integrated marketing

---

INTEGRATED MARKETING: 35C COMPANY BRANDING

CARE ADVANTAGE, INC. REBRANDING OVERVIEW Up until late 2017, Care Advantage, Inc. had carried the same corporate identity design from when it was founded in 1988. Even as the company grew over the subsequent years (to include a skilled care division and latterly a clinical supplemental staffing division) very little consideration was given to the look, feel and overall brand story of each company division, resulting in three very similar looking identities. This “copy and paste” approach would ultimately cause confusion to both internal and external stakeholders as they found it difficult to differentiate between which services each division actually provided. The overall look and feel of each identity was simply too similar and outdated. This issue was further exacerbated in the digital marketing environment. Web site and social media users, would find it difficult to find the information they needed, become frustrated and ultimately leave the web site. In the case of more traditional forms of marketing, such as advertising and print materials we found that again, people simply didn’t realize there were important differences between the divisions. Finally, there was a very little consistency in the way each divisions brand was represented. Key elements such as messaging, brand language, logo representation were not managed closely. It wasn’t uncommon to see the same brand be represented in multiple different ways across the same medium. The one positive was that after conducting a study amongst our key stakeholder groups that people did recall one key brand asset a “heart” icon which would ultimately become one of the cornerstones of the brand development process. The Executive Team felt that a brand overhaul was required and in a fairly unusual move requested for a Brand Steering Committee to be created. The committee, which was made up of 15 people, from all different parts of the company would provide feedback and ideas throughout the design process. The results of this collaborative process became the new brand family and that is now being used across all of the company internal and external communications channels.

THE BRAND LOGIC

STRUCTURE . STORY . DESIGN

BRAND STRUCTURE The first significant change implemented was to create a brand hierarchy based on differentiating each division’s identity by the type of care or service they provide rather than the company name itself, as was done historically. This resulted in the overall umbrella brand of Care Advantage, Inc. and sub-brands of Care Advantage (Personal Care Services), All About Care (Skilled Care Services) and Nurse Advantage (Clinical Staffing). This new method has allowed for communications assets to be delivered in a more structured and easy to follow manner. It also provides a greater degree of flexibility if additional brands are acquired through acquisition.

BRAND STORY All designs, are united by one common theme, that everyone who is involved in the care process share an important connection and have a story to tell. Be it for personal care or skilled care or from a patient or care giving perspectives, each story is unique, each one is important. The identities also build on the idea the care we provide takes place in the home environment, where so many of our patients’ memories and stories formed. The theme of “story telling” became the nucleus of all four designs with the central shape being inspired by an open book and the shaded panels representing the pages or chapters.

BRAND DESIGN Due to the wide variety of mediums and materials we have to use the brands, flexibility was key, so we wanted the identities to be impactful when used just as an icon or in their entirety. We also wanted to introduce a typeface that had a wide variety of styles so we could ensure that the identity would retain its brand essence regardless of how it was being used from a production standpoint. This impact was further underpinned by the final color palette selected. We consciously chose colors that would complement the grey(s) we had decided to use as a base color across all of the communications. More importantly however, we wanted the signature colors to be bold and different from the usual palettes used in our business environment. As we worked through the design process, we created individual and collective pieces to see how the overall color palette complimented one another and captured attention the way we had envisaged. Although each design has a number of elements, we were determined to keep a clean and engaging feel for the final design(s).