“It’s not fashionable these days to say that you want to put more effort towards brand and consumer sentiment because they’re harder to measure… And yet, if you don’t have that balance, you’re going to run into trouble sooner rather than later.”
— Lena Waters, CMO of Grammarly
There’s nothing I love more than hearing a B2B CMO champion top-of-funnel brand building — especially someone like Lena Waters, who helped guide Grammarly from a consumer-loved tool to a trusted enterprise solution.
Grammarly didn’t just “add” a B2B offering — they expanded into it. And their strong brand awareness from years of consumer marketing made that transition significantly smoother.
Lena gets something a lot of performance-minded marketers miss: Most of your future revenue doesn’t come from people in-market right now. It comes from the much larger group of out-of-market buyers — people who aren’t ready to act yet, but will be someday.
If your brand is familiar and trusted when those buyers enter the market, your performance marketing suddenly works a lot harder. Lower acquisition costs, faster sales cycles, better close rates — all fueled by prior investments in the brand.
That’s why Lena continues to invest in brand-building while scaling direct response.
Because here’s the truth:
✅ Brand isn’t soft.
✅ Brand isn’t a “nice to have.”
✅ Brand is a force multiplier that lifts every part of your funnel.
So yes, track your KPIs.
Optimize your CTAs.
But never forget:
The best-performing brands are the ones that people already know and trust when it’s time to buy.
—BJ