Beyond Financial Engineering: How Brand and Marketing Drives Investor Portfolio Value creation

Investors get concerned about stalled revenue curves, margin compression, talent churn, and portfolio companies that looked unstoppable at Series B but now feel suspiciously…average.

Across family offices, growth VCs and private equity firms, the underlying constraint is often the same: demand is not compounding at the rate the model requires. And when growth slows, financial engineering only stretches so far.

This is where brand and marketing stop being “nice to have” and start becoming the keys to value creation.

The Investor Portfolio Value Creation Reality: Different Capital, Similar Pressures

Family Offices

Family offices typically seek long-term compounding and capital preservation. But increasingly they are investing in operating businesses, not just assets; the tension here is:

• Concentrated bets

• Reputation risk

• Limited internal operating resource

• Desire for steady growth without reckless scaling

Brand here is about resilience and pricing power. It protects any downside, it increases optionality and it reduces dependency on short-term performance marketing spikes.

The IPA’s Long and Short of It research consistently shows that businesses investing in brand building (long-term emotional memory structures) outperform those relying solely on short-term activation. Long-term effects account for the majority of profit impact. For family offices thinking in decades, that matters.

Growth-Stage Venture Capital

Growth VCs face a slightly different heat:

• Follow-on funding expectations

• Clear path to category leadership

• Exit multiples tied to narrative and momentum

• Competitive noise in crowded sectors

WARC’s effectiveness studies show that distinctive brands are less price-sensitive and grow market share more efficiently. The Ehrenberg-Bass Institute reinforces this: mental availability and distinctive brand assets drive penetration growth.

A portfolio company that is mentally available and clearly differentiated requires less incremental spend to grow. CAC pressure reduces. Margin improves. Exit story strengthens. Brand acts as a growth efficiency lever.

Private Equity

Private equity firms operate with sharper timelines and clearer value-creation plans focusing on:

• EBITDA expansion

• Multiple arbitrage

• Operational efficiency

• Clear exit horizon

Historically, brand was seen as intangible, however it is increasingly recognised as a driver of tangible metrics:

• Reduced customer churn

• Increased share of wallet

• Improved employer brand (reducing hiring costs)

• Premium pricing power

The IPA’s Effectiveness Databank demonstrates that campaigns with strong creative quality deliver significantly higher profit uplifts. Creativity is not fluffy - It compounds cashflow and in this sense, brand is an operational lever.

Where Scaleups Actually Get Stuck

From our work with scaleups and investor-backed businesses, the constraint rarely sits in one place.

Common portfolio challenges we see are:

1. A strong product but weak category positioning

2. Over-reliance on paid acquisition channels

3. Confused investor narrative versus market narrative

4. Marketing teams optimising tactics without strategic clarity

5. Growth plateau at £10–30m revenue with no clear next inflection point

Brand architecture, category entry points, mental availability, and distinctive assets are rarely audited with the same rigour as finance or ops, and in our experience, that is the missed opportunity.

Brand as a Multiplier, Not a Cost

The research for brand and it's role in growing a business - and creating investor portfolio value creation - is pretty clear:

• The IPA shows long-term brand investment improves profit growth and reduces volatility.

• WARC analysis highlights that balanced investment between brand and performance marketing delivers superior ROI versus performance-heavy mixes.

• McKinsey’s brand studies demonstrate that top-quartile brands outperform in total shareholder return.

This is not about “doing more marketing.”

When portfolio companies over-index on short-term activation, they often hit diminishing returns, CAC creeps up, and incrementality drops. At this point, it is common for teams to chase tactics and agencies to get some heat. But despite all the new efforts to tweak creatives and audiences, without brand salience, performance marketing becomes increasingly expensive oxygen.

In the Wild: Investor-Backed Brands That Drove Real Value

The examples below all have different capital structures, but show the same pattern and instances where 'brand' created;

1. Pricing power

2. Repeat purchase economics

3. Cultural salience

4. A stronger exit narrative

Gymshark

Backed by General Atlantic. From DTC disruptor to global performance brand. Gymshark focused on community-led brand building before capital. Investment then accelerated international scale. This is a textbook example of brand creating demand before capital magnifies it.

Monzo

VC-backed in one of the most crowded categories in finance. Monzo was all about bright coral cards, radical transparency and cultural momentum. Brand made customer acquisition socially contagious - not purely paid-media dependent.

Beats Electronics

Backed by The Carlyle Group, Beats had a premium positioning and cultural relevance. Sold to Apple Inc. for $3bn. Brand wasn’t the wrapper; it was the value.

Canada Goose

Backed by Bain Capital, Canada Goose turned outerwear into a status signal. The brand strength drove premium pricing and their IPO trajectory, leading to a strong investor narrative around pricing power.

Oatly

A VC-backed challenger that used a provocative brand voice and distinctive assets to explode category awareness globally. Even with later volatility, the brand built category scale and cultural dominance.

The OSER Perspective: Creative Rigour Meets Capital Discipline

We sit between two worlds.

Global agency effectiveness thinking (IPA, Cannes-winning strategy) and board-level, investor-aware growth advisory.

We understand the operational reality of scaling teams and systems and the creative science of how brands grow. Our role with investors is to help portfolio companies answer sharper questions:

• Where is growth constrained?

• Is this a demand problem or a distribution problem?

• Are we distinctive enough to justify our multiple?

• Are we investing correctly across long and short term?

• Is the investor narrative aligned with the market narrative?

We bring frameworks such as category entry point mapping, distinctive brand asset audits, and growth engine diagnostics into portfolio reviews and value-creation plans. This is consultancy-level rigour with creative industry insight.

If you manage a portfolio across family office, growth VC or private equity, here is the practical opportunity:

1. Identify which portfolio companies are plateauing due to brand and demand constraints.

2. Audit growth mix balance (brand vs activation).

3. Strengthen category positioning to support pricing power and exit multiples.

4. Equip portfolio CEOs with clearer growth narratives for boards and future capital raises.

The best investors know that spreadsheets are trailing indicators, the leading indicators live in perception, distinctiveness, salience and story.

You can optimise cost lines endlessly, or you can strengthen the asset itself.

That is where brand and marketing - done properly, with commercial discipline - become portfolio strategy.

If you’d like to explore how brand-led growth diagnostics or portfolio workshops could strengthen your value creation plan, we’re always open to a conversation.

Speak to OSER

FAQs

Isn’t brand a long-term play? Our fund cycle is 3–5 years.

Brand is long-term, but its effects are not invisible in the short term. IPA Effectiveness Databank studies show that brand investment improves pricing power, reduces volatility and increases conversion efficiency across channels. In a 3–5 year hold, that translates into stronger EBITDA, lower CAC pressure and a more compelling exit narrative. Brand is not a 20-year vanity project. It is a growth efficiency lever within your hold period.

2. How does brand actually impact EBITDA?

In three primary ways:

• Pricing power: stronger brands command premium pricing and reduce discount reliance.

• Customer retention: mental availability increases repeat purchase and lowers churn.

• Acquisition efficiency: distinctive brands convert more efficiently, reducing cost per acquisition over time.

When marketing is strategically aligned, it supports margin expansion rather than eroding it.

Isn’t this the responsibility of the portfolio company’s CMO?

Yes, but often without investor-level oversight or clarity on strategic balance.

In many scaleups, marketing teams are optimising channels rather than questioning fundamentals: category positioning, brand distinctiveness, demand mix, and narrative alignment with investor strategy.

We work alongside portfolio leadership to bring board-level rigour to those growth levers, ensuring marketing decisions support value creation, not just activity metrics.

What’s the difference between brand work and performance marketing?

Performance marketing drives short-term activation - capturing existing demand. Brand building expands and strengthens future demand - increasing mental availability and distinctiveness.

Research from the IPA and WARC consistently shows that the most effective growth strategies balance both. Over-indexing on performance alone typically leads to rising CAC and diminishing returns.

How can we identify which portfolio companies need brand intervention?

There are clear signals:

• Growth plateau between £10m–£30m revenue

• Rising CAC despite stable spend

• Heavy discounting to drive volume

• Weak differentiation in competitive pitches

• Exit conversations focused solely on cost discipline

These are often symptoms of demand constraints, not just operational inefficiencies.

Does brand really influence exit multiples?

Increasingly, yes. Strategic buyers and public markets value companies with strong category leadership, recognisable positioning and predictable demand. McKinsey research shows that top-quartile brands outperform in total shareholder return. A compelling growth narrative supported by demonstrable brand strength can strengthen perceived durability of earnings, which underpins multiples.

How does OSER work with investors specifically?

We typically support in three ways:

• Portfolio diagnostics to identify growth constraints

• Value-creation workshops for portfolio CEOs

• Strategic brand and growth advisory for high-potential assets

We operate in the language of investors; IRR, capital efficiency, margin expansion, while bringing effectiveness research and creative discipline into the conversation.