Ready to go deep on your brand? Say hello to Brand Forensics X.

I wanted to share a tool I’ve been working on. It uses AI, but it isn’t really about AI.

For more than twenty years now, most brand projects I’ve worked on have started in the same way — with a workshop. Most brand people have one. Mine started life borrowed from another studio, via a client, before gradually becoming something much more my own.

Over that time, I’ve built up a large body of brand-related research across all kinds of organisations, including professional services, engineering, manufacturing, automotive, education, charities and not-for-profits. Every project has added something to that body of work. Every workshop has sharpened how I look at organisations from the outside.

More recently, with all the current AI kerfuffle as a backdrop, I found myself asking a question.

"Could I build a tool that used AI to consult that experience?"

Not to invent strategy. Not to generate brand ideas. Not to replace human judgement. But to look at how an organisation presents itself to customers and prospects through the material it has already chosen to make public.

Could it spot familiar patterns in that material? Could it compare what it finds against things I’ve seen before? Could it help form a view of how that organisation is likely to be understood from the outside, and where that story may naturally lead if nothing changes?

The answer to that question became Brand Forensics X.

Brand Forensics X focuses on evidence rather than opinion. It examines what is visible, what is consistent and where the picture isn’t yet clear. The output is available in two tiers.

On the Surface (Tier 1) is a concise, tightly defined outside observation. It looks at what comes across, what feels strong and where the current picture isn’t clear. Every report is reviewed, sense-checked and verified by me before publication. It is also free.

In the Deep (Tier 2) follows on from On the Surface. Using the same publicly available material, it examines how the public picture holds together when viewed more closely. Alongside the AI consultation process, this tier includes my own observations and interpretation. It is a paid-for service.

The process uses multiple AI models to examine the available evidence from different perspectives. Every finding, observation and conclusion is then reviewed, sense-checked and verified before anything is shared. It isn’t an automated report.

Brand Forensics X also isn’t any of these things:

• Agentic;

• A branding exercise;

• A strategy project;

• A rebrand process;

• A list of recommendations.

It doesn’t tell organisations who they should be. It doesn’t tell them what to do next.

It does, however, give them a clearer view of how they are currently presenting themselves from the outside. And that can be a useful place to begin a more informed conversation about brand.

Find out more about Brand Forensics X and the Brand Forensics Workshop here.

If you’re curious to see what your organisation looks like from the outside, I’d be delighted to put Brand Forensics X through its paces.