Distinctive branding
Define and deploy a distinctive brand strategy using competitive research and insights from the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute.
Marketing Architects
Strategy, Research, Creative
This is an OKR I led as part of an initiative to optimize our brand’s distinctiveness, while retaining what makes it memorable after its 25-year presence in the market. The goal was to use Jenni Romaniuk’s Distinctive Brand Asset thinking to poise our company for category fame and uniqueness, increasing its potential for mental and physical availability, as well as long-term creative potential.
Throughout the length of this project, I was challenged with selling the idea internally from the CMO to the CEO to the board. Being a small and agile team, I also prioritized choices that balanced speed and efficiency with impact potential.
Contributed to an 8-point increase in brand awareness and 17-point increase in top-box familiarity from 2023-2025.
The creative, before and after:
The strategy:Strategic logo updates:
Color Swap. The colors of our old logo were similar to several brands in our competitive set, reducing asset uniqueness.
Mobius is Hero. Although the mobius had reduced uniqueness within our competitive set, we wanted to honor our historical roots. We also believe it has an earned level of brand fame and recognition we want to retain.
“G” with personality. We believe our unique “g” has earned a level of brand fame and uniqueness, so we wanted to retain use of unique typography.
Design refined. We also wanted to address several design decisions unrelated to the distinctive assets process. For example, reading flow, balance, and the personality of our mobius and typography.
Strategic color updates:
Follow the rules. While our color palette was technically a multi-color palette, we were not executing it using multi-color rules. After deepening our understanding, we realized a single-color palette would be the most efficient for us to launch.
Balance unique with traditional. We found high level of color overlap within our competitive set. At the same time, we felt compelled to honor our 25+ year tradition of using blue. We explored our competitive set and found a unique blue.
Preview of the research:
