Rebranding with Grit and Intention.
CREYOS (formerly Cambridge Brain Sciences) leads the field in accurately quantifying brain function and brain health through its SaaS solution. Its cognitive assessments and health questionnaires—all delivered and scored digitally—are used by healthcare practitioners and researchers worldwide.
Since 2009, CREYOS has worked with hundreds of thousands of people, helping them to gain a deeper understanding of brain health while contributing to large-scale scientific studies that have advanced the knowledge of the brain. However, over the years, the company’s product has evolved, and it became clear that the current brand needed to better reflect what CREYOS was doing and its advances.
A rebrand was needed, and CREYOS called Avocet.
From the initial meeting, CREYOS’s position and 20+-year reputation were at the forefront of Team Avocet’s mind. While a rebrand was necessary, we did not want to sacrifice brand equity – and CREYOS’s deeply respected business and academic credibility – in the process.
Avocet’s strategic rebranding approach was designed to differentiate CREYOS from the competition, illustrate its value proposition, align the product attributes, and articulate the brand’s new and unique qualities and offerings.
Unlike many marketing agencies involved with a rebrand, we did NOT immediately jump to design. Instead, we laid a path forward that began with deploying critical strategic levers to gain insight into the brand’s past, present, and future state: a business leader revolutionizing the industry and knowledge of brain health.
That strategic groundwork included interviewing internal and external audiences, a competitive analysis, and deep and thorough research of the marketplace. And because the CREYOS team came in with a “no limits” mindset and no preconceived notions of what the rebrand might look like, we could be innovative and make bold choices. The CREYOS team was steadfast from the beginning that they wanted to take the rebrand as far as possible, including renaming the company. They wisely understood that sometimes solid marketing can get in the way by keeping a brand’s name.
We began the rebrand by asking CREYOS two critical questions: Where did they want to take the brand, and where did they want to be in their customers’ mindsets? The answers guided us every step of the way.
CREYOS knew it wanted to take bold steps to advance the brand, and it understood that its long-standing position in the industry and customers’ minds were strong enough to withstand a significant rebrand.
We began by deploying a multi-pronged branding evaluation that included the following:
From there, we developed a rebrand scaffolding that was built on five key outputs from the research:
The information gleaned from this thorough dive into CREYOS and the industry made it clear that the rebrand presented a unique positioning opportunity. This was especially apparent when it came to renaming the brand. To stand out in the sea of sameness of other similar – but not as state-of-the-art or scientifically innovative – brands, the new name had to be, above all else, memorable. That not-so-simple or small change was the key to elevating the brand and to our rebranding. The new name, however, also had to be easily trademarked and one we could get a domain for.
As is often the case, the rebranding process takes time. But the weeks we spent with the CREYOS team were fruitful and ultimately satisfying: CREYOS, a combination of two of the company’s most important values – credibility and ethos – was born. This was also inspired by the brand archetype we chose: The Sage, which focuses on brand qualities such as truth and insight and inspires loyalty and trust.
CREYOS’s messaging, which formed the structure for the comprehensive marketing strategy Avocet developed, highlighted its belief in science and concrete data and its commitment to empowering people—both practitioners and patients—to better understand their health and the world around them.
An essential part of any rebranding process is overcoming the fear of change. Because we engaged CREYOS’s team in meaningful ways and included them in the process, the new name and brand were smooth and universally accepted across the company. We scheduled regular meetings in “The War Room,” where ideas were presented and problems were openly discussed and resolved.
Once the new name was chosen, we engaged our creative team to design a new logo. While nodding to the old look and feel, the new design was modern, simple, and memorable.
The messaging brought tone and memorability to life through several branded materials, including a style guide that outlined specifics on visual details, client voice and tone, and essential elements from the messaging architecture. The guidelines were clear but flexible, allowing the entire CREYOS team to walk down a path together with consistency and clarity.
We assisted in training the CREYOS team to use the brand book in ways that equipped them to do their jobs better while helping to move the brand forward.
Brand valuation has exceeded expectations through existing client retention, new business acquisition, employee excitement, and key stakeholder interest.
© 2000-2024 Avocet Communications Company
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