clarity
aligning people, purpose and performance
Introductions
We're Keith Wells and Keshi Bouri.
A brand strategist and a designer. A team that brings clarity to clients as they meet significant business challenges.
Our clarity aligns people, purpose and performance. It shows what needs to change, why, and how.
After more than 300 client projects, in 12 sectors, across 30 countries, we know it works.
As one client said, "All of our success flowed from that single point of clarity you gave us".
Clarity in your brand strategy
Brand Proposition
Who are you for, and what do you do for them?
We’ll work with you to identify the people who are most important to you, and to understand them properly. And by getting real clarity on that, we’ll define what you do that attracts and retains them.
In one word: a verb. It will describe the value you deliver to them, demonstrably and uniquely.
A law firm recognised that it strengthened people. That thought propelled its growth in its chosen sectors and into new geographic markets. It became the go-to destination for the best talent. It’s now one of the Top 3 in its home market.
An insurance company understood that it created certainty. That quality drove its underwriting and claims approaches, and redefined its innovation strategy. It also cemented its reputation as respected market leader.
An accounting firm realised that it built businesses. As it refined its client targeting and development plans, it also built itself into a Top 20 firm increasing its fees by 65% over the five years of its business plan.
Brand positioning
How do you compare against your competitors?
It’s not enough to be different: you have to be the brand your audiences will prefer.
We’ll help you define that. It might be in your ‘What’, it might be in your ‘How’, it might be in your ‘Why’. What matters is that it’s true, yours alone and compelling.
A professional services firm stood apart by accentuating the positive. It outgrew its business plan, and put it in pole position for a merger with a larger firm.
A mobile network used a technical advantage to appeal to the fastest-growing audience group, by showing how ‘now isn’t fast enough’. It leapfrogged three international competitors to become No1 in its home market.
A B2B supplier captured the innovation ambitions of its customers, by embracing ‘the power of and’. This positioning took the business from a debt-restructuring programme to IPO in 14 months.
An accounting firm realised that it built businesses. As it refined its client targeting and development plans, it also built itself into a Top 20 firm increasing its fees by 65% over the five years of its business plan.
Brand values
Behaviours should support and deliver your overall strategy.
Values must be operationalised, or they just become words on walls. And they must be recognised and celebrated by your people. We have a unique methodology for ensuring that.
A transport and leisure group based its turnaround on making things easy. This simple commitment made everyone aware of the power of thinking in the other person’s terms. Running through all internal and external operations, it helped the business achieve record profits in its first full year, and to exceed them in each successive year.
A professional institute found new relevance by being ‘compelling’. By shifting from its former ‘power to convene’ attitude, it made past and present members re-assess its advantages, and turned around a decline in numbers to a sharp and sustained increase.
A B2B supplier addressed its innovation deficit created by its traditional command-structure culture. By putting ‘bold’ at the core of its turn-around strategy, the business empowered its people to act like owners, to challenge their conventions and to be happy with risk. And it returned to profitability within a year.
Brand communication
How can you inspire the people you need to come with you?
Communication is one of the focal points for the brand's proposition, positioning and values. We make sure our clients stand out and are remembered.
A transport and leisure group transformed its reputation and performance by expressing all the meanings of 'better connections'.
An insurance giant reinforced its leadership position by showing how it was 'designed to be different'.
A professional institute regrew its membership base, and increased its reputation for relevance, by 'giving business confidence'
The commercial benefits are clear
"Complexity adds cost"
Our client couldn't have made our brief clearer.
We simplified the brand portfolio from 240 SKUs to 20 groups. We brought 4 sales organisations into 1.
And a market analyst said our client should now be "a buy stock, because the new branding strategy will make the business far more efficient."
"Can you make money while you change?"
We brought clarity to a total change programme. New mentality, new customer focus, new way of working, new brand expression and architecture.
And, as the CEO said at a seminar, "If anyone tells you that you can't make money while you're changing, they are lying. We made record profits in Year 1. And then again in Year 2."
Can we really grow that fast?"
We worked with one of the UK's leading Professional Services firms on their 5- year Ambition Framework.
We discovered a tendency to be over-modest (backed up by our client research). Working with local leadership teams across the UK, we developed a framework and a new sense of believe, that led to the firm achieving its 5-year objectives a year early.
And then set out the plan for the following 5 years with assured confidence.
"We need more innovation"
If innovation is only ever seen as someone else's job, it will probably never work across an organisation.
A financial services client had set up an 'innovation structure' that wasn't delivering.
By bringing it into line with the brand strategy and culture, we helped a new approach to emerge that contributed over 600 ideas across its EMEA operations within 3 months.