Overlay
Let's talk
Emotive Brand
Get in touch: [email protected] 510-496-8888

Hello!

Tag: Technology Companies

How to Hire the Right Branding Agency

Posted on by Tracy Lloyd

The Business Case for Hiring a Branding Agency

In all the years of working with tech companies, we have heard the same story time and time again about the trials and tribulations of VPs and marketing executives trying to secure a budget to invest in hiring a branding agency with limited success. On top of that, how to hire the right agency can be just as confusing.

We hear about them making strong and compelling business cases to invest in the brand to leadership teams and hitting a wall. It happens at every budget cycle, management meeting, and discussion around disappointment in growth, differentiation, and lead gen that fails to meet expectations. And still, there’s no investment in the brand.

When so many founders and CEOs of technology companies don’t yet see the value in investing in brand strategy, it’s often because they are deeply invested in building a product and often feel that the product will sell itself, until, well, it doesn’t. They try and fix the things that are easy and seem obvious, but oftentimes it takes more than that. They don’t know what you know: investing in the brand is investing in the business. Yes, it’s frustrating. We feel your pain.

Investing in brand strategy is not easy for many founders and CEOs to wrap their head around, but when they are ready to pull the trigger, you need to be ready.

How to Hire the Right Branding Agency

Hiring the right agency is critical to your success, the success of the business, and the agency’s success. So, how do you hire the right agency when it’s finally time? Very, very carefully.

Some things to consider:

Do your homework to see who are the top agencies. Tap your network, do your research, check the rankings to see what firms measure up.

Be incredibly clear about the goals and objectives of the project. Map them out to get sign-off from the leadership team.

Set appropriate expectations about timing so they are clear what their time commitment is on the project.

Be realistic around what budget is required to engage an agency to do great work, and the reality of how long it will take from start to finish. Set this expectation with the leadership team so they know from the outset.

Tap your network for strategic agencies. Find agencies that have relevant experience, a strong portfolio, and a great reputation, but offer different approaches to solving the problems you are looking to address.

Choose three agencies to prepare proposals. Cast a wide net at first and bring the top three back to go through the process with you.

Be very clear about what you are asking help for. Help each agency understand what you are trying to accomplish—big picture—with this project, what the dynamics of the leadership team are, and what you personally are trying to accomplish. If you set the agency up for success, you’ll be successful too.

Compare apples to apples. Give each agency the same project to scope so that they can prepare a proposal, timing, team, and budget for you to be able to compare each agency to the same scope.

The pitch. Once you’ve kicked the tires of each agency and checked references, invite your top two agencies to come in and pitch.

Trust Your Gut

This is where you should sit back and watch the dynamics of each pitch. Which agency fires up your leadership team about what is possible? Which agency enables the work to begin even within the pitch? Which agency provokes a meaningful dialogue? Which agency feels right?

Once you’ve checked all the rational boxes, this decision becomes an emotional one.

So, how do you hire the right agency for your brand project? Choose who you feel can help you manage your leadership team and this project, deliver a meaningful brand strategy that delivers the results you need, and who you can imagine working side by side with for the next few months—because you will be spending a lot of time with them.

Emotive Brand is a brand strategy and design agency in Oakland, California.

The Next Frontier for Employer Brands: Healthy Behavior Change

Posted on by Carol Emert

At Emotive Brand, we’ve seen a jump over the last year in clients seeking help with employee behavior change. Better brand behavior isn’t the focus. Instead, organizations are actually trying to help their people live happier and healthier work and personal lives.

It’s exciting to see companies living out their employer brands through a greater commitment to their people, and to see them authentically rewarded with more trust and loyalty.

Several trends have brought us to this point, starting with greater competitiveness in recruiting – especially in Silicon Valley, which seems to be innovating the employee-employer relationship as fast as technology these days.

Other factors include better neuroscientific insight into the mechanics of behavior change coupled with proven successes, especially in the area of health. And putting all of that theory into action are new digital tools that can monitor, measure, and support healthy habit formation over time.

From our vantage point at the intersection of brand and business, we’ve identified four best practices for successful behavior change.

1. Open the door with a powerful creative idea

You can chuck a new benefits program over the fence through an email and a new section on your HR page.  Or you can really engage employees through a strategic internal campaign wrapped in a powerful creative idea.

To get to an idea that works, you need to deeply understand your people. How they perceive the problem. Their barriers to adoption – both functional and emotional. What their ideal end state looks like. The language that resonates with them. The cultural context in which they live and work.

Connecting the dots between these data points will provide the emotional insight that informs your messaging. This insight and the resulting creative idea should create a siren’s call that’s so true and powerful, your people open up to it instinctively.

2. Make behavior change activity visible

Once you have peoples’ attention, they’ll be more drawn to a new program if they can see others participating. A sense of momentum triggers both FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) and a genuine desire to be part of a collective action.

Think of the poor chump who is the first to give a standing ovation after a performance. Standing alone feels incredibly vulnerable – and foolish if nobody joins in. But once the standing O gains momentum and most people are doing it, the vulnerability shifts to the few people left sitting. A moment ago they were a regular part of the crowd. Now they appear either mean-spirited or clueless.

This principle, called social norming, is classically illustrated by this video of a lone Dancing Guy who convinces a whole hillside of picnickers to stand up and boogie.

For organizations, social norming points to the importance of seeding a new behavior change program with high-profile early adopters. Then make their activity visible, ideally both through external markers like a progress-tracking exhibition or swag, and digitally through workplace social networks, apps, or an intranet ticker showing an ever-growing number of participants.

3. Reward small actions and accomplishments

Gamification has exploded with the proliferation of apps promoting wholesome behaviors, from exercise to saving money to learning a language. Congratulatory badges and notifications have become expected bread crumbs down the path of behavior change.

Employers can leverage this trend by offering consistent, step-by-step rewards and incentives to get people started on a new behavior and then keep them on the path of progress. In addition to digital gamification, rewards can include personal recognition, financial incentives, and perks – whatever feels most true to the employer brand.

4. Break down big challenges

Sometimes behavior change is difficult because mastery requires an intimidating amount to learn or do. The sheer number of topics to master or actions to take can be paralyzing. Financial planning is one example. Losing 70 pounds through diet and exercise is another.

There are two ways to take the intimidation out of behavior change. One is to break down each step into pieces that feel doable. The second is to start with what’s easy. For example, someone might find it hard to create a financial plan that addresses all of their life goals. But starting with something that’s inherently rewarding, like saving toward a vacation, can open the door to a broader conversation.

If the process is then laid out in simple steps, ideally reinforced with a system of rewards, there’s a better chance of an employee getting all the way to the end.

A new frontier for employer brands

Behavior change is hard. Historically, it’s been a lonely endeavor. But we believe organizations can change all that by following our simple blueprint: Harness the power of your community. Break down big challenges into the doable. Offer motivating incentives. And deliver it all through inspiring communications.

Emotive Brand is a San Francisco brand strategy and design agency.

Why the Best Brands Act Like Tech Companies

Posted on by Paige Lansing Valle

Everyone’s in Tech

Today, it’s not a question of tech vs. non-tech. At the end of the day, every company is a technology company.  This means it’s time to throw away preconceived notions about what tech companies are, what they do, or where they do it. Technology companies don’t only thrive in Silicon Valley. Technology companies aren’t all as big as Google. In fact, you don’t even need to sell technology to be a technology company.

It’s not always about the product. It’s about how you do business, how you compete, and how you offer the most meaningful value to customers. It’s about embracing opportunity and fueling business with disruptive innovation.  And today, this all comes down to tech.

There’s a reason why innovation is at an all-time high, disruptive technologies are more disruptive than ever, and new competitors constantly emerge, enter, and shift the ever-expanding landscape of technology. And companies that don’t act like technology companies are lagging behind. And at the end of the day, in today’s increasingly digitized and hybridized world, everyone needs to act like a tech company in order to compete.

Embracing The Best Qualities of Tech Companies

Ignoring what’s happening at the top tech companies of today is only going to hurt your business. Across the board, all businesses have to work to stand out, gain and keep competitive edge, offer new value to competitors, and agilely compete in and against shifting markets. There’s a lot to learn from the way successful tech companies are approaching their business and their brand. So let’s take some plays from their rulebooks.

Following Suit

Brands that follow the rules of the best tech companies are finding success. So embrace it and own it. Here’s how:

1. Constantly test, learn, and adapt:

Businesses are constantly looking for new ways to understand, reach, and connect with the people important to their success. For many top tech companies this means constant research and testing. But it never stops there. Integrating these findings and insights, learning from them, and tailoring the business and brand towards successful solutions is a constant task. Because customer expectations are evolving at rapid pace, being able to keep up with current needs and adapt accordingly is key to staying competitive in any market today.

2. Be agile and flexible:

Many brands need a new, more agile approach to address the changing dynamics of market and businesses and stay ahead of the competitive curve. Agility is the new norm. Flexibility is a requirement, and fast is the new normal pace, especially in times of growth. People want brands that can anticipate their needs: built for them, catered to the ways they want to connect with and experience the world, and able to move fast with (or often times, ahead of) their shifting desires.

3. Innovate, never imitate:

The top technology companies of today aren’t successful because they accepted the status quo or followed along the path of competitors. Asking questions, challenging long-held assumptions, and focusing on innovation can fuel real, transformative change for businesses. Curiosity, a focus on learning, and collaboration are one of the best ways your brand can power innovation. Look for problem solvers, big thinkers, and people unafraid to ask questions to help build a brand that is more innovative. Innovative brands today stand out and constantly move forward with momentum.

4. Identify needs and create meaningful value:

Top tech companies aren’t at the top simply because of their product or service alone. It’s about how they communicate their value proposition. There are endless businesses that are great at creating new products and services. However, most of these businesses struggle because they are unable to craft a value proposition for their offering that stands out from their competitors. These are the business that quickly fall off and lose competitive edge. This is because products don’t have real value unless the value is fully realized by customers themselves. These means winning brands understand customer needs and know how to communicate their value in a meaningful, impactful, and persuasive way.

5. Look toward the future:

Brand relevance relies on looking towards the future. Top tech companies understand that success today does not guarantee success tomorrow. They build their business for the future and map their brand towards these goals, objectives, and greater visions. Brands that aren’t designed for the future simply cannot compete in an ever-evolving digital landscape. In order to stay relevant, stay forward-thinking.

Maximum Impact

There’s a reason why the best brands are not only embracing technology but acting like tech companies. See how you can apply some of the top practices of thriving tech companies today to the way you approach your business and your brand, no matter what industry you sell in. By moving faster, with agility, and more dynamically, we believe you will be able to offer more meaningful value to the people who matter to your brand – making your brand more impactful and your business more competitive and positioned for success.

Emotive Brand is a San Francisco brand strategy agency.