These publications trace the method from its first journal article in 2008 to a 2026 book chapter. Most can be downloaded in full.
Beyond Knowing: Sensing the impact of a change before you make it (PDF, 7.8 MB, opens in a new tab)
Booklet, a concise introduction to branding constellations
Are you planning a business change such as a new name, a logo update, a product launch, or a new partnership? And would you like to sense its impact before you alter it? Then this booklet is for you.
Branding Constellations – From Opportunities To Realities (PDF, 450 kB, opens in a new tab)
Chapter 12 in Georg Müller-Christ et al. (Eds), Organisational Constellations in Practice
Wim’s research results on the physical stand-in format of the branding constellation: the applications that let brand decision makers test whether an opportunity they are considering should become a reality, on the strength of the information they have processed subconsciously. The chapter sets out the marketing research methods behind those applications, the main findings on relevance, validity and reliability, and what they imply in practice.
Embracing the elephant (PDF, 493 kB, opens in a new tab)
Mintzberg, Ahlstrand and Lampel open their 1998 Strategy Safari with the story of the blind men and the elephant. Its moral still fits the strategy disputes of today, in science as much as in business: every disputant has their own perception, and not one of them sees the whole elephant. The paper asks what it would take to get the whole animal in view.
Better than trend watching (PDF, 2.5 MB, opens in a new tab)
Change fascinates us, radical change most of all, and we look for any way we can to get a clear view of what lies ahead, preferably a grip on it too. Augusteijn proposes a radical move of his own: use future constellations, and read what lies ahead from inside the system rather than from the signals it gives off.
Unravelling branding systems (PDF, 4.8 MB, opens in a new tab)
Doctoral thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen
The doctoral thesis the method came out of. Brands, Wim argues, are built on the strengths of their individual elements and on the feedback loops between those elements, so the power of a branding option only becomes clear once you look at how they interact. The thesis adapts systems constellations, long used to examine families and organizations, to take those loops apart.
Systems constellations: A better way to identify branding opportunities
Journal of Brand Management
The paper that first put the method in front of an academic audience. Building strong brands is one of the main marketing priorities for brand-supportive companies, but the positivist paradigm that leads marketing may not be the most effective vantage point from which to identify branding opportunities. The paper offers a phenomenological alternative, applying the systems constellation technique within soft systems methodology.