Total Brand Review

This is the flagship service and often sets the tone for a longer-term client engagement. It’s best suited to complex global firms who recognise they need brand led solutions to business problems that are restricting growth. These challenges are not always obvious but can create low-level friction which, if left untreated, over time will bleed value away from the business.

Working with 300 firms over the last 20 years we’ve developed a standardised approach to solving brand problems that go deeper than just design. We know exactly how and where to look, interpret the data, and make suggestions to improve your brand and business outcomes.

The Total Brand Review breaks into five main phases:

01 / Chemistry & Fit

Let’s make sure we’re a good fit for each other. Assuming we’re both in agreement, we send you the necessary scope and paperwork and schedule a kick off date.

02 / Research & Understanding

From kick off, we start by gathering understanding from the various stakeholder groups: from the senior client team to the shopfloor, customers and industry bodies. Our aim is to ask questions of the brand, organisation and customer. Depending on requirements these might be run as one-to-one interviews or brand workshops. We’ll augment understanding with customer research as required.

This phase typically takes between 6-12 weeks.

03 / Strategic Plan

Next, we’ll take all the understanding gathered and evaluate it against our named characteristics of sound branding, namely:

• Foundations (are the vision, mission, values fit for purpose?)
• Brand Architecture & Naming (is there any friction here?)
• Product Positioning (is the value clearly defined?)
• Creative Expression (how strong are the brand assets?)

Our analysis and recommendations will give us the basis of a strategic plan that maximises the impact of brand in meeting your business objectives. In our view Brand Strategy is Business Strategy, so it’s all about making sure the brand is optimised for a commercial return.

Allow 4 weeks from completion of Research & Understanding.

04 / Creative Development

From agreement of recommendations in the Strategic Plan we move to building creative solutions which will cover the core brand building blocks of:

• Language and Tone of voice
• Visual identity
• Colour
• Typography
• Imagery

We’ll consider each in isolation and then demonstrate how the brand can come to life across multiple touchpoints. This is an iterative process with feedback loops and refinement built into the plan.

Allow 4 to 8 weeks from completion of Strategic Plan.

05 / Implementation (& Evaluation)

This is where the work is rolled out and we handover the final master assets in line with the agreed scope – whilst standing by for a period to ensure it’s being adopted as imagined. We can drive the activation, or we can work in partnership with other agencies or in house teams to ensure value for money. Further down the line we want to understand the impact of the work, so we’ll maintain contact and plan for a review meeting.

Operational Details

Timing

From 4 to 6 months in total; but much depends on the complexity and depth of engagement.

Deliverable

In additional to the meetings, calls and project management, presentation documents will be supplied after the Strategic Plan phase and the Creative Development phase. Once complete all phases will be combined into a master TBR document.

Participation Requirements

These projects work best with a dedicated senior client lead, e.g., CMO supported by a small leadership group who can represent the rest of the business. Other selected managers and employees can come in and out of the project as required.

Location

Parts of this can be completed remotely, but there’s a huge amount of value to be had in meeting face-to-face, particularly at the presentations following Phases 2, 3 and 4.

Cost

Starts at circa £50k ($65k) and depending on the scope could extend beyond £100k ($130k).