The branding statistic I will not
use to sell you branding

There is a branding statistic you have probably seen before.

The wording changes depending on who repeats it, but the claim usually sounds something like this:

Consistent branding can increase revenue by up to 33%.

It appears in agency articles, branding guides, social posts, statistics roundups, and sales pages.

It is a useful number if you are trying to convince someone to spend money on branding.

That is exactly why I wanted to know where it came from.

The answer is more interesting than the statistic.

The headline is stronger than the evidence

A 2019 press release issued by Lucidpress carried a headline saying companies with consistent branding could see revenue increases of up to 33%.

That headline travelled well.

Years later, variations of it are still repeated across branding content.

But when the underlying Lucidpress research is read more carefully, the evidence is not a measurement showing that companies improved brand consistency and then recorded a specific increase in revenue.

The 2021 State of Brand Consistency report, based on more than 450 respondents, asked people to estimate what they believed would happen if their branding were consistent.

Respondents estimated that revenue could increase.

That is different from observing an actual revenue increase.

Expected revenue is not measured revenue

This distinction matters.

Imagine asking 450 business professionals:

“If your branding were more consistent, how much do you think revenue would improve?”

Their answers tell us something about what those respondents believe.

They do not tell us what actually happened to revenue after a branding change.

To establish that, you would need a different kind of study.

You would need to observe businesses before and after an intervention, account for other changes happening at the same time, and establish some credible relationship between the branding work and the commercial result.

That is difficult.

Revenue is affected by too many things.

Pricing.

Distribution.

Sales performance.

Product quality.

Market conditions.

Advertising.

Customer service.

Competition.

Seasonality.

Availability.

A new website.

A new sales team.

A new product.

Branding can be part of that system without being responsible for every movement in the final number.

This is how weak statistics become strong claims

The progression is easy to understand.

A respondent says:

“I think more consistent branding could improve revenue.”

A report summarises those expectations.

A press release needs a strong headline.

A marketing article quotes the headline.

Another article cites the marketing article.

Soon the statement becomes:

“Research proves consistent branding increases revenue by 33%.”

The uncertainty disappears at every step.

By the time the statistic reaches a sales page, an estimate about a hypothetical outcome can look like a measured business result.

That is not a branding problem.

It is an evidence problem.

Branding does not need a questionable statistic to justify itself

The temptation is understandable.

Design can be difficult to connect directly to financial outcomes, especially when a business is making several changes at once.

A revenue statistic gives branding a number.

Numbers feel concrete.

But a number does not become useful simply because it is precise.

If the evidence underneath it cannot support the claim, repeating it makes the argument weaker, not stronger.

There are better ways to evaluate brand identity work.

Look at what the design can directly change

A brand identity project can make specific things better without pretending to control the entire business. That's the kind of brand identity design work I focus on: specific, defensible improvements, not vague revenue promises.

For example:

These outcomes are less dramatic than promising a specific revenue increase.

They are also much easier to defend.

Commercial impact still matters

None of this means branding has no commercial value.

Businesses invest in branding because communication, perception, recognition, positioning, and presentation matter to how they compete.

The problem comes when we pretend that one design intervention controls a commercial result that depends on the rest of the business.

A better question is:

If a company previously had five unrelated visual styles and now has one coherent system, that is a real change.

If nobody could apply the identity without asking the designer and the new guidelines make the system usable internally, that is a real change.

If important information was difficult to distinguish and the new hierarchy makes it clearer, that is a real change.

Those improvements may contribute to broader business performance.

But contribution and attribution are not the same thing.

The standard I would rather use

I would rather explain what branding can reasonably do than sell it with a statistic that becomes less convincing when you read the source.

That means being more specific.

What problem is the identity supposed to solve?

What decisions need to become clearer?

What needs to become more consistent?

Which applications need to work better?

What should the business be able to produce after the project that it struggles to produce now?

Those questions do not produce a dramatic percentage for a sales page.

They produce a much better brief.

And they give both the client and the designer something real to evaluate when the work is finished.