What People Brands and Things understands about brand equity that most professional services are missing entirely.
An anonymous Instagram account just launched trading cards for brands.
Not merch. Not another branded tote bag nobody asked for. Trading cards featuring 29 consumer brands like Crown Affair, Merit, and Heaven Mayhem, designed to be collected, traded, and obsessed over.
If your immediate reaction is “that’s a gimmick,” you’re missing the strategic brilliance behind what People Brands and Things (PBT) has built.
Because whilst everyone else is still talking about “building community” and “authentic engagement,” PBT has figured out something fundamental about modern brand positioning: obsession is more valuable than awareness.
And if you’re running a professional services business wondering why your “community building” efforts aren’t converting to premium clients, this is exactly the lesson you need to understand.
Why Community Strategy Is Dead (And Fan Building Is What Actually Works)
Let’s start with the uncomfortable truth that PBT’s founder articulated perfectly:
“What we used to think of as ‘community strategy’ is evolving into something deeper: fan building strategy.”
Community is passive. Fans are active.
Community members might follow your content. Fans track your launches, share your work unprompted, and defend your positioning in conversations you’ll never see.
Community members consume. Fans advocate.
And yet, most professional services businesses are still optimising for community metrics that don’t actually drive business results.
You’re counting followers. Tracking engagement rates. Celebrating when someone likes your post.
Meanwhile, you’re completely missing the difference between people who passively consume your content and people who actively champion your work.
Here’s what PBT understands that most professional services don’t: building fans requires giving people something worth being obsessed about.
Not just “good content.” Not just “valuable insights.” Something that signals identity, creates belonging, and rewards devotion.
That’s not community building. That’s brand positioning at its most strategic.
What Trading Cards Reveal About Brand Equity (And Why It Matters to You)
The PBTrading Cards launch isn’t cute branding theatre. It’s a masterclass in creating tangible brand equity.
Think about what these cards actually represent:
They’re collectible – Limited, desirable, worth seeking out. Not infinitely available like every other piece of branded content flooding the internet.
They’re tradeable – They create secondary value through exchange. Your collection has worth to other fans, which increases perceived value exponentially.
They’re proof of devotion – Owning the full set signals you’re not just aware of these brands. You’re invested. You’re a true fan, not a casual observer.
They gamify engagement – The Willy Wonka element (special edition cards unlock prizes, collecting all 29 unlocks something bigger) transforms passive consumption into active participation.
This is strategic positioning disguised as playful merchandise.
And the reason it works? Because PBT has built something most professional services desperately need but rarely achieve: a positioning so clear that fans don’t just understand it, they want to be part of it.
The Real Strategy Behind “Brands Are The New Teams”
PBT frames brand launches as game days. Founders as coaches. Marketers as star players. Fans as the ones who turn campaigns into cultural moments.
This isn’t just clever metaphorical framing. It’s repositioning an entire industry.
Because here’s what that sports analogy actually does strategically:
It elevates fandom from embarrassing to expected
Sports fans aren’t weird for obsessing over their team. Brand fans shouldn’t be either. PBT legitimises devotion by connecting it to something culturally accepted.
It creates clear roles and expectations
When you know you’re a fan, not just a follower, you understand your role differently. You show up differently. You engage differently.
It establishes measurable wins
Launch days become moments of collective achievement. Success isn’t abstract – it’s something everyone witnesses and celebrates together.
It builds identity through allegiance
Supporting a brand becomes part of how you see yourself, not just what you consume.
This is the kind of strategic positioning that professional services businesses need but rarely build.
Because you’re so focused on being “professional” that you’ve forgotten people don’t form deep connections with professional. They form deep connections with positions they believe in.
Why “Anonymous” Might Be The Smartest Brand Decision They’ve Made
PBT remains completely anonymous. No founder reveal. No personal brand. Just the work.
And that anonymity is doing something strategically brilliant: it makes the platform itself the star, not the person behind it.
The founder explained their approach: “Our job isn’t to critique; it’s to amplify.”
This is positioning clarity at its finest. They’re not building a personal brand that competes with the brands they cover. They’re building a platform that elevates those brands whilst establishing their own authority through curation and perspective.
The anonymity removes ego from the equation. It shifts focus from “who is saying this” to “what is being said.” It makes the insight more important than the individual.
How many professional services businesses could benefit from that same strategic clarity?
You’re so busy building your personal brand that you’ve forgotten to build a positioning that transcends your individual personality. You’re the face of everything, which means when you’re not there, nothing has value.
PBT proves that strategic positioning can exist independent of personal profile. The work can be the brand. The perspective can be the product.
That’s positioning confidence most businesses never achieve.
The Real Lesson: Intention Beats Volume Every Single Time
Here’s what made me sit up and pay attention to this launch:
“We didn’t want to create something purely promotional. No one needs another branded sweatshirt or tote bag. For us, creating a meaningful product starts with intention: the why behind it.”
Intention beats volume. Every single time.
Most professional services businesses are drowning in content production. Posting daily on LinkedIn. Publishing weekly newsletters. Creating endless “value” that nobody asked for and fewer people remember.
You’re optimising for activity, not impact.
PBT took the opposite approach. They built a community of 105,000 people on Instagram not by posting constantly, but by posting intentionally. By having a clear perspective. By amplifying what matters instead of commenting on everything.
And when they decided to create a physical product, they didn’t rush to launch merch just because they had an audience. They created something with strategic purpose that reinforced their positioning whilst giving fans a tangible way to express devotion.
That’s the difference between brand building and content spam.
One creates equity. The other creates noise.
What Professional Services Can Learn From Trading Cards
Right. Let’s make this practical for your business.
You’re not launching trading cards. You’re probably not building a platform that documents brand culture. You’re a consultant, coach, or expert helping clients solve specific problems.
But the strategic principles behind PBT’s success apply directly to your positioning:
1. Stop building community. Start building fans.
Community is passive. Fans are active. Community consumes. Fans advocate.
Your content shouldn’t optimise for followers who scroll past. It should cultivate fans who share, defend, and champion your work unprompted.
That requires having a position worth being obsessed about.
2. Create scarcity, not infinite availability
Everything you publish isn’t equally valuable. But when you treat it all the same – infinitely available, constantly produced, never special – you train your audience that nothing you create is worth prioritising.
Limited access. Exclusive insights. Special offers for your most devoted followers.
Scarcity creates value. Abundance creates indifference.
3. Give people a way to signal devotion
PBT’s trading cards are proof you’re a true fan, not a casual observer. What’s your equivalent?
How do your most devoted clients signal that allegiance? What do they get that nobody else does? How do you reward obsession?
If the answer is “everyone gets the same thing,” you’re not building fans. You’re building followers who could just as easily follow someone else.
4. Make your positioning so clear that people want to be part of it
PBT didn’t succeed because they post about brands. They succeeded because they have a clear perspective on brand culture that people want to be associated with.
“Marketing is pop culture now” isn’t just an observation. It’s a thesis. A position. Something you can agree or disagree with, but can’t ignore.
What’s your equivalent? What’s your clear, defensible position that makes people say “yes, that’s exactly how I see the world too”?
5. Intention beats volume
Stop publishing constantly. Start publishing intentionally.
One piece of strategic content that reinforces your positioning is worth more than fifty generic posts that sound like everyone else in your industry.
PBT built 105,000 followers not by posting more, but by posting with clear perspective and strategic purpose.
You can do the same. You just have to care more about impact than activity.
Why This Matters More Than You Think
The PBTrading Cards launch represents something bigger than a clever product drop.
It’s proof that in 2025, the brands that win aren’t just the ones with the biggest budgets or the most sophisticated marketing teams.
They’re the ones with the clearest positioning and the most devoted fans.
PBT has built something most professional services businesses desperately need: a position so clear that people don’t just understand it, they want to be part of it.
They’ve created equity through scarcity, not abundance. They’ve built fans through intention, not volume. They’ve established authority through perspective, not personal profile.
And they’ve proved that when your positioning is strong enough, people will collect trading cards just to signal they’re part of your world.
That’s not cute. That’s strategic positioning genius.
The question is: what are you building that’s worth being obsessed about?
Because if the answer is “nothing yet,” you’re not building fans.
You’re just adding to the noise.
Is your brand building fans or just followers? Download the free Luxury Brand Audit Checklist and discover whether your positioning is creating genuine devotion or just passive consumption. Or book a Discovery Call and let’s build a position worth obsessing over.
Key Takeaways
- Community strategy is passive. Fan building strategy is active. Professional services need to understand the difference
- PBTrading Cards aren’t merch – they’re strategic brand equity disguised as collectibles, creating scarcity, signalling devotion, and gamifying engagement
- Anonymity can strengthen positioning by making the perspective more important than the personality
- Intention beats volume every time. 105,000 followers came from strategic posting, not constant content spam
- The brands that win in 2025 won’t just create products – they’ll create positions worth being obsessed about
- Professional services can apply these principles: build fans not followers, create scarcity not abundance, give people ways to signal devotion, and make positioning so clear people want to be part of it