Brand promise · Deliverability · Component
The cost to keep
What delivering the promise reliably requires, in capacity and in money — because a promise nobody has costed is a promise nobody has agreed to.
The deliverable
What it is
Promises are written by people who do not carry their cost and delivered by people who were not asked. Costing the promise is what converts it from a communication decision into an organisational one.
The cost has two shapes: standing capacity held in order to be able to keep it, and the marginal cost each time it is invoked. Both matter and they behave differently under growth.
One level in
What it is made of
Each element is a constituent part of the component. Follow one to see the attributes it carries.
The standing cost
What is held in reserve so the promise can be kept.
3 attributes: Standing cost · What it buys · Period
LearnThe marginal cost
What it costs each time the promise is actually invoked.
3 attributes: Cost per occasion · Invocations · Scales with
LearnThe margin impact
What keeping the promise does to contribution.
3 attributes: Margin effect · What it earns · Confidence
Learn
Standing capacity held for the promise is the first thing cut in a cost exercise, because it looks like slack. Name what it buys.
The other components in deliverability
The breaking point
Where and under what conditions the promise fails first — because there is always a first failure point and naming it is what allows it to be resourced.
LearnThe operational commitment
What has been agreed internally to make the promise deliverable — because a promise operations did not agree to is one operations will not defend.
Learn