How to make waves with a start-up brand image

How to make waves with a start-up brand

Developing a new brand – whether a start-up or for an established company – always starts in the same way, says Stuart. Most agencies have a variation on what Simon Sinek brought to popular attention in his TED talk on understanding a brand’s ‘why, how and what’.

“We ask them what they do, which most can manage. Then we ask them how they’re different or how they do it, and that lets us tease more information out of them. But when it gets to the why, it can cause friction between founders,” he says. “We’ve come into contact with so many brands where there are incredible people with incredible ideas, but you really have to prod them to understand why they’re doing it.”

The why how and what of WaveMetrix

Following that, the agency uses a pyramid style of questioning to dive into position, proposition, personality and persuasion in regard to their message. That should be sufficient to come back to the client with a first stage presentation suggesting brand names, positioning, personality, tone of voice, and research on competition and the market.

WaveMetrix, software used by film studios, tracks what audiences are saying about movies online. BTL came up with an initial brand for the business seven years ago, but this was a chance to look at it again in the face of greater competition in the market.

“We ended up with a brand message that was ‘discover more’,” says Stuart. “[Co-founder] Alan Ault kept coming back to the same point – you get more insight, more deliverables, and more human interaction with WaveMetrix. And it also came down to the idea that when you discover something you’re not necessarily manufacturing it. In most cases the brand message includes words that are used in the workshop, which we rearrange and hand back to them.”

WaveMetrix logo

When it came to the creative, BTL focused on aligning the brand and the company’s founder. “Because Alan is quite low-key, we really wanted to have something that was very subtle as a brand marque, but still had a concept behind it. The personality is key because it has to sit with him.” The creative reflected WaveMetrix’s ability to measure both positive and negative sentiment with an identity that brings both aspects to life.

What are the major differences when working with a start-up and founders compared with corporates and marketing directors? “When you’re working with a founder it’s their own money behind a project so they really do value what you do. They question you less and tend to trust you more,” Lewin says. 

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