Planning brand ecosystems that deliver
measurable business growth.
We help brands earn the right to be called a favorite brand by focusing on five types of behaviors:
A favorite brand is present, participative and responsive, utilizing each relevant channel to engage consumers with the brand and its purpose.
A favorite brand becomes invaluable by being purposeful, helpful and easily usable.
A favorite brand is a good citizen and transparent in its marketing; its behaviors are consistent with its values.
A favorite brand acts continuously to be of service to its customers and its cause.
A favorite brand delights and encourages exploration via storytelling and surprise; it delivers a positive return on attention.
To chart a course towards desired strategic outcomes, we implement the three-stage process pictured below. Each stage includes a variety of milestones within.
Every one of our strategic engagements starts with a review of known challenges and an assessment of which outcomes will define success. The goal of this phase is to create alignment between stakeholders and clarify the central problem to be solved.
We field primary quantitative and qualitative research to supplement gaps in knowledge and give us a clear view of our audience’s thoughts, feelings and behaviors. This holistic understanding of what our consumers say and how they act shapes the core insight that will fuel breakthrough creative work.
We use stakeholder interviews and immersive business planning to gain an in-depth view of the brand from the inside out, emerging with a firm grasp of the company’s unique value-creating characteristics. From, this we develop a data-informed, diagnostic ecosystem model to help measure the brand’s current and potential in-market performance across all channels.
We thoroughly review the competitive landscape to indicate where market opportunities exist within the brand’s given business sector.
We utilize access to over $10M in research tools, ranging from attribution modeling to retail and POS data to inform and refine our strategic direction.
As a next step, we map the brand's presence and behavior across the entire consumer journey, and present a holistic vision of its future-state ecosystem:
A strategy is the central organizing idea against which a brand can act. This strategic vision gives the organization a clear direction forward by identifying the highest value opportunity and mapping how different entities will contribute to a consistent consumer experience.
A creative brief distills the core consumer insight to provide a launching point for creative conceptual development. This, along with additional structured communications architecture, will guide brand messaging and content development to maintain a consistent, compelling voice across all media.
This future-state outlook helps the brand fulfill its purpose, foster direct and relevant relationships with consumers, and creates efficiencies of scale for the business. Collectively, these smaller interactions create affinity, building a relationship with consumers while helping them move through their respective journeys.
As creative development nears completion, we create a phased implementation plan to help move the brand from its current state to the desired future state. Prioritized tracks of work are created, allowing the organization to weigh the level of effort against ROI
The new ecosystem is executed, component by component, across all relevant channels. We continue to optimize it in real time – establishing a new market presence in which the brand makes deliberate choices and behaves consistently even in the face of market dynamics.