Last week I met an entrepreneur working on a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) product where one of his main value propositions was product ease of use. The market is cluttered with a number of vendors, mostly a decade old, that have a distinctly web 1.0 feel. The entrepreneur sees an opportunity to be better, faster, and cheaper with a focus on ease of use. Only, after seeing his investor slide deck and current website, it screams complicated and not easy to use.

Brand messaging and reality need to match up.

Looking at it from an investor perspective, the entrepreneur immediately lost credibility as things didn’t match. My advice is to hire a professional designer, either through a crowdsourced design site like 99designs and crowdSPRING, or hire a local like Two Way Dialogue or Nebo Agency.

Make sure the presentation and product match the brand promise.

What else? What are your thoughts on disconnects between brand promise and reality?