The Risks of Ignoring Brand in Your Product

When product teams build fast and brand is left behind, user experience gaps emerge — and trust erodes.

In this first installment of our Brand & Product Series, Focus Lab CEO Bill Kenney sits down with Lee Eisenbarth (Partner, Max Q) to unpack why brand and product are still so often siloed, and why that separation is a critical failure for B2B startups and scale-ups.

From early-stage identity myths to missed emotional cues in product design, this conversation sets the foundation for a new way forward: one where brand is built in from day one.

What we cover:

• Why product-first thinking often undervalues brand
• How emotional architecture builds resonance and retention
• The business risk of “brand as garnish” thinking
• Real-world moments where brand drives product trust
• How to align marketing, product, and brand as one experience

Whether you're a founder, product leader, or anyone shaping brand in your organization, this series is a must-watch on building unified experiences that drive clarity, trust, and long-term growth.

Episode Resources:

• Learn more about MaxQ
• "Brand Isn't the Frosting. It's the Framework." (Article by Lee Eisenbarth)
• Connect with Lee on LinkedIn

Full Transcript:

[Lee Eisenbarth]

When teams treat brand as a nice to have they miss the bigger point. Brand is not decoration, it's direction. It's how your product actually means something and creates emotional stickiness, which is the whole purpose of these B2B businesses.

[Bill Kenney]

Hey everyone, this is Bill Kenney, CEO, and co-founder of Focus Lab, a global B2B brand agency. You know when you are ready for a new software tool and you do your research and maybe you start getting some marketing materials around a certain software product, or you get a product referred to you from a friend. You go to the website, you sign up for a free trial and you start using the product and it doesn't feel like what you signed up for.

There's a gap there. There's a brand gap there. It either looks different, it functions differently. It just feels like not what you interfaced with originally when you made the decision. That's exactly what we're gonna talk about in these next three episodes: this topic of brand and product. Why is it that they're often built in silos? I sit down with Lee Eisenbarth, who has a rich history from design to design leadership, to leading product within organizations, to now running his own agency, helping startups with very similar problems.

They're building a product, but what's the brand behind it? With my brand background and his experience, we really dive into this important topic of brand and product being siloed when it needs to be one. It needs to be a single unit. That's where the magic is. So episode one is gonna be all about why we believe this is happening.

Episode two is going to be about actionable points that we would share with any startup founder about how to build in tandem. And then in the third episode we're gonna get into where we think the industry is going in both brand and product, as concerned with say, AI and these types of things.

A lot of valuable information. I hope you enjoy.

[Bill Kenney]

Uh, Mr. Lee. Dude, excited to have you on the show. Props to Shannon on our team for connecting us and saying, I think that you all should talk about a subject. So here we are about to talk about that subject. But before we do that, would you mind introducing yourself to the viewers and listeners? What the hell are you doing? What's your background?

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Yeah, I'd be happy to. Also first thank you, Bill. Thank you Shannon, for having me on. For everyone who doesn't know me, I'm Lee Eisenbarth. I've spent the last 15ish years kind of bouncing between both sketchbooks and spreadsheets. My brain, uh, pushes pixels and it also helps steer strategy. So I've been the first designer at a startup. Uh, I've been VP of Design at a design firm. I've led product and, uh, everything from designing brands and products for seed stage teams that have no money, all the way to helping the Marines build software that helps make them mission ready.

[Bill Kenney]

Hell yeah.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

So, yeah, and like some of that I can talk about, and then other parts. It's really fun because I just get to say it's, it's classified. But yeah, and then personally I just had a kid!

[Bill Kenney]

Congrats.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

We’ve got a five month old, um, who may or may not make a cameo in this depending on, uh, how he's feeling today. He may have some thoughts to share.

[Bill Kenney]

Roger that. Yeah. Yeah.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Um, but really like all of these experiences have snowballed into my current role leading the design practice at Max Q, which I know we're gonna hit that, more in a second.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah. You know, I was doing a little bit of digging this morning and I was like, wow, I, I saw that progression. LinkedIn would be my area of learning that background. I'm like, designer to design leader to product, to product leader, to now running his own agency.

I'm like, okay, I can actually see now why Shannon was like, y'all should talk. Because you're gonna have such a great deep, rich perspective on this topic, which is marrying brand and product together. How those two things need to be one, but they're often not seen as one.

And most often I think, product is first out of the gate building the thing. Then eventually people go like, oh snap, we need a brand behind this. But then they don't always pull those two things together. So you work with a lot of startups, but you even talked all the way up to military level.

What do you think the misconceptions are? That lead people to not understand that brand is important that early, right? It's just all about the product and brand's not even thought about yet.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

I ask myself that every morning. Um, I, I, because like it makes so much sense in my brain, but it doesn't make sense in others. But you're, you're absolutely right. So many brands treat their identity system as a garnish rather than the glue that holds everything together.

[Bill Kenney]

Hmm. Well said.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

I think too, like without it, your product, uh, it may work just fine. But, it will feel forgettable, generic, and potentially even soulless. And so I feel like that's the real risk, that people don't just need your product to function. They need it to resonate. And the way to do that is a really strong brand.

[Bill Kenney]

I think the garnish point is fantastic. That's something I think everybody can understand very easily. Right. So when you say garnish, I'm guessing you're kind of painting this picture of: people see, brand and identity as very much a visual exercise. We need a logo, we need a, you know, these types of things and, but that's all it is.

It's then just stuck in that corner of their business.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

And the visual system is certainly part of it, right? However, it also goes to, uh, how your people communicate. Like Chewy for instance. Thankfully I've never had to experience this myself, but have had friends and family kind of, uh, receive this type of treatment.

But when one of their pets unfortunately, passes away. Chewy has, uh, sent a card. They've, uh, sent flowers. Like, all of these things are brand and how you're perceived in the market. I think you and I both know, like your brand is what people say behind your back. And when you have, a really strong product and a really strong brand, good things will happen.

It's those details that really matter, not just in the visuals, but iin the strategy and the communication and how you speak about your business.

[Bill Kenney]

And do you find most often the people you're working with, they've not made those connections yet? Where brand is really kind of like a marketing asset and let's just say the product team is building product. These two things are separated by a wall.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Absolutely. So, um. Given Max Q. I didn't explain the name of it, but it's a space reference, but I kind of view it as like building a spaceship and then just saving the oxygen system for later. And so like the engineers are so concerned, they just need this thing to fly, but there needs to be astronauts on it who need oxygen and so like, I feel when teams really treat brand as like a nice to have, or just a visual system, like a color palette, a font system, a clever campaign, whatever, they, they miss the bigger point like. Brand is not decoration — it's direction.

And I, I think too, like how your product actually means something and creates that emotional stickiness, which is the whole purpose of these B2B businesses.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well said. It has to be more than just a feature or a product. I can understand though, I can empathize for the startup founder that might even be technically minded, more of an engineer wiring

Their thought is linear to product. Right? Well, like, yeah, we can say all we want over here on the fuzzy lovey-dovey brand stuff, but the product has to work, right? You know, we have to have something that people need in the market. And it's like, yes, that is true. That's also true. Both worlds can be true. It's not just one or the other.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

I think too, like when you're thinking about like those very early stage teams, like all those founders are thinking about are speed and survival and brand gets postponed, because it's seen as fluff, or a nice touch for later when there's more time or budget or breathing room,

The irony is, that's when you need a brand, let alone a solid brand, the most, when you're about to go raise Or are unleashing a new product to the world, you only have one chance to, to go to market and there's, there's only so much facelift you can give when you don't start with it in the first place.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah, it's, you know, I think we see people on both sides of the spectrum. I assume you do too. Like we're speaking with somebody just yesterday, they have zero products yet, but they have the vision and they want to start thinking about brand to help bring the vision, the story, and then the finance fundraise to life, and then build the thing.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

I think too, like all of this AI stuff happening, and I know as part of this series, we're gonna dig into that eventually, but there, there are going to be so many products that are stitched together with scotch tape that come to market, and I bet the vast majority of them won't have a solid brand.

[Bill Kenney]

Very good point.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

I think this is the time, this is the year, for brand to really make a stand. And the products that do come to market, even if it's a matter of the ones that will last are the ones that have that really strong brand behind it. And so like I know there's a lot of talk of designers losing their jobs and engineers losing their jobs.

Like, I’ve used a bunch of these tools and I know they're gonna get so much better, but what they can't do is generate something your team can generate.

[Bill Kenney]

I appreciate that.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

I think that human touch needs to be there. It must be there.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah, I think that without going too far into that too, 'cause I know we'll get there, a brand that I think about that is really good at delivering on experience but is a technical engineering tool. Maybe this is a stretch, but I think about the language learning apps and Duolingo, the technical aspect behind what they've built, I'm assuming, this is really dumbing it down, broadly speaking, not terribly hard, right?

Remember there's like Rosetta Stone back in the day and you got DVDs and CDs, right? Like people have been entering into that space for a long time, but Duolingo has done it in a way where it's not just about learning the language.

They've created a kind of a branded experience around the whole entire thing. And that has become what I would consider maybe like a magnifier, like an amplifier for what might be one of hundreds of language learning apps. If I had to guess, there's probably like a top five of the ones we know, but there's probably a million.

And to your point, with AI tools, how easy is it gonna be to build so much crap without that brand? Your point's exactly like a Duolingo. It is just that. It's just kind of like, it's just a thing.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Also like with Duolingo, generally I am anti mascot, like it is case by case basis. But what they did with their most recent marketing campaign of Duolingo Owl, did you see this getting killed by a cybertruck?

[Bill Kenney]

Oh, yes. Yeah.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

They killed off their mascot. And so that's another unique brand moment that wouldn't have happened if they didn't invest in the brand in the first place. And like the plan was never to kill off the Sad Owl. Um, also, I think he's still alive.

[Bill Kenney]

Yes. Yes.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

I check in with my mom every now and then to make sure he's still kicking. But, uh, like that's a brand moment too and people miss out on it when they neglect it.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah. Yeah. Now let's, this is gonna bridge us, well, I believe into, what are other branded moments then that we can talk about? I think Duolingo is a great example, which I had not planned to bring up. It was top of mind. Kudos to them. Power of brand.

I start to think about, well you even kind of labeled it, and you've written on this before.

So definitely we'll have links in the show notes for people to find those articles, but filling the emotional gap.

These kinds of, let's call them branded interactions, not just duo the owl coming up. And, you know, a lot of people give the app heat because it's like, it's uh, it's throwing shade at you.

It's making you feel bad because you're missing your streak. But how little, maybe interactions, when you, when you complete something, these little animated moments, these little sprinkles of the visual identity, but also just kind of like joy as you know, we might say. How important do you think that emotional gap is and how often do you think clients recognize the value of that emotional gap?

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Yeah. Good question. I think there's a significant chasm, because you have these marketing leaders who are trying to champion, uh, we need a new website and sometimes brand is part of that. At least the good CMOs know that.

And then you have the CFOs who don't understand emotions. Probably, I'm just kidding. Uh, that's terrible.

I think there's a real dissonance between the two. And so like, the way I like to frame it to my clients like when you, you think of like a customer's expectations, right? And, a product that might not deliver. So maybe they have beautiful marketing, like that, that's just marketing, and it doesn't matter if that impression is delightful, premium, playful, or even trustworthy, the second they log into that product, it has to back it up.

And so like, when you're asking about apps that do it well, um, I'm not suggesting Chase is the most beautifully designed app. I think all apps have room for improvement and that goes for things that I've designed as well. But when you think of something like a banking app, you need it to feel trustworthy and you personally need to feel safe if you're going in there to transfer money or accept money.

And I feel like, yes, the visual identity and that whole system plays a part in that trust with color psychology and blue feeling trustworthy and all of those things. But the product itself, if you enter in your credentials and then just are hit with a 60 second loader, like that doesn't give me the warm fuzzies.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah. Where's my money going? Did it go to the wrong spot?

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Exactly. And so like, it doesn't matter how slick the website is, like that brand, uh, that kind of layer, is the promise and then product is actually the proof.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah. Well said.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

And if the proof disappoints, trust just doesn't erode, it collapses completely.

[Bill Kenney]

It's pretty hard to get that back, right? What do they say? Like it takes years to build up the trust, but like a day to lose it basically.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Yeah, it's unreal. Like you, you never get a second chance at a first emotional impression.

And so, like, this is where I go back to Chewy. Um, sure they sell pet food, but them sending sympathy cards when your pet passes away, that's not a feature. It's emotional architecture and a brand being part of every touch point.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah. You know, I like that you touched on Chase and this idea of trust and the interaction of it. I can't help but think because I also spend a decent amount of time in these kinds of crypto worlds, right? Whether it's a brand or an actual tool, like a Ledger. You want to talk about clicking a button and not knowing where your stuff is going, dude.

And that's the biggest hurdle of crypto hitting a mainstream customer right now. They're just not gonna go through the rigamarole of what feels like a sketchy little USB card and you punch in a code and you're just waiting for it to arrive on the other side, and there's nobody in between, right?

That is also the, that's the value prop of crypto. But man, it is quite scary. It does not make you feel comfortable. So yes, somebody like Chase their job is to be the antithesis of that, right?

And through the product experience, let's not hit 'em with that loader. God, if there is a delay, what are we gonna put in front of them to make it feel like they didn't wait that long?

There's gonna be so much psychological brand slash product items that need to be thought through there. That's the pairing of brand and product.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

100%. These are not different departments. Brand and product are of that same experience and all of what you just talked about with crypto and I'm sure the folks at Coinbase are thinking about this.

It needs to be their marketing team. It needs to be their product team. It needs to be their brand team because of all of these things, down to the empty state graphic while your stuff is loading, you wanna know that it's thinking.

And you're almost getting to those moments of delight, which is unique for every product, but happy to talk through some different areas.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah, yeah, Well said that like maybe we need to give, deliver some messaging that even delivers a little bit of humor right here in this part of the product because we know they might have a little bit of fear in this waiting period.

Yeah, tricky balance, right? But it all comes through, what is the brand?

Maybe, you know, if the brand is more like a Duolingo, it embraces this idea of humor and kind of joy and personality and really pushes it forward. Where some of these, let's call it banks and crypto and maybe more technical products, they could over index really technical, really fast. Full dark mode.

Everything's pretty serious. High tech, and it's like, oh, we might have to soften that a little bit if you want to get to general mainstream, but let's not go on the crypto rant here.

We work in B2B branding specifically. So, the kitch there is like, oh B2B branding. That means it's technical and uninteresting and maybe potentially boring.

Our clients don't want it to be that generally that's why they're coming to us. But I think, um, people's perception of B2B is that it's less emotional and I think people like you and I would argue then therefore it should be even more emotional than, if that is true. B2B buyers are still people.

So do you run into the same kind of misconceptions in the B2B space? Do you think that product is also challenged by that in the B2B space?

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Absolutely. I think emotion gets overlooked so frequently, and I think it's because in this like LinkedIn era, we've gotten tricked into thinking professional means emotionless.

I think, especially in B2B, there's this assumption that software needs to be fast, efficient, and clear, but not emotionally intelligent. So you're talking about that as those moments of levity, um, in a really intense moment.

Like, there needs to be more of that. I feel like the people using your product want to feel something, whether it's confidence, delight, clarity, relief, or even a little fun.

I think delight is 1000% a retention strategy. I think those that invest in a product, having an emotion like it, can really be used as a growth lever. And so I feel like when you have functionality that's just there and looks like every other app. It's, it's forgettable. Brand brings life to all of that.

[Bill Kenney]

Yes, yes, yes, yes. Man.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Do you guys use Asana?

[Bill Kenney]

We do use Asana. Yes, sir.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Okay. is super silly too, you know the unicorn that just jumps across the screen after you complete a random task.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah. Or is it a narwhal too? Is it their optionality there? Yeah.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Yes, there is a narwhal. So, those are the types of things that make people smile and like, obviously we're, we're two brand nerds, so we're gonna talk about it. But it only takes one really small, uh, magical moment to make that impression and that was the brand showing up inside of the product.

So it doesn't matter if you have the cleanest UX in the world. If it makes me feel nothing, I'm probably not coming back.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah. Yep. Because people are driven by emotion at the end of the day, right? Whether we all wanna believe it or not, know it's a tool. They're just trying to serve a function. Again, both worlds are true. Yes, Asana is a tool, and I do need it to serve just some functionality that I need, but I'm not mad when it delights me either.

And if anything, it makes it more memorable when you talk about it. Therefore, they're getting free marketing out of it, right? Like these things work. It has to be more than just the radio buttons you click and the, you know, the form fields you put your information into when you walk away from a product, it has to be more than that.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Yep, absolutely.

[Bill Kenney]

I think we covered this, but I'm gonna ask it anyways, so then, if these are true and they seem obvious to us, is it just us? Like why? Why do founders slash startups, why do they wait? Why don't they do it from the start?

[Lee Eisenbarth]

The comment section is gonna come after me for continuing to bring up the CFO, but if you look in the closed loss column, uh, and reasons why, like the majority of the time, it's because brand is under the umbrella of expensive and intangible to those decision makers, uh, your founders are told to, to build, to ship, to iterate. And brand is kind of like a later phase luxury — until it’s not.

[Bill Kenney]

And what the hell is it, anyways? Yes.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Yeah, exactly. Until you're six months in, struggling to explain what you do or rebranding for the second or third time or the sixth time, like HBO max, because the first version didn't stick.

I think brand debt is real and it is significantly harder to pay off than technical debt.

[Bill Kenney]

Say more.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

So one of our clients puts their SVP of Marketing in every single design review. This isn't like a formality, like they're a true partner in there. And it's because this particular individual knows this isn't just design, it's brand in motion and how decisions compound and build equity over time.

And so I think the brand debt of these delightful moments that the unicorns not being talked about because it's silly or a waste of engineering time, like those types of things are really hard to catch up on because there's always gonna be the next feature you need to build.

The Jira backlog is not getting any smaller. And so that's, that's what I meant by, brand debt, kind of being real. Technical debt gets so much, uh, attention in board meetings. Um, in engineering meetings. I would argue that brand debt, uh, should be treated the same.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah. You know, 'cause in saying that, I think about an analogy I often kind of draw from, ' cause I think the world understands it very clearly. This idea is like the restaurant that serves good food, the product and then the facade out front that either makes you want to walk into it or not.

Let's call that the identity, right? So the debt could be really good food coming out of that restaurant, but every time you drive by that strip mall and you see the outside of that restaurant, you're like, I would never go in there. And the more it looks like that, it is burnt into your brain, you'd never go in there. You'd never go in there.

So now they have to build even harder to change the perception. There's the debt you're digging back out of, right? Eventually you'll get them in there. They'll go, oh my God, this food is amazing. I'm so bummed. I didn't come here for the last four years. So, or somebody tells them, you get a word of mouth referral.

Okay. You can get around the immediate barrier, but there is debt there. Like now I have, there's mental friction of, oh, and then you see these like new ownership, or new business. Maybe it's the same business, new name, new identity, who knows? But maybe there's another example of some debt and how it shows up in the real world, not just like SaaS tooling.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Yeah, to use the, uh, restaurant analogy, um, in a sketchy strip mall, one, that's where some of the best places are. Um, however, if you go in you touch one of the menus and it's hella sticky. I'm not coming back, disgusting. But that is brand debt.

The owner is just worried about what they need to order for the next day and who cares about the design of the menu.

[Bill Kenney]

Yep. Because it's all about the food, right? We have the best chef, like we don't care about those things. They're auxiliary. People just want the best food. They just want the best product. And it's like, no, they kind of want it all to work together or something doesn't feel right. Or you walk into the epically designed, manicured place and the food is crap.

Right? It's the inverse problem.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Yeah. Sticky menus and lighting. Those are two pieces of brand debt for non B2B SaaS companies. Take care of that. Invest in that. You need to.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah. Faded pictures of old food on your, outside your window, eh, that's, that's not the way to sell the product.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Yeah, I totally agree.

[Bill Kenney]

Uh, alright Lee, last question, and this will be a good lead in for the next episode. Is there an appropriate right time then, given everything we've said, to start thinking about brand when you're building your product? How can somebody follow and trust what we're saying, and actually pull this off side by side?

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Yeah, I feel like the traditional CEO response is: yesterday.

But no, I think it really comes down to like when you treat brand as a surface level layer, you lose clarity, cohesion, trust, all the things we've been talking about. But, we need to think about brand as less of a bolt-on strategy and more of a build-in.

And so I believe, just like revenue is everyone's job, brand is also everyone's job. Because it's how you're talking about the business out in the wild. It's consistent email signatures, like all of those different touch points matter and therefore, like you need to start talking about it as soon as humanly possible.

But yeah, the best are built in tandem, and I know we're gonna get into that in the next episode.

[Bill Kenney]

Yeah, so I'm excited for you to share very specifically from your experience. And like, how can a startup build in tandem? How can it not be a world where it's one or the other? How can it not be a budget challenge and a timeline challenge? And a priorities challenge? How can a startup founder build in a way that they're asking who are we and what are we serving?

Both at the same time and ping ponging between those two worlds. They do not have to be two separate worlds. So we'll get into that in the next episode, building both brand and product in tandem. Until then, thank you, sir. I can't wait for some of these nuggets of wisdom to hit the streets and I'll see you in the next episode.

[Lee Eisenbarth]

Yeah. Thank you, Bill. See ya!

[Bill Kenney]

Ciao.