FOCUS: BRAND RELEVANCE LOSS | AUDIENCE: STEWARDS OF PLATEAUED BRANDS
BY: SHOBHA PONNAPPA | BRAND BREAKTHROUGH STRATEGIST | 45 YEARS | 125+ CLIENTS
I answer 6 tough questions about why seasonal marketing efforts may spark short-term interest, but not deepen year-round relevance.
I often work with brand managers who pour months of energy into holiday campaigns that look fantastic and earn engagement … but vanish without a trace weeks later. The momentum doesn’t carry over. Brand meaning stays shallow. When festive lights go out, so does the visibility. If your brand only comes alive in festive or summer sales, it’s not a campaign problem … it’s a continuity problem. In this post, I unpack six questions that reveal why seasonal highs don’t translate into sustained relevance.
Seasonal campaigns often ride on borrowed emotion … the joy of holidays, the energy of summer, the urgency of end-of-year sales. But these emotions belong to the moment, not the brand. If your core message isn’t clearly connected to the campaign, buyers remember the event, not you. Buzz is easy; brand memory is harder.
It’s also common to overinvest in production and underinvest in brand narrative. The result? A beautifully designed promo with no link to what your brand stands for. When the occasion ends, your message disappears too. That’s not celebration … it’s strategic fragmentation.
Yes … but only if it ladders up to something deeper. Visibility that doesn’t reinforce your brand’s central identity ends up as forgettable noise. Many brands get a spike in metrics … but no lift in loyalty.
The bigger risk is teaching audiences to only think of you seasonally. A brand that shows up only at Diwali, Christmas, or Valentine’s Day becomes locked into that lane. Relevance shrinks to a calendar window. That’s dangerous.
If your biggest marketing assets are campaign-specific … if your traffic and conversions are heavily time-bound … and if off-season engagement plummets, then you’re likely suffering from event dependency.
Another clue: internally, your team is always planning for the next spike instead of building year-round strategies. If your brand’s voice and message shift dramatically between campaigns, that’s not seasonal agility … it’s brand schizophrenia.
Only if the format is rooted in a clear brand idea. Repetition without evolution leads to diminishing returns. Your audience starts seeing through the trick … and brand fatigue sets in.
Instead, ask what insight powered the campaign’s success. Was it nostalgia? Community? Celebration? Now, how can that same insight power a product launch, a podcast, or a LinkedIn series? Translate, don’t transpose.
Great. Then own the season … but own the off-season even more. Brands in travel, fashion, or wellness often have natural peaks. The key is to use off-peak time to build authority, deepen trust, and educate.
Some of the best brand stories are told when everyone else goes quiet. Use slower months to launch an origin series, publish behind-the-scenes, or show R&D. That way, when the season comes, you’re already top of mind.
Start by identifying the deeper themes behind each campaign. What values were you really promoting? Shift from selling a product to sustaining a point of view. That’s how brands become meaningful.
Then, create a recurring narrative arc that continues throughout the year. Use editorial calendars, not sales calendars. Instead of thinking campaign to campaign … think chapter to chapter. Brands with seasons of relevance always stay in story.
If these questions feel familiar, your brand may be working hard but running in cycles … visible only in bursts. A brand that lives by the season often dies with it. But you can change that. By anchoring your seasonal work in a year-long narrative, and matching emotion with continuity, you’ll create a brand that’s not just exciting … but enduring. Relevance is built between the spikes.
If you’re an investor seeking momentum for your portfolio brands, this FAQ Insight Post I wrote could interest you: “FAQs: When Google Finds You … but No One Remembers You.“
And if you’re a solo expert looking to sharpen traction, this FAQ Insight Post I worked on may resonate: “FAQs: When Your Product Story Fails to Justify Your Value.“
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