Here’s why brand and performance marketing need to go hand in hand.

Two of our agency partners (TikTok and Tracksuit) have produced a revolutionary report on why Performance & Brand Marketing achieve better outcomes together.

Gone are the days of pitting them against each other; of picking one over the other.

And whilst we could go on and on explaining why, that wouldn’t be very Data of DataSauce. So, some major callouts before the whole shebang.

• High awareness brands achieve 2.86x the conversion rate of low awareness brands.
• Medium awareness brands achieve 1.48x the conversion rate of low awareness ones.
• Click-through rates and brand awareness? Zero significant correlation. Any brand can smash it in this department, but high clicks and likes don’t guarantee sales.
• Brands with higher awareness can achieve 43% more efficient conversion outcomes.

TL;DR – Especially on TikTok, brands that are active, known and remembered perform the best when it comes to the most crucial business objective: Conversions.

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Quick pause for some definitions.

What is performance marketing? Digital marketing campaigns where brands pay to advertise across online platforms (e.g. social media, affiliate channels) to achieve specific, measurable outcomes like sales, leads, website traffic, or any other granular KPIs

What is brand marketing? Strategy of promoting a company’s brand as a whole, beyond individual products or services – to nurture the relationship between brand and consumers, enhancing more “qualititative” metrics like brand recognition, reputation and brand recall.

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Brand Marketing vs. Performance Marketing

No. Not versus, but AND.

“Should we invest in brand or performance?” is the marketing equivalent of asking if you should breathe or drink water. Your paid strategy should always build brand while driving sales, and the biggest levers to pull often lies in:

1. Your ad creative,
2. Your brand’s presence on content-first channels like TikTok. 
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What should modern brand building look like?

Cooperate with culture. Don’t just co-opt it.

Trends are all well and good, but in the grand scheme of things, content (and potential virality) falls under the umbrella concept of “culture” – a space for conversation, community, and relevant ideas to co-exist in. Don’t be the brand that bolts onto trends you don’t understand, because it will be glaringly obvious that you’re posting for the sake of it.

Instead, show up where your people are in ways that feel ownable, not opportunistic. 

The goal isn’t to mimic Duolingo or RyanAir, but to understand why they work – and find your own version of it. Want advice that’s a little more concrete? Sweet, here’s four.

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1. Limited resources? Focus on creativity over budget.

Harsh truth? TikTok doesn’t care about your $50K campaign if it doesn’t feel human and viewers don’t feel compelled to watch more than two seconds of it.

TikTok is a platform that undertakes target audience analysis every second. 

Watch-times and engagement rates are equivalent to customer feedback, meaning the app’s algorithm always makes sure that widely delivered content is good. Period. 

And even though there’s no one-sized-fits-all definition of a “good” TikTok, the best ones often look a little like brutally entertaining, lo-fi, idea-first videos.

In fact, overproduced = perceived as an ad = scrolled past.

Audiences come to TikTok for entertainment and value, not polish. Creativity wins every time and extra budget? That’s just the amplifier. So, smaller brands with clear strategy and a decent iPhone can absolutely outpace legacy players on attention and relevance.

2. Establish your niche, then scale it.

Want to grow your brand? Don’t go broad.

It can be tempting to make your content as applicable as possible to everyone, but that also limits TikTok’s understanding of who you truly want to reach as a business.

Go deep instead.

Like how Frank Body went all-in on skincare girlies with coffee scrubs and cheeky copy before expanding into international markets. Or how Bondi Sands claimed the self-tan space so hard they became synonymous with the Aussie summer. Or even Culture Kings, which started as a streetwear cult favourite and scaled up into a global experience, one sneaker drop at a time. One thing they all had in common?

Own a specific angle for a specific group, then scale from there.

It’s how you make your brand mean something from the get-go, and nurture strong relationships with the right demographics – who truly believe you exist for them.

3. Consistent cadence over picture perfect.

Today’s best brands are built from a thousand little moments, not one major campaign.

With an influx of content all the time, people forget. And people forget fast, even if an event or moment was something wild for the books.

But it’s much harder to forget something that’s always-on and always happening.

Your brand is what people piece together from TikToks, memes, influencer partnerships, Reels, emails, offline events, and maybe even a conversation they caught on the tram. 

It’s all of it. Fragmented, messy, and deeply human.

So, it’d just be a real pity if you weren’t on any of those channels… Like TikTok, for instance. You’ll never go viral if you don’t post to begin with. And it isn’t even necessary to aim for one perfect message – aim for consistency, authenticity, and fun. That’s your strategy’s job.

4. Keep the human touch, and bring back IRL moments.

We’re in the era of peak internet.

TikTok is TV, AI writes your emails, ChatGPT is providing medical advice. It’s no wonder IRL is gradually creeping back in fashion – run clubs, book clubs, warehouse sales, etc. 

And while AI can help you brainstorm and consolidate information, it can’t give your brand soul. That beautiful backstory about how your product came to be? ChatGPT can’t make that sh*t up, and yet THAT’S the gold. 

Your brand identity needs to feel real.

And nothing is more real than a founder with something to say, and the guts to say it with personality. Bonus point if you hold an event and meet your customers face to face. Subtle plug, but our sister-agency Sticki has an Events & Activation service that does just that

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So, the play from here?

1. End the “brand vs. performance” debate. You need both.
2. Work in tandem with culture, but never chase trends you don’t understand.
3. Be creative, not expensive. TikTok loves humans, not high-budget ads.
4. Go niche. Saturate a specific space that makes sense for you, then scale.
5. Take it offline. Use your online presence to bring people together, ideally IRL.
6. Just keep on keeping on. Meaning be consistent, and commit to habits like posting on TikTok. If you still find it unserious or inconsequential, you’re falling behind.

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Chat with our expert strategists for some proven ways to tie both pillars together seamlessly.

We've got a few ideas.