Branding for Local Government
We’ve been recently working with a regional Victorian Council, over the years we’ve worked with Local governments all over Victoria, from the City of Melbourne to the Moira Shire Council. We’re working developing their brand, evolving the brand mark, creating a visual language. and creating a brand system, they can use to easily communicate on brand. It reminded me of the key steps we’ve taken over the years, with our Local Government clients, that have delivered a successful branding project. I thought it’d be good to share them.

Working with Local Government has it’s challenges, but so does working with any organisation. They have no market, no competitors, you can’t pick another council to empty your bins or maintain your park. But they have a vital need to successfully communicate their brand to all their constituents. They need to clearly communicate where every dollar of rates has been spent. These are my 5 keys for successfully branding a Local Government, but they could apply to any organisation.

Read the rest of this entry »

We all love a unique brand expression and I can’t help but acknowledge one of the most remarkable brand expressions I’ve seen in recent times (albeit dating back to the late 1970s) from one of the most iconic and well know fashion brands in the world – Gucci.

Read the rest of this entry »

Today it’s more critical than ever for businesses to differentiate themselves from their competitors and make memorable connections with their audience by creating unique, recognisable brands.

Colour in Brand Design
Every touch point of a brand plays a vital role in brand recall, but the brand mark is the heart and soul of a brand’s image. Whilst it’s the interplay between colour, typeface, and symbol that creates a brand mark, colour is registered by the brain before either images or typography. A University of Loyola, Maryland study recently found the correct use of colour could increase brand recognition by up to 80%.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Point of Point-of-sale
Recently we wrote about adidas’ augmented reality campaign for their Originals product line. Augmented reality is fast becoming a ‘must-have’ for any brand designing an integrated campaign – especially those with a customer interface such as retail. Lego has recently launched an augmented reality point-of-sale system that blows traditional POS out of the water. We’ve coined the term ‘Brandticipation’ – which describes a sense of heightened anticipation created by a great brand experience or a brand’s reputation. If the role of point-of-sale is to engage the customer at the point of purchase and create brandticipation to positively influence their decision to buy, Lego’s new augmented reality POS must be one of the snappiest examples anywhere in the world.

Read the rest of this entry »

Creating Experiences

Over the holidays I indulged in a little self expression. The Town Hall Gallery in Hawthorn accepted my proposal to stage my first solo exhibition. I wanted to explore convention and human interaction within an art space. The installation was to cover the gallery floor with canvas and then use pigment to write words and draw pictures directly onto the canvas. As people came into the space they would spread the pigment across the floor.

Read the rest of this entry »

What Makes a Compelling Brand Story?
In a recent spot created for MercedesBenzTV the German luxury car brand designed a wonderful piece of brand story-telling. As neatly defined by Chip & Dan Heath in their book Made to Stick, the most appealing (’stickiest’) stories are those that are: • Simple; • Unexpected; • Concrete; • Credible; and • Emotional. When you apply these five principles to stories that align with your key messages, you deepen the emotional bond between your customers and your company.

Read the rest of this entry »

London’s aBuzz About ‘Unpackaged‘
London has long been one of the worlds greatest retail cities – a place where new concepts are launched and sunk every day with barely a ripple to mark their passing. As they say in the classics – ‘If you can make it there, you’ll make it anywhere…’. Into this buzzing retail landscape, old school food store ‘Unpackaged‘ was quietly launched four years ago as a market stall and over the ensuing years has grown to become a much loved and powerful little retail brand in a charming shop at 42 Amwell Street, London.

Read the rest of this entry »

Your Shoe will be the game Controller
adidas Originals is launching the first Augmented Reality experience in footwear. The adidas Originals AR Game Pack is a set of 5 shoes, each printed with an AR code on the tongue. When you hold the code in front of your webcam, you’ll gain access to a virtual version of the adidas Originals Neighborhood. Each month between February and April, they’ll launch a new interactive game within the Neighborhood and your shoe will be the game controller. The experience launches next week on February 10th at http://www.adidas.com/originals

Read the rest of this entry »

The Demise of Unique Brand Design
Sadly these days unique and fresh brand identity design is the exception rather than the rule. As more brands seek to become global, the trend has been for the visual language of their brand images to become more and more similar. Global branding firm Landor’s recent 2010 Trend Forecast agrees that ‘A global homogenization of design is taking place, with design blogs and online portfolios as the major culprits.’ They say ‘Companies need to rely less heavily on testing and research, which tend to nullify originality. Brands can’t just follow the herd and hope to succeed.’ And they predict ‘We’ll find larger companies willing to take risks, break the rules, and appear imperfect. Shaking up the status quo will be considered far better than disappearing into oblivion.’

Read the rest of this entry »

Working for a creative brand agency I’ve always valued remarkable advertising and marketing. One particular stand-out for me was Veet’s “Goodbye Bush” ad that ran as a quarter page in Sydney’s Daily Telegraph and Melbourne’s Herald Sun in January 2009. The ad was forwarded in a viral frenzy to family, friends (myself being one of them) and colleagues around the globe, by 3pm the same day had made it’s way back in the in-boxes of staff where the campaign had started – Euro RSCG’s Sydney office.

So what was it that made this ad so remarkable it created a life of its own?

Read the rest of this entry »