If you are a freelancer or small agency looking for clients, you have probably considered LinkedIn Sales Navigator. It is a strong tool. But it solves a different problem from BrandBnk, and for many creatives the best answer is to use each for what it does best.
The short answer
- Sales Navigator helps you find people. You tell it who you are looking for, and it finds them on LinkedIn.
- BrandBnk tells you which brands to look at, and when. It spots UK brands showing signs they are about to spend on creative work.
What Sales Navigator does well
- Detailed search filters for people and companies, such as job title, seniority, company size and location.
- Saved lists of leads and accounts, with alerts when they change jobs or post.
- InMail, to message people you are not connected to.
- It is built on LinkedIn, where most brand marketers keep their profiles up to date.
Where it falls short for creatives
- It does not know about creative intent. It cannot tell you that a brand has just raised money, ramped up its ads and hired a Creative Director in the same month.
- You still do the research. Deciding which brands are worth contacting right now is left to you.
- It is priced for sales teams, on a per-seat subscription. Check LinkedIn for current pricing.
- Alerts get noisy. Job changes and posts from hundreds of accounts are hard to act on.
What BrandBnk does
- Watches UK brands for six signals: hiring, ad activity, funding, product launches, brand refreshes and open briefs.
- Combines them into an intent score, so the brands most likely to brief soon rise to the top.
- Gives pitch guidance for each brand: which signals fired, what they usually mean, who to contact and the angle to lead with.
- Is priced for creatives: £15/month founder rate for early freelancer sign-ups (then £25/month), and £45/month for agencies with five seats.
What it does not do: BrandBnk is not a contact database, and it does not write or send pitches. It is also currently in invite-only early access.
Side by side
- Main job: Sales Navigator finds people. BrandBnk finds the right brands at the right moment.
- Buying signals: Sales Navigator has job changes and company news. BrandBnk has six creative-spend signals combined into one score.
- Finding the contact: Sales Navigator is excellent. BrandBnk points you to the likely decision-maker.
- Pitch help: Sales Navigator has none. BrandBnk gives the context and angle; you write the pitch.
- Built for: Sales Navigator for B2B sales teams. BrandBnk for creative freelancers and agencies.
- Coverage: Sales Navigator is global. BrandBnk focuses on UK brands.
Which should you choose?
- Choose Sales Navigator if you already know exactly which brands you want and just need to reach the right people there.
- Choose BrandBnk if your problem is not knowing which brands are about to need creative work.
- Use both if you pitch regularly: BrandBnk to decide who to contact this week, and LinkedIn to find and warm up the person.
Free LinkedIn goes a long way too. Many creatives find they can reach the people BrandBnk points them to without paying for Sales Navigator at all.
For a wider view of the options, read our comparison of lead-generation tools.
Know who is about to spend before you start searching. BrandBnk is in early access, and founding members lock in £15/month (standard price £25/month). See pricing.