Scope
End-to-end social strategy and content playbook development for Sandbagger to establish a cohesive brand storytelling system across channels. The project defined brand voice, content pillars, channel roles, audience guardrails, and tactical content plans to guide organic and paid social execution across Canadian and U.S. markets.
Objective
Build a structured, insight-led social media playbook that would make Sandbagger more culturally relevant and consistent on social. The goal was to create a scalable storytelling framework that connected brand heritage, product rituals, and lifestyle moments into a repeatable content system across platforms.
My Role
Lead Strategist and Playbook Owner. I developed the strategic framework, channel architecture, content pillar system, persona mapping, and tactical content plans. I authored all strategic components and partnered with a designer to translate the strategy into a presentation-ready playbook for internal and partner use.
The Challenge
Sandbagger had strong brand roots and product differentiation, but lacked a unified social storytelling system. Content efforts were fragmented across channels and markets, with no consistent narrative structure, platform role definition, or content cadence model. The challenge was to create a clear, actionable framework that could guide teams toward culturally relevant, story-driven social content while respecting regional nuances and compliance guardrails.
The Strategy
I built a multi-layered social playbook designed to turn brand positioning into a repeatable content engine. The framework connected brand values, audience personas, and platform behaviors into a practical execution model.
Key strategic components included:
• Defining three core content pillars — Crafted, Camaraderie, and Celebration — to anchor all storytelling
• Translating brand positioning into a distinct social voice and conversation style
• Building channel-specific roles across Instagram, Stories, TikTok, Facebook, and Paid to clarify purpose and content fit
• Creating awareness, inspiration, and conversion content ladders tied to funnel behavior
• Developing tactical content matrices mapping pillar × funnel stage × format
• Establishing Canadian and American content guardrails to localize tone, rituals, and cultural cues
• Designing persona-led guidance (Alex archetype) to align content with lifestyle signals and drink rituals
• Recommending cadence, KPIs, and content formats per platform to support consistency and measurement
• Defining three core content pillars — Crafted, Camaraderie, and Celebration — to anchor all storytelling
• Translating brand positioning into a distinct social voice and conversation style
• Building channel-specific roles across Instagram, Stories, TikTok, Facebook, and Paid to clarify purpose and content fit
• Creating awareness, inspiration, and conversion content ladders tied to funnel behavior
• Developing tactical content matrices mapping pillar × funnel stage × format
• Establishing Canadian and American content guardrails to localize tone, rituals, and cultural cues
• Designing persona-led guidance (Alex archetype) to align content with lifestyle signals and drink rituals
• Recommending cadence, KPIs, and content formats per platform to support consistency and measurement
The Execution
• Audited brand positioning, product rituals, and audience lifestyle signals
• Built a cross-channel social architecture defining platform roles and content types
• Developed pillar definitions and storytelling territories tied to brand values
• Created funnel-based tactical content plans with example formats and series ideas
• Defined voice and tone guidelines to ensure conversational consistency
• Mapped regional guardrails for Canadian and U.S. audiences
• Delivered a fully structured, presentation-ready social playbook for cross-team adoption
• Built a cross-channel social architecture defining platform roles and content types
• Developed pillar definitions and storytelling territories tied to brand values
• Created funnel-based tactical content plans with example formats and series ideas
• Defined voice and tone guidelines to ensure conversational consistency
• Mapped regional guardrails for Canadian and U.S. audiences
• Delivered a fully structured, presentation-ready social playbook for cross-team adoption
The Results
• Delivered a unified social storytelling framework adopted as the foundation for ongoing content planning
• Established clear pillar and channel roles, reducing content fragmentation
• Enabled faster content ideation through tactical pillar × format × funnel matrices
• Provided market-specific guardrails that supported localized relevance without brand drift
• Equipped internal and partner teams with a scalable roadmap for organic and paid social execution
• Established clear pillar and channel roles, reducing content fragmentation
• Enabled faster content ideation through tactical pillar × format × funnel matrices
• Provided market-specific guardrails that supported localized relevance without brand drift
• Equipped internal and partner teams with a scalable roadmap for organic and paid social execution
Key Takeaway
By translating brand positioning into a structured social storytelling system, the playbook turned abstract brand values into practical content direction. The result was a scalable framework that aligned voice, pillars, platforms, and tactics — enabling Sandbagger to show up more consistently and culturally relevant across social channels.
