What happens when your brand story is used one-to-one in sales. Why that makes you miss opportunities. And how you can use your brand story in the right way to strengthen your sales.
by Gabrielle van Vlodrop
Sr. Creative Strategist
“We’ve just sharpened our brand story. Sales can use that, right?”
We hear that thought a lot. And honestly? It sounds logical.
But in practice, this is exactly where things start to go wrong. Because this way of thinking reveals that your commercial organisation is out of sync.
In this article, we explain why. What happens when your brand story is used one-to-one in sales. Why that costs you opportunities. And how your brand story can actually strengthen your sales story, if used the right way.
What do we see happening?
Marketing develops the brand story. A story that resonates. That captures what you stand for, what makes you unique, what you believe in. A story that gets you excited.
But the moment that brand story becomes the starting point of sales conversations, you’ll hear things like: “We are company X. Founded in year Y. And our mission is to…” Often followed by the familiar facts & figures slide.
Still sounds fine? Then keep reading.
A mismatch between goal and channel
The core issue here is that goals and channels get mixed up.
A brand story is powerful. It builds recognition, visibility, and brand affinity. Exactly what you need to attract attention from a large audience.
But that’s not why you’re sitting at the sales table. You’re not there to build your brand. You’re there to convince the person across from you. To show why your solution makes sense for their situation.
So what does your customer really gain from hearing about your mission? Or that you were founded in 2004? They listen politely, but it doesn’t land. Momentum fades. Attention drops. And it becomes harder and harder to steer the conversation toward a “yes.”
Marketing and sales are out of sync
What’s happening here is that marketing and sales are working past each other. The brand story does its job: it generates leads. But it doesn’t help move prospects across the finish line.
A strong brand story drives inflow.
A strong sales story drives conversion.
In between, a crucial step in sales enablement is often missing: translating the brand story into a sales story. And with that, truly empathizing with the customer’s challenges.
Too little focus on the customer
And you’re not the only ones. More than half of the B2B organisations we talk to don’t have a sharp view of their customer. What drives them. What keeps them up at night. And what actually moves them to act.
In a strong sales story, that customer is central. Not your product, but their world. Their challenge. They are the hero of the story.
Without a clearly defined target audience, every story automatically becomes inside-out. It’s about you, when it should be about them. Because that’s often where real differentiation lies. Not in what you sell, but in how you explain it. And how relevant that story is to the person across the table.
More than alignment
And this isn’t something you solve with another tool or an extra alignment meeting between sales and marketing. It requires something more fundamental: a different way of thinking. And a different way of having sales conversations.
As long as it’s not explicitly clear who your buyer is, which problem they need to recognise, and how to effectively pitch your solution to them, alignment remains superficial.
True alignment only happens when marketing and sales work from the same commercial story, not just the same brand story.
Let your brand story strengthen your sales story
So does sales have nothing to gain from the brand story? Absolutely not.
Your brand story often captures what truly sets you apart from competitors. USPs that should definitely show up in your sales story as well.
It also contains proof points that build credibility. Why you exist. Who you work for. Where you operate. These are strong arguments to support your product claims and the effectiveness of your solution.
A brand story is not a sales story, but used this way it can make your sales story much stronger.
That’s how you bring marketing and sales back in sync. And how you make sure it's not just you who gets excited about your story, but your customer does too.
Stay in Sync.
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