Every year, Fortune ranks the world’s top companies across a range of criteria. Looking at the classic Fortune 100, the more recent list of Unicorns (private startups that are valued at $1 billion or more), and other lists, we were curious to see how color was used in the brand identities of these successful…
Millennials. Generation Y. Whatever you call them, consumer brands understand the importance of the huge cohort born between 1980 and 2000. Whether they think millennials are refreshingly confident and engaged, inappropriately self-centered and entitled, or some combination of the two, marketers realize they are critical to the success of consumer businesses, responsible for $600…
According to the Harvard Business Review, “study after study puts the failure rate of mergers at somewhere between 70-90%.” More often than not, brand is not promoted or leveraged to provide unity, clarity and solidarity during this critical inflection point, yet brand can make all the difference between success and failure for the companies…
A brand is a brand is a brand. And then there are technology brands. While other industries face new competitors, technology companies face disruptors – companies that completely alter the competitive landscape and threaten the very survival of legacy players.
Technology companies that embrace their brand as an articulation of the promise that they deliver through…
A lot has been written about the ‘prolonged demise’ of Yahoo. In short, the internet company has suffered a tumultuous and tiring 22-year identity crisis. This was perhaps most famously crystalized in the leaked “Peanut Butter Manifesto,”an internal memo from 2006 that criticized the company for spreading itself too thin.
“If you’re…
It’s a topic on the mind of every B2B marketer these days: customer experience, that elusive moving target. Specifically, how to meet customer expectations when, as a brand, you are competing against every (predominantly digital) interaction your customers have ever had.
For many B2B marketers, keeping up with customers, not competitors, has become their…
Look around any security technology tradeshow and you’ll feel more like you’re in a national security event than a business technology conference. Military images, dark, ominous colors, and foreboding language from vendors that all convey the same message: You’re not safe, and you need us to protect you.
Be Afraid. Be Very…
According to Dealogic, the tech sector is seeing the highest levels of M&A activity since 2000.
The numbers are staggering. Globally, there have been 1,535 tech deals so far in 2016 (as of March 1), reaching $71.4 billion. This is up 53% from last year at the same time. In the…
A leading energy consulting firm had a proprietary methodology for significantly reducing energy costs (think seven-figure savings, each year). Though the company’s proprietary solution was extremely powerful, it was communicated in such a seemingly straightforward manner, that many prospective clients thought – mistakenly –they could build a comparable energy-savings program on their own…
In a year marked by unprecedented M&A activity in the technology industry, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (once again) made headlines last week with its announcement of plans to spin-off its technology services operations and merge them with those of Computer Sciences.
Change is Never Easy
As Chief Executive Meg Whitman tells it, the…
We recently partnered with a fast-growing data analytics company. It had successfully leapfrogged larger, more established competitors by providing hand-on, high-touch, over-the-top customer service. Branding around this level of service was a no-brainer, right? Well, maybe not. The company was preparing to go public. High-touch service is a…
It’s the classic chicken or egg. What comes first: brand or culture? Leadership teams often ask us this very question during rebranding initiatives. While there is no one-size-fits-all answer, there are two critical questions that any leadership team must answer to understand the optimal relationship between brand and culture in their…
In business, growth is more than important – it’s essential. But chasing annual revenue and profit goals, whether by building upon existing relationships or expanding into new markets, can sometimes come at the expense of a company’s core position in the marketplace: its brand.
We recently partnered with a health care technology company who…
We’ve written before about the content conundrum currently facing many B2B brands. The proliferation of content as a marketing tool has led to one of its main challenges: in a marketplace where every brand is a publisher, how can your content stand out? Add into the mix our collective shrinking attention span and preference…
We are constantly amazed by the power of words, especially when it comes to employee engagement. Seemingly small tweaks in language can lead to meaningful changes in employee perceptions, morale and even behavior. In fact, according the WSJ, new cognitive science studies show that language “profoundly influences how we see the world…It turns out…
We recently partnered with a health care cost management company looking to redefine themselves in an industry fraught with systemic change in reimbursement models, regulations, compliance and more. Their customers were struggling to stay above water through all of this dynamic change and relied on strong vendor relationships to ensure business continued to function efficiently…
If we had to sum up B2B branding in 2015, we would do it with one word: innovation. It has been a recurring theme in almost every one of our conversations with B2B companies in recent months. From the CMO to the CEO, B2B executives have been laser-focused on building brands that convey innovation…