Make it amazing
Pitch
Positioning
Messaging
Verbal Identity
Voice
Naming
Video
Website strategy
Website copy
A new name, identity and website for a $5bn tech merger
Much like a homeowner seeking renovation experts, this newly merged interior design tech company shopped at our agency to fit themselves out with a new name, brand and go-to-market strategy.
In a dominantly bland and B2B category, we built a standout, more emotive brand fitting for a global interiors powerhouse. This included a brand name (to tightly express tech, synchronicity and end-to-end servicing), flexible verbal identity and website strategy for the business to adapt and grow into new verticals and ventures after launch.
Pitch
We won the account off the back of research and setup that I led on.
There was interest in optimal ways to announce merging brands, how to tell its new story while gradually phasing out the old brands, and how to manage all this online without losing sense.
As part of our case, I found a killer example of an HR tech brand that had just done a merger and how their website was set up to convey change. This made the client confident in our abilities to understand and deliver on change.
Positioning
We ran customer and client interviews, which help gain insight into how they talked about and understood the services and the opportunities of the merger.
But the most interest insight was of the category, where the brand existed in an overwhelmingly B2B and unsophisticated space in terms of branding. This gave us the opportunity to counter the norm with a B2C-friendly idea and proposition:
Make it amazing
This open-book phrase reached to the end customer and their hopes to turn design dream into reality, while remaining meaningful to all the producers, manufacturers and other workers in the service chain.
Messaging
With "Make it amazing" as the positioning idea and tagline, I developed more messages to complement it and support the new brand direction.
The old brands merged to own a fully end-to-end solution for researching, planning, shipping and executing interior designs. Alongside a five-stage design process to use in comms, I came up with easy, repeatable lines like Bring spaces to life / Bring life to spaces and From inspiration to installation. These phrases gave a tidy, emotional slant.
Verbal Identity
I defined several high-level messages and ideas designed to galvanize teams and clarify direction for the new business:
Mission, Vision and Purpose statements and six Brand Pillars that played off the expression of the positioning idea, "Make it Amazing".
Voice
For this brand's voice, I took a different approach to agency convention. With so many messages and ideas already and a global team of diverse speakers localizing efforts to their markets, I wanted to create something easy and flexible.
I invented a character profile for writers and marketers to embody and guide how they should write.
Meet Cyril
“Everything our brand stands for is to help you make it amazing. Turn customer vision into reality. Make designers, retailers and manufacturers excel at their jobs. Making products and spaces that wow everyone. The power of creation, the excitement of seeing differently, opening your mind to wonder.
Cyril personifies Cyncly’s brand voice. He celebrates everyone’s capacity to make what they do and what they want to do, amzing. When you write or speak for Cyncly, picture Cyril and channel him in your words.”
Naming
We ran a traditional naming project, taking a brief, exploring wide territories, understanding preferences and whittling down names to a few viable candidates.
As expected, picking the name became everyone's business. Decision-makers, along with other investors and private equity guys, gunned for a name from our list which regrettably had a problematic spelling.
I take credit for making the case to opt instead for an alternative spelling with better connotations, easier domains to claim and way fewer red flags for trademarking. The new name was accepted.
Video
I worked with the project lead and a production agency on the script for its brand film. This introduce introduced the new brand and its propositions, including the story of the merger, the five-stage design process and many of the creative, high-level messaging and ideas developed in the verbal identity.
Website strategy
Reflecting the work developed for the pitch, we devised a roadmap for how to comunicate the merger for websites.
We proposed that the homepage include the old brands to keep the connection between the familiar and new. Over time, this would be phased out with the new brand dialled up, and minor pages keeping old brand mentions to help with SEO efforts.
Website copy
I wrote all the copy for the new website for the brand launch.
Light, simple, clean copy that used headlines to playfully refer to the different specialities. Some great lines survived many rounds of site change as the brand managed it themselves.
