Marketing and Design Blog

The Brand Spiral of Death (and other thoughts on branding)

The importance of branding from the inside out.

There are two things you need to understand about your brand:

1. You care about it more than your customers do
2. You can change that

In order to begin the shift to a brand that customers genuinely care about, it’s critical to understand that branding is the starting point. Not marketing. Not sales. Branding. Yes, that 8-letter word that agencies and clients have been carelessly throwing around for years in an attempt to sound smarter than one another.

Read 'The Brand Spiral of Death (and other thoughts on branding)'

Rethinking The Professional Services Website

Professional services firms often struggle with their own branding, social media and marketing. Typically, it's because the services they offer are so similar to their competition, there's no real platform or defined difference to create anything concrete. It's sometimes difficult to tell them apart.

We're fortunate to work with many professional services organizations (architects, financial services, healthcare, technology, etc.) to help develop memorable messaging and marketing strategies. And typically the first place this new thinking will appear is on the company website.

Here's some helpful perspective on what you should consider as you build your professional service firm’s marketing materials and website.

Read 'Rethinking The Professional Service Website.'

Atomicdust Refreshes Website and Messaging for Resinate Materials Group

Resinate Materials Group came to us with a problem: their core promise – high quality, custom resins at stable prices – was lost in their website’s dated design and (by their own admission) inaccurate content.

Right away, we saw this wasn’t a design or writing challenge. This was a branding problem. So we started by interviewing key stakeholders from Resinate to gain a deep understanding of the company’s place in the resin market.

Read about the website and messaging Atomicdust created for Resinate Materials Group. 

Naming, Branding and Website Design for Daugherty Mobile Suite

One project leads to another.

We were in the midst of a full-scale branding program for our new client, Daugherty Business Solutions, when they came to us with a more urgent task: branding their new, mobile-oriented products.

This in and of itself represented a seismic change for the company. Daugherty had always focused on long-term consultative client relationships, rather than individual products or services. Daugherty asked us to name these new products in a way that positioned them as an extension of the company’s experience and expertise, not as a separate entity or independent division.

In the competitive marketplace, names for mobile-focused divisions run the gamut from straightforward to esoteric. We decided to leverage Daugherty’s brand equity – they have a long history in the IT consulting space – and name the set of products the Daugherty Mobile Suite. It’s simple, descriptive and accurate, while giving the company the flexibility to add new products or functionality without rebranding.

Read more and check out our naming, branding and web design work for Daugherty Mobile Suite.

New Messaging, New Website for Florsheim Work

Our longtime client, Florsheim Work, asked us to refresh their website with new messaging, new design – and an improved e-commerce section, to make it easier for customers to find the shoes they need, and for Florsheim Work personnel to update the ever-changing stock.

Florsheim Work makes safety footwear that doesn't look like safety footwear. It's not bulky, stiff or uncomfortable. This drives their core promise: their shoes are equally comfortable and appropriate on the factory floor, in the office and at dinner with the family.

Read more about the website and messaging we created for Florsheim Work. 

Should My Brand Be on Pinterest?

Did you know there’s a new social media site out there driving more referral traffic than Google+, YouTube and Linkedin combined?

It’s Pinterest.

Pinterest is an online community that allows users to save, or ‘pin’, images from around the web onto their own personal, virtual bulletin boards. There are popular categories - home decor, food, crafts, fashion - but users can create as many boards as they want, on any topic they desire. The idea is to express your personality and share the things that you love with your followers.

Sure, Pinterest is popular. In fact, it reached the 10 million monthly visitor mark faster than any other standalone site in history. But can Pinterest be used for marketing?

Read more about Pinterest and if it's right for your brand. 

Atomicdust lends a hand for U.S. Crisis Care’s branding and marketing

When we were first introduced to U.S. Crisis Care by a board member – and Atomicdust client – what we found was a small, passionate organization doing some very important work. Their mission was fairly well articulated:

“...a nonprofit organization that supports the development and operation of community crisis care programs...”

Their goals were pretty clear, they were organized and had had many accomplishments over the past 25 years. In this case, Atomicdust met U.S. Crisis Care at a time when they seemed to have their situation figured out. We weren’t sure where we were needed, but we wanted to help the organization... and we believed in our ability to help even the most successful groups get even better. They agreed to let us apply our Branding Program to see what Atomicdust could do to strengthen their efforts.

Learn more about our work for U.S. Crisis Care. 

Online Ad Spending Outpaces Print, But Does it Matter?

Online advertising spending will surpass print in the United States for the first time in 2012, according to a forecast by eMarketer. As stated in this report, spending is set to increase twenty-three percent to $39.5 billion.

Interaction is Branding

When someone mentions "branding," my guess is "interaction design" isn't the first thought that comes to mind.

In the increasingly always-connected mobile world we live in, it should be.

The way a user interacts with an app, website, or device has a profound impact on the emotional connection users form with their favorite brands. People love to be surprised and delighted - and paying careful attention to interaction decisions is a fantastic way to reinforce a brand experience. Read more about branding and interaction design.

Atomicdust plugs in to branding and design platform for Perch

Picture this: You’re in a hotel, getting ready for a meeting. As you get up to leave, you grab your laptop, phone, bag and suitcase – and head out the door. You’re on your way before you realize your chargers are still plugged into the wall back at the hotel. 

It’s a scenario that plays out in hundreds of hotel rooms, lounges, airports and homes every single day. Some companies’ solution to the problem has been to sell replacement chargers, but our client, LPS Technology had a better, far less wasteful approach.

Read more about our branding, design, and marketing work for Perch.