strategy to ensure that we're 391 - > reaching as many people as possible across different 392 - > mediums, and we're also thinking through what is the messaging 393 - > and how can we communicate this in a way that's going to get 394 - > people excited and show them the benefit of it, so that campaign 395 - > creates a moment in time where people are excited and you need 396 - > to capitalize on that.

So, what we usually do as a part two to 397 - > that is a campaign, and during that campaign we capitalize on 398 - > the excitement of the launch, and we go to market with a 399 - > thought leadership campaign, a report or something that really 400 - > showcases that expertise of this new brand, and there's a whole 401 - > strategy behind that as well, but the idea is you kind of have 402 - > multi touch across a couple of different campaigns, 403 - > Morgan McLintic: yeah, I like the idea of having a very 404 - > detailed rollout plan, so that all your sort of stakeholders 405 - > have their own elements to it, but also externally for rest of 406 - > world.

Okay, this is a moment where people are paying 407 - > attention to you, have something else for them to then engage 408 - > with your thought leadership piece, or your demand change 409 - > piece, or whatever the other engagement is, because this is 410 - > one of the few moments when you've got attention. What are 411 - > you going to do with it? Because otherwise we're going to read 412 - > the CMOS blog of here's why we've got the new logo and why 413 - > we've learned. And okay, but then I just bounce out and I go 414 - > and do something else.

You want me to then go, okay? And here's 415 - > an example of our new brand and some of the thinking that we've 416 - > got and where we're going, so that we give them a real taste 417 - > for it. So, beyond the sort of financial engineering and maybe 418 - > technical integration behind an M and A, there's also this 419 - > concept of cross selling. Right, we have a proposition, and I can 420 - > now sell it into our new customer base, and their 421 - > customer base can buy our existing proposition.

Cross 422 - > selling, as you mentioned, right at the beginning, is really 423 - > important, because I think a lot of the numbers are predicated 424 - > around all right, we think x percent of our customer base is 425 - > going to buy, let's factor that in, that's upside for us all, 426 - > but they do have to buy, it has to actually happen, and so you 427 - > know. Okay, it's easy to write that down on a piece of paper on 428 - > the model. Then marketing, okay, off you go.

How do you think 429 - > about cross selling? How do we make that happen? 430 - > Megan Adler: Absolutely, so I think that first of all you need 431 - > to take cross selling into consideration at the very 432 - > beginning of the process, so when you're making decisions 433 - > about brand and messaging, start there and make sure you're 434 - > thinking about, is this a message we can take to market to 435 - > help us scale our revenue from there. As you start to roll it 436 - > out, that's another part of the rollout process, right, making 437 - > sure that sales and.

Marketing are trained on the new messaging 438 - > on the new brand and creating those avenues for cross selling, 439 - > so we're working with a customer right now that has a few 440 - > different internal divisions, and they're not cross selling 441 - > with those divisions, so we're helping them put a program into 442 - > place where they have umbrella messaging, like we talked about, 443 - > that connects everything together, and then messaging 444 - > that allows them to cross sell across each of the four 445 - > divisions, and having a plan in place for cross selling, and to 446 - > enable it is key.

Otherwise, it's not going to happen out of 447 - > the blue. You have to train people, you have to have a 448 - > process, you have to have the right messaging, and that's 449 - > something we really help our customers think through. 450 - > Morgan McLintic: Brilliant. I have worked with a company that 451 - > got bought by Cisco, and Cisco has a massive order book.

They 452 - > have loads of things that they're selling for their sales 453 - > team, and of course, their sales team can't know all the 454 - > different things. So we literally were doing paid media 455 - > campaigns and social media campaigns not aimed at 456 - > prospects, but aimed at the Cisco sales team, so that they 457 - > knew, "Hey, we're a company that, but Cisco had bought four 458 - > other companies at that point, they would just pop in company, 459 - > we had to literally market as if they were prospects to the sales 460 - > team of the parent company to get attention, unbelievable, but 461 - > really important, because then they just drag you along, and 462 - > that you're the garlic bread to the pizza that they're selling, 463 - > they're like, okay, just have some of this with a great, it'll 464 - > work very well, but yeah, you've got to sales people are busy, 465 - > and they are used to selling their own, they're very familiar 466 - > with the with with all these products, these things I don't 467 - > know about them.

Also, I don't know how to price them. I don't 468 - > know whether they're good. I don't want to jeopardize my main 469 - > deal. There's risk, right?

You have to incentivize them, but 470 - > you also have to just get them familiar with the brand. 471 - > Megan Adler: Enabling sellers is tough, right? They also don't 472 - > like to read a lot because they're really busy. They're not 473 - > spending a long time digging through 20 page documents that 474 - > maybe you would see in other functions, and so it's important 475 - > to get to them and communicate with them in a way that's clear, 476 - > that's concise, that's short.

We do a lot of in-person work with 477 - > sellers, and we do a lot of training to make sure that 478 - > everyone is aligned and doing things in the same way. 479 - > Morgan McLintic: This is really important, and a very broad 480 - > definition of brand, like a lot of this is change management or 481 - > management consulting. Even, okay, we can't have a podcast 482 - > without talking about AI, because it's the law. Tell me, I 483 - > know that you guys use a lot of AI, but just tell me about the 484 - > role of AI in this entire process.

485 - > Megan Adler: Absolutely, we are definitely living in a world 486 - > where AI is the law. I like the way you frame that, and 487 - > honestly, we use it a lot in our work as well. So, with AI, if 488 - > you put in a bunch of stuff that's low quality, you're going 489 - > to get something on the other side that's low quality. So, our 490 - > strategy, our messaging, our positioning, that's something we 491 - > do with humans, we use our top strategists.

We spend a lot of 492 - > time thinking about it and getting it right, but we're 493 - > using a lot of AI to do things like market research, 494 - > competitive analysis, buyer persona profiles. A lot of that 495 - > research stuff that used to take so much time is automated, it's 496 - > fast. It allows us to move faster, and then once we have 497 - > this really solid foundation with a great brand design 498 - > system, brand messaging, and we put it, we use it as input for 499 - > AI.

That's where we can start creating marketing collateral a 500 - > lot faster, or sales collateral, right? You can spin up one 501 - > pagers using AI if you have the right input. You can take a 502 - > piece and spin it into a lot of different formats, so maybe you 503 - > have a one pager and we turn it into a LinkedIn post, and then 504 - > we turn it into a blog post. AI is really great for that.

It's 505 - > basically enabling us to move faster, do more personalized at 506 - > scale. That's really important, and then also we use it to help 507 - > with geo, right, with generative AI search, and so you can use AI 508 - > for things like just beefing up your content and finding ways to 509 - > make sure that it's more visible in AI searches. 510 - > Morgan McLintic: Yeah, I imagine, because when you're 511 - > doing an acquisition, there's just a lot of information to 512 - > absorb, and so that even just that research piece, just 513 - > ingesting all the information about this brand and their ICPs 514 - > and their customer, digging through all sales calls, all the 515 - > information that is available to you that you might not normally 516 - > have got to, at least you can now ingest and absorb and 517 - > synthesize and turn it, make sure it's a good input.

So I 518 - > love that. Now we've gone through all this work with all 519 - > these different brands, creating this umbrella brand, and maybe 520 - > some sort of child brands underneath it, product brands 521 - > underneath it. Nice visual identity, everything's reset to 522 - > the core here, but one of the downsides of AI is now all of 523 - > the employees can create their own assets, because, hey, I know 524 - > it dissipates across, like this is true of all marketing right 525 - > now, but How do you keep people having a cohesive brand and stop 526 - > it just getting diluted by enthusiastic marketing material 527 - > creators.

528 - > Megan Adler: Absolutely, that's an age-old problem with people 529 - > going and spinning up their own version of things, and that's 530 - > something that I think all companies struggle with. And I 531 - > think having clear brand guidelines, having templates 532 - > that people can leverage the other thing that we're doing 533 - > internally at Sublime is we have AI projects that are loaded, 534 - > pre-loaded with our data and our information about the client, so 535 - > we have our team use those, so we know that they're working 536 - > from our data and that it has the background they need to do 537 - > it successfully.

538 - > Morgan McLintic: Oh, that's a good idea. So, you're creating 539 - > the Claude project, if you like, for the client stakeholders to 540 - > use, and say, okay, I know you're you can't resist the 541 - > temptation to create this new one pager using AI, at least use 542 - > ours, which has got all the prompts and has got the right 543 - > information in there, and has got the guard rails, and I might 544 - > not see the actual output, but I know that I've controlled. I 545 - > think that's very smart.

I love that. There's an idea for all 546 - > the marketing teams to borrow. 547 - > Okay, just as we wrap here, you've written a whole playbook 548 - > about how to do these brand roll-ups. What's one thing that 549 - > you've learned about brand integration the rest of us 550 - > probably haven't noticed 551 - > Megan Adler: how complex it is.

552 - > I think a lot of times we go in and we're like, oh, look, 553 - > there's a new logo, how cool is that, new brand, great, done, 554 - > but so much work went into that. 555 - > There's so much work on the change management side, the 556 - > research side, the creation side, the rollout side, and just 557 - > I've gained a new appreciation for that, and also how important 558 - > it is. We have literally seen companies get a huge bump in 559 - > their revenue, improve cross-selling, everything turns 560 - > when they have a great message and a great brand, and we've 561 - > seen other companies who floundered because, and they 562 - > came to us because they didn't have the right foundation, and 563 - > so it's critical, it's foundational for everything that 564 - > you do, 565 - > Unknown: and you'll want to make sure you get that right.

566 - > Morgan McLintic: I love that, you know, Brian, it comes to M 567 - > and A brand, it can feel soft, but when it's in M and A, it's 568 - > deadly serious, and has a huge impact on the success of a deal 569 - > or not. So, having a good framework for that, and a 570 - > process, and putting the right effort behind it sounds vital. 571 - > And just some of the examples you've given that have been 572 - > really proven there. Okay, so Megan Adler is the CEO and 573 - > founder of Sublime Design media, and Megan, thanks for sharing 574 - > some of this.

It's been great talking to you. If people want 575 - > to get in touch with you, where should they go? 576 - > Megan Adler: They can add me on LinkedIn, just look for Megan 577 - > Adler, and I will be there. 578 - > Morgan McLintic: Wonderful, Megan, thanks for your time 579 - > today.

Really enjoyed that, and we look forward to talking to 580 - > you again soon. 581 - > Unknown: Bye.