In today’s hyper-competitive B2B ecosystem, achieving sustainable growth requires embracing modern frameworks that align with the evolving market dynamics. Megan Bowen, CEO of Refine Labs, brings a wealth of expertise in B2B SaaS marketing and shares a transformative framework - Brand, Demand, Expand - designed to help companies achieve sustainable and profitable growth. Whether you're an executive, founder, or investor, this article will guide you through the practical application of this data-driven approach to build a resilient and growth-focused strategy for your business.
The Challenge of Modern B2B Growth
The B2B landscape of 2025 is far removed from the "growth-at-all-costs" mindset of the early 2020s. Companies are facing longer sales cycles, shrinking budgets, and increased competition for market share. Without adapting to these changes, businesses risk stagnation or decline. Megan Bowen identifies three critical pillars - Brand, Demand, Expand - as the foundation for any successful go-to-market strategy. This approach not only addresses customer acquisition but also emphasizes the often-overlooked areas of customer retention and expansion.
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Breaking Down the Brand, Demand, Expand Framework
1. Brand: Building Awareness and Recall
At its core, building a strong brand ensures your company is top-of-mind when your target audience is ready to buy. Brand awareness transcends flashy campaigns; it’s about creating meaningful, memorable connections with your market.
Key Aspects of Brand:
- Message Clarity: Ensure your core positioning and messaging articulate the problem you solve and the value you provide.
- Memorable Marketing Programs: Invest in content, organic social media, events, and paid advertising to enhance visibility.
- Measurable Metrics: Use tools like share-of-search analysis, brand surveys, and self-reported attribution to track brand awareness over time.
Why Brand Matters:
Most B2B purchase decisions occur before prospects even engage with a salesperson. Buyers recall only 1-2 brands in a given category when a need arises. Without strong brand awareness, your company risks being excluded from consideration entirely.
Practical Example:
One company working with Refine Labs faced declining demand. By analyzing share-of-search against competitors, they identified gaps in brand awareness. With strategic investments in demand creation campaigns, they improved their share-of-search and saw long-term growth in inbound inquiries.
2. Demand: Creating and Capturing Demand
Demand generation isn’t just about flooding sales teams with leads - it’s about creating real buyer intent and capturing that intent efficiently. Megan differentiates between demand creation (building interest among future buyers) and demand capture (targeting buyers actively searching for solutions).
Key Aspects of Demand:
- Demand Creation: Focus on the 95% of your market that is not actively buying. Use brand campaigns, thought leadership content, and targeted advertising to nurture future buyers.
- Demand Capture: Target the 5% of your market currently in buying mode using intent channels like Google search or large language models (LLMs).
- Budget Reallocation: Shift from outdated lead generation strategies to a balanced budget - ideally 60% on demand creation and 40% on demand capture.
- Performance Metrics: Track metrics such as cost per conversion, cost per meeting, and ROI on paid advertising.
Why Demand Matters:
Without demand creation, businesses may focus solely on low-intent leads, leading to wasted resources and missed opportunities. By rebalancing investments, companies can achieve a 30-50% increase in qualified pipeline within six months.
Practical Example:
A client previously allocated 80% of their budget to demand capture (e.g., Google search) and saw diminishing returns. Refine Labs helped them reallocate resources to focus on demand creation via paid social channels and strategic narrative building. Within six months, the client experienced a significant increase in high-quality leads.
3. Expand: Retaining and Maximizing Customer Value
In today’s market, growth doesn’t just come from new customers - it’s equally important to nurture and expand existing ones. The expand pillar focuses on driving retention, upsells, cross-sells, and customer advocacy.
Key Aspects of Expand:
- Retention: Ensure customers consistently derive value and avoid churn by delivering on your promises.
- Upsell and Cross-Sell: Leverage existing relationships to introduce additional products or services. Use personalized and targeted digital campaigns for awareness.
- Customer Advocacy: Turn satisfied customers into brand evangelists. Activities like case studies, customer advisory boards, and testimonials boost credibility and influence new buyers.
Why Expand Matters:
Acquiring customers is expensive, but retaining and growing value from your existing base is far more cost-effective. In addition, customer advocates can become your most powerful sales asset.
Practical Example:
For a large B2B SaaS client, Refine Labs created a paid advertising campaign targeting their existing customer base to raise awareness of additional product offerings. This strategy increased product adoption rates and contributed to the company’s net revenue retention (NRR).
Why Change Is Essential in 2025
Many larger companies - those with $50 million to $1 billion in annual revenue - are struggling to adapt because they’ve been running outdated playbooks for over a decade. While they weathered the market instability of 2020-2022, they now face declining pipeline generation and stagnating revenue. For these organizations, embracing the Brand, Demand, Expand framework is no longer optional - it’s a matter of survival.
Megan emphasizes that change management is crucial for success. This requires breaking down silos between sales and marketing, fostering collaboration, and aligning resources with long-term goals. She stresses that even small shifts, such as reallocating paid advertising budgets or using targeted customer campaigns, can yield measurable results in just six months.
Actionable Key Takeaways
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Invest in Brand Awareness:
- Use share-of-search analysis to gauge brand performance.
- Develop creative, scroll-stopping content for paid social campaigns.
- Conduct regular brand surveys to measure recall and preference.
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Rebalance Demand Budgets:
- Shift budgets from lead generation to a 60/40 split favoring demand creation.
- Optimize Google search spending to capture in-market buyers efficiently.
- Explore emerging intent channels like large language models (e.g., ChatGPT).
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Expand Customer Relationships:
- Run targeted campaigns to promote upsells and cross-sells within your existing base.
- Focus on retention by ensuring customer success and delivering promised outcomes.
- Build customer advocacy through case studies, testimonials, and advisory boards.
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Measure Effectiveness with KPIs:
- Brand: Track share of search, brand survey results, and inbound self-reported attribution.
- Demand: Monitor metrics like cost per conversion, cost per meeting, and ROI.
- Expand: Evaluate NRR, lifetime value, and expansion revenue from cross-sells.
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Prioritize Sustainable Growth:
- Think beyond quick wins; focus on strategies that integrate brand, demand, and expand for long-term success.
- Adapt your approach to align with modern buyer behavior and market dynamics.
Conclusion
The Brand, Demand, Expand framework isn’t just a buzzword - it’s a roadmap for navigating the complex and competitive B2B environment in 2025. By investing strategically in these three pillars, companies can achieve sustainable growth, improve ROI, and future-proof their business against changing market conditions. As Megan Bowen aptly notes, "The only constant is change." Businesses that prepare to adapt will not only survive but thrive in the evolving landscape of B2B growth.
Source: "Proven B2B growth strategies from the 'Brand. Demand. Expand.' framework" - Dreamdata, YouTube, Aug 5, 2025 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8qjvC36o5A
