Past Clients
We’ve helped clients uncover the behavioural drivers behind customer decisions, diagnose hidden risks in their strategies, pressure‑test ESG claims, interpret complex survey and experimental data, and translate ambiguous signals into clear, evidence‑based action. Our role isn’t just to analyze data—it’s to reveal the human motivations beneath it, giving leaders the insight they need to make sharper, more confident decisions.
US Department of State
The US Department of State sought to increase college student participation in the Foreign Service Officer Exam, recognizing that many potential candidates dismissed it as a bureaucratic hurdle rather than an entry point to meaningful global work. To shift this perception, the Department partnered with Brand Dummy to reframe the exam in a way that resonated with the motivations, aspirations, and identity drivers of university‑aged audiences. Our work began with a deep dive into how students interpret career opportunities—what signals credibility, what sparks curiosity, and what triggers disengagement—allowing us to understand the psychological distance many felt from the Foreign Service as a career path.
Through systematic pressure‑testing of messages, narratives, and value propositions, we identified the barriers that suppressed interest and the themes that unlocked it. We repositioned the exam not as a test to be endured, but as a challenge tied to purpose, global mobility, and real‑world influence—elements that aligned with students’ desire to contribute meaningfully while exploring the world. This reframing produced a measurable increase in interest and signups, demonstrating how Brand Dummy helps mission‑driven organizations earn trust by grounding their outreach in clarity, relevance, and strategic empathy.
SumoSalad
SumoSalad sought to deepen its relationship with Australian consumers by moving beyond routine social posting and toward a more intentional, insight‑driven approach. To support this shift, Brand Dummy conducted a comprehensive behavioural mapping of the brand’s digital audience. This work surfaced the subtle but powerful patterns that shape how people interact with food and wellness content online—moments of decision‑making, emotional cues that prompt engagement, and the points at which audiences experience fatigue or disengagement. These findings provided a clearer picture of not just what people were doing on social platforms, but why they were doing it.
Using these insights, we built a modular social strategy that aligned platform choice, message framing, and posting cadence with the underlying psychology of SumoSalad’s consumers. Instead of relying on generic content calendars, the brand adopted a storytelling‑driven approach that met audiences at the right moment with the right narrative. This shift strengthened engagement, increased loyalty, and reinforced SumoSalad’s core brand values—ultimately transforming social media from a broadcast channel into a behaviourally informed engine for connection.
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation—now known simply as the Gates Foundation—has long demonstrated its commitment to expanding equitable, affordable access to higher education through initiatives such as the Washington State Achievers program. As part of its effort to understand and strengthen the long‑term impact of this investment, the Foundation engaged Brand Dummy to provide rigorous behavioural‑science‑driven support. Our mandate was to help the Foundation move beyond short‑term metrics and uncover deeper insights into how scholarship recipients experienced the program years after receiving their awards.
To meet this need, we designed a suite of quantitative and qualitative research instruments capable of capturing nuanced, longitudinal perspectives from Achievers alumni. These tools were intentionally crafted to balance methodological rigour with practical usability, ensuring that the resulting data would be both internally valid and strategically actionable. The Foundation ultimately adopted these instruments in subsequent years, as they consistently generated high‑value insights into program effectiveness, recipient outcomes, and opportunities for continuous improvement.
Digital Crew
In collaboration with Digital Crew, Brand Dummy helped develop the ABC Index—an evidence‑based framework designed to illuminate how Australian brands are understood, trusted, and emotionally interpreted by Chinese consumers. The core challenge was the persistent gap between what brands intend to communicate and how those messages are actually received across cultural, linguistic, and regional contexts. To address this, we conducted large‑scale research with thousands of consumers across mainland China, capturing the nuances of perception that often go unnoticed in traditional market studies. This work surfaced the subtle shifts in trust, relevance, and emotional resonance that occur when brand narratives cross borders.
The resulting ABC Index became far more than a diagnostic tool; it evolved into a strategic compass for Australian brands navigating China’s complex and rapidly evolving market. By translating behavioural data into clear, actionable insights, the Index enabled organizations to pressure‑test their assumptions, refine their positioning, and build communication strategies that travelled authentically across cultures. This project exemplifies how Brand Dummy helps brands decode audiences with precision and craft trust‑building strategies that hold up in diverse global environments.
Heritage Bank
Heritage Bank set out to understand a persistent puzzle in the Australian mortgage market: despite the availability of significantly better rates, many homeowners still fail to switch lenders. To uncover the root causes, the bank partnered with Brand Dummy to examine the behavioural dynamics behind this inertia. Our research revealed a critical blind spot—consumers consistently underestimated the financial upside of switching and dramatically overestimated the effort involved. This miscalibration created a powerful status‑quo bias, where sticking with an existing loan felt safer and easier than exploring alternatives, even when the numbers told a different story.
Recognizing that the barrier was not information but perception, we reframed the challenge as one of trust, clarity, and emotional engagement. Brand Dummy developed messaging strategies that directly addressed the cognitive and emotional frictions preventing action, making the benefits of switching feel both tangible and achievable. The work resonated widely, earning national media coverage and being cited by the Australian Government in discussions about consumer behaviour and financial decision‑making. It stands as a clear example of how Brand Dummy helps organizations move people—not just metrics—by aligning communication with how real decisions are made.