In March 2010 we changed our name from “Avencia” to “Azavea” to put an end to a legal dispute in which we had been entangled for a few years.  While a pretty disruptive event, to say the least, we saw this as an opportunity to re-introduce ourselves to the audience that had known us under the original name and to use this as a fresh start.  We also saw the event as a chance to reinforce our mission and services, and, in the process, develop a better understanding of how we might more effectively communicate this information to our customers and partners.  So how did we go about this?

First and foremost, we needed to understand our audience’s perceptions of the company’s brand.  If we had tons of cash, we would have conducted focus groups, but we’re a small company, so we sent out a questionnaire to a limited but targeted group of people.  The idea was to ask the same questions to a varied group of people and see how their responses differed or correlated with what our marketing messages intended to convey.  The group included:

• Staff members: 2 who had been with the firm longer; 3 who had joined us recently.
• Members of our constituency: clients; non-client stakeholders.
• Remotely connected people: friends of the company’s owners; people who knew about the company, but who didn’t necessarily know what GIS is, our industry, and/or products.

We asked straightforward questions:

• What does the company specialize in?
• What is your current perception of the company?
• What do you think the company’s strengths are?
• What do you think the company’s mission is?
• Is there an aspect of what the company does that is not clear to you?
• What differentiates the company from other GIS software companies?
• What do you think the company’s values are?

The survey uncovered both some strengths that we could build upon and expand as well as some aspects of our mission and offerings that we needed to more effectively articulate and clarify.

So, first the good news.  All survey respondents understood that the company specializes in building web-based geo-enabled/ GIS/ geospatial software, and that we like to take on and solve interesting and complex challenges that involved geographic data.  We were both surprised and pleased about some of the strengths and differentiating aspects that respondents highlighted:

• Best suited to work with clients in academic, government, nonprofits, and NGOs
• Socially responsible and aware
• Willingness to work on projects that have socially-redeeming values
• Patience and honesty
• Extremely strong customer service
• Agility, creativity, and flexibility, i.e., think from the customer’s perspective and needs rather than providing out-of-the box solutions
• Interested in bringing very advanced technologies to the fore, i.e., an intellectual approach to what can be done with GIS data instead of a boilerplate approach
• Tailor-made, visually beautiful work that is also budget conscious
• Dedication to stay on the leading edge of the field
• Work that bridges between pure research and real world solutions
• Intellectually motivating projects and work environment
• Smart, capable, professional yet casual staff

This was probably best summarized by one of the respondent: “When we first came on as a client, I accidentally sent an email to avencia.org, not .com.  This isn’t a slight.  As much as it’s a for-profit entity, I see [the firm] largely aligned towards the pursuit of information and a sense of social justice.  Its values aren’t political or partisan, they’re academic.”

Interestingly enough, though, while we discuss how our products have been used in some of our clients’ projects in each of our bi-monthly e-newsletter, and while each of our products also has its own dedicated website, the survey revealed that a) some respondents did not know we have product offerings beyond our custom software development services, and b) they didn’t understand the relation between our custom software and analysis projects and our software products.  It was also not entirely clear if all respondents understood that one of our strong interests lies in engaging in geospatial analysis and modeling rather than just building solutions that display data points/ assets on web-based maps and software.

So we now knew what we were communicating effectively as well as several aspects of the company we needed to work harder at articulating in the future.

Once we determined what the brand provides, what had been clearly understood and what needed to be better explained, we needed to fully understand who the brand is and how people perceived it, not just in terms of offerings, but in terms of its personality.  In turn, this personality is what would determine the tone of our new communication pieces, e.g. whimsical, academic, witty, light, didactic, etc.  Thus, part of the survey, we also asked the following questions:

• Which well-known personality does the company remind you of?
• Which personality characteristics does this person embrace?

We smiled at the following responses:

• Barack Obama
• Alton Brown
• Richard Feynman
• Google
• Harry Potter
• Buckminster Fuller

And embraced the following personality traits:

• Smart, serious, sophisticated, but not afraid to be witty and funny as hell
• Hard-working, creative, eager, intelligent, very detail-oriented, involved, focused, earnest, light-hearted, youthful, idealistic and inventive
• The Underdog
• 4 parts knowledge, 3 parts good people skills, 2 parts geek chic

Strengthened with what we’d learned from our customers, employees and partners, we conducted a four-month re-branding campaign that began with a letter from Robert Cheetham, (Azavea’s president and CEO), press releases, announcements about our new name and our newly acquired B Corporation status, articles in our e-newsletter, and Google ad campaigns.  Each communication piece attempted to reinforce what the survey had revealed as well as clarify areas of uncertainty.

This enabled us to articulate a clearer and stronger value proposition, i.e., the primary reason a potential client should hire us.  We wrote a more precise internal positioning statement, i.e., statement that expresses how a company wishes to be perceived.  This is the core message an organization wants to deliver in every communication medium.  And finally, we crafted a new tagline (Beyond dots on a map.) that I think differentiates our brand while being meaningful and evocative.

Our new website comes as a summary of the entire re-branding process, and it attempts to emphasize the following:

• Our expertise in spatial analysis and geoprocessing
• The distributed geoprocessing work we do
• A better correlation between our clients’ projects and our products
• The R&D work we are involved in
• Our interest in projects with positive social value and our B Corp status
• Stronger emphasis on the culture and the people behind the company

So a new website is indeed much more than a fresh face on an organization – it can be an opportunity to re-articulate what the organization does as well as what it stands for.

Our new website was also an opportunity to improve the systems that underpin it – check out Jeremy’s blog to read more about that.  What’s your feedback on Azavea’s brand?  What well-known personality does it remind you of?  Make sure to let us know.