brand loyalty

the “perfect” brand

Rarely are you handed a perfect brand on a silver platter. Sure, you may have parts that function well and segments that are beautifully designed, but the chance that it will be ‘perfect’ is slim to none. There are also cases where, upon your first day, you are handed a set of brand guidelines that are typed up in a single sheet in excel and all you have to go by is that their main color is red and that you shouldn’t use comic sans, but the rest is up to you. I mean, good call on no comic sans, but that’s not a lot to work with. While you typically will have access to a. A set of brand guidelines, including specific colors, fonts, and general styles, b. An archive of previous work to show practical applications, and if you’re lucky c. an aesthetically pleasing brand.

At least in my career, I have been gifted a less-than-attractive brand on more then one occasion. It’s not because they like having an unattractive or outdated brand, but typically because it would either cost too much to rebrand, or upper management cannot make a decision; usually a combination of the two. So what do you do? you adapt.

refresh, don’t rebrand

As mentioned above, much of the reason companies avoid rebranding is cost. In this case, the DentalWorks brand stretches across almost 150 offices in 13 states with thousands of employees.
Think about that scope.
For each office, you would need to replace: building signs, monument signs, door & window signage, any brand-color furniture or art, business cards, referral and reminder cards, letterhead, brochures and flyers, most forms and documents, marketing items on hand [pens, stress balls, t-shirts, etc.], scrubs, clinical coats, and likely much more. This isn’t even including the initial time and cost of finding the new brand (many brainstorming meetings, logo design process, new messaging, new colors, new fonts…you get the point). Now multiply that by 150. Yikes, right? That list is why the second reason is usually making the decision.

So the solution? Refresh, don’t rebrand.
Most of the time, you’re able to make many small tweaks over time, while still maintaining the core of the brand. The trick is to not move too quickly and not stray too far.

avoid confusion

Now, i’m sure you’re thinking “Ok, the name of this page is ‘brand loyalty’ and all you’ve done is explain how to fix a brand”.
You’re right. You see, a big part of brand loyalty is not only making sure that you are loyal to the brand, but that the brand is loyal to its mission. If the mission changes but the brand can’t, you have to get creative. By making small changes, like changing the font weight hierarchy or by adding in more neutral colors to a very colorful color pallet, and utilizing better layouts (this one is key), you are to start cleaning up the brand without confusing the customer/patient when the website doesn’t look like anything else.
Lucky enough, DentalWorks had already begun to establish a new image style that was being under utilized with the rest of the creative. Images are the first thing people notice in a brand, followed closely by color.

slowly changing the guidelines

After months of slowly reworking existing creative and using this new set of changing guidelines for every project that came through, big or small, the DentalWorks brand seems newer, fresher, but still completely familiar.

The core color is still reflex blue (#24508f), the main accent is still green (#85b540), and the main font is still Gotham (Book, Medium, and Bold), but things look different.
Headers now pop with a bold typeface (vs the previously used “Light”) and the occasional green highlighted word. Backgrounds are now softer and easier to read with grey as the starting point instead of the solid blue. The addition of a new accent color (Goldenrod) for digital applications only keeps display and social ads fresh, without completely coming from left-field. All of this, in combination with genuine lifestyle photos, friendlier copy, and a better sense of design has completely transformed the way the DentalWorks brand is viewed - all without changing a single sign.

“be loyal to the brand by making the brand is loyal to its mission”

Another question you might be asking is why. “Why even bother making these changes and trying to keep up with what you have or haven’t changed if the brand is going to be overhauled soon?” Short answer? It’s easier to create things with a better looking brand style. Not only is it more fun to work on, but i’ve seen that the updated creative has gone on to perform much better than the previous. The longer, but still not all that long, answer is that this brand deserved more. The previous creative had been granfathered in for years and had been 100% adhered to without question. While there are plenty of things that are completely ok to live in an “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” kind of world, creative that changes as frequently as display advertising, flyers, and social media does has the unique ability to be more fluid. We first tested most of these newer designs on facebook and in reminder emails, this way there wasn’t a ‘wasting thousands of dollars testing a design that may no resonate’ problem. Once it was obvious that this new style was the right way to go, we began using it on flyers and direct mail as well.

By putting in effort and trying to create a cohesive design, even though it differed from the original set of brand standards, all DentalWorks branded items now feel like they’re all part of the same organization and most patients were completely unaware it was happening. As mentioned before, in order for you to be loyal to a brand, you need to ensure that the brand is loyal to its mission - not working directly against it.

refreshing the brand an overview

DentalWorks has had the same logo and design style for nearly 10 years. Due to the amount of practices sporting the DentalWorks logo (nearly 150), a complete rebranding is an extensive and expensive task. The brand is currently in the very beginning stages of re-branding, but there needed to be a change in the meantime. In 2018, myself, along with the Marketing Director, collaborated to develop a new brand style to better match the new voice we were adopting. Changes were made slowly and intentionally, as to not confuse the patients.

While the logo, fonts, and brand colors did not change, we made small tweaks to the brand guide in order to have it better reflect the mission. Bolder headers, unique layouts, new accent colors; this was the revitalization this brand desperately needed.

Additionally, an updated brand guide was created (Q3 2019) in order to better reflect the modernized DentalWorks. As proof in comparison to the original brand guide, many of the core elements did not change. This new guide also acted as a visual guide for any non-designers looking for guidance in navigating the brand style. It should be noted that, even in the time since this guide was created, more neutrals have been incorporated into print designs as to soften things up even more.

thank you for coming to my TED talk.

Not really, but I know how long this is and I appreciate you taking the time to, at least, thumb through it a bit. Again, please let me know if you have any questions for me or if you would like to discuss anything I’ve mentioned further. In the meantime, feel free to check out the rest of my portfolio, or even shoot me an email.