A Checklist to Build the Perfect Website

Take a good look at your car. ‘So what?’ you’re thinking. ‘It’s just a car.’ Well, according to some estimates, the average car is made up of 30,000 parts. You don’t think about all the gears and pipes and turbo air intakes hidden within each model, because engineers have put it together so seamlessly that it just looks like one unit to you — a singular “car.” The same goes for any decent website, which is composed of hundreds of decisions stitched into one integrated layout. The better it’s been built, the simpler it looks.

Don’t be fooled though—building the perfect website requires crossing off a lengthy checklist of to-do’s. Every web design agency has their own schedule of planning and executing a site build, but here’s one we suggest you follow.

Set a Budget

How much does a website cost? How long is a piece of string? A freelance designer can make a DIY brochure site to showcase their portfolio and get everything they need out of it. Whereas a business that wants to track a donation form, build a member login portal, catalog an interactive shopping matrix — yeah, you should probably opt for the DIFM (do-it-for-me) route and benefit from a web development company’s expertise. Added functionality always costs more, so determine which site features you need and how many you’re able to pay for.

Register a Domain Name

Whether you’re going with a free Wix template or shelling out $100,000+ for a site, no one will be able to appreciate it if you don’t claim a domain name, which is basically your address on the internet and costs around $10–20. Check out Domain.com or GoDaddy to see if the domain you want is available, but don’t be surprised if it’s not. (After all, the internet is a star cluster of two billion websites — 400 million of which are active, but who’s counting?) So if the domain you want is taken, ask the web design agency you hired which name they recommend. Tempting as it is to get creative or quirky here, you’ll want your URL to be as similar as possible to the name of your business so prospective customers can find you.

Value the UX

One reason to hire a web design agency is that they’re staffed with UX (or “user experience”) designers. These talented folks are digital artists who keep the experience of their audience top of mind as they create a website design, which should incorporate a color palette and a copy .doc into modules that solve a different problem on each page. The “Donate” page drives visitors to, well, donate. The “About Us” page tells the company story. The “Become a Member” page touts the perks of membership. If all that sounds intuitive, that’s because the UX designer has made the ride feel effortless, so your visitors further your business goals with each click they make on your site.

Make Your Content King

Web copy needs to get to the point. Sure, you want your writing to lure visitors in, but don’t wax poetic. Front-load your copy with the most relevant info about your business: email, address, a few lines about what you do. Use the same tack with social posts and paid advertising — content that people like to snack on and that directs traffic back to your site. With a blog or a newsletter, consistency is key. Publish on the reg to drum up an audience. Optimize it with keywords, and then link out to related blogs and articles. All those strategies impart upon your work enough authority to make it rank higher in Google searches. (Because, really, when was the last time you clicked past the first page of a Google search?)

Ship It!

At long last, the site is finished. Oh, happy day. You’ve bought your domain. You’ve designed your layouts. You’re excited about revving up your content initiative. You’ve been working on this thing for months and you’re ready for it to be over. We understand — but we insist you do some last-minute QC. Proof the copy, triple-check that the links work, write metadata into the CMS, and set up 301 redirects to steer visitors familiar with your old site toward your new site. 

One final thing: Plug in Google Analytics to track how many people are viewing your domain, where they’re coming from, and how long they’re staying. (These insights give you a bird’s-eye perspective of your web performance.) Take a breather. And then take the wheel: Hit launch, post about it on Facebook, and congratulate yourself on assembling a sleek and sexy site.

How Branding Can Build Better Customer Value

How Branding Can Build Better Customer Value

Businesses, for your own survival, remember this: Customers today have more choices than ever before. Drop into any grocery store and you’ll have to decide between, at minimum, 12 different brands — not bags, but brands — of rice. So to distinguish yourself from all the other metaphorical bags of rice on the shelf, your branding needs to demonstrate a record of reliability. In a word, you have to show that your business builds customer value.

CV=(B-C)

See that equation up there? That’s a rough-and-ready definition of customer value: The benefit of a product minus the cost. You’ve just bought a bag of scrumptious basmati rice for $4. Are you satisfied with it? You are? Then bask in the glow of high customer value. That purchase is one tesserae of the mosaic known as “brand equity,” or the social value of a brand. Calculating brand equity can get tricky, because it’s not based entirely on market capitalization, but also on intangibles like dependability. Once people trust you, they may be willing to pay more for your product if they enjoy the perks of your branding. Some marketers argue that branding benefits customers in at least three ways: making their lives easier, moving or inspiring them, or reinforcing their beliefs and bottom lines. Let’s go over each one.

 

Ease and Convenience

No matter how glitzy your brand design gets, many successful companies still follow the same customer service principles as Mom and Pop: They solve problems. Need a credit card? Call Visa. Want a bassinet delivered? Log onto Amazon. Gotta write a content article about how branding builds customer value? Open your Macbook Air. 

Visa and Amazon and Apple have thrived in part because they provide “convenient customer service,” which is mostly a euphemism for easing people’s apprehensions or fears. Take a more visceral example: A tree branch falls on your roof and a home repair business removes it and patches up the damage before a hailstorm sets in. All that anxiety welling up inside you about replacing rotted wood and soaked furniture goes away, courtesy of this company. Afterwards, you’ll probably call them again — or even buy hammers and wood chippers from them, if they’re selling. Why, you ask? Because you trust their brand.

 

Inspiration and Identity

Brands don’t just fix problems for us. They also welcome us into the club. Remember the last time you went into the Mac store? You felt like you were entering a spaceship. Your floor was the Cloud. Everything looked like a vision from twenty years in the future. The glowing white layout enticed you — and your pocketbook. At a Mac store, you’re paying for a 27″ monitor with a desktop shot of Catalina Island, yes, but you’re also meshing your identity with the aura of simplicity and sophistication that you’re nimbused in. What’s the customer value of being enticed? Brand agencies will debate this point endlessly, but one could argue that, in Apple’s case, it currently amounts to $241 billion, making Apple a giant among other global tech giants today, with a near-perfect brand value rating of AAA.

 

Beliefs and Bottom Lines

Consumers have rewarded Apple with billions of their hard- (or otherwise-) earned dollars, in part because Apple enriches them right back. Your Macbook Air will cost you at least $1,000, but the ease with which it lets you work from anywhere or plug into LinkedIn communities will lead you to opportunities that recoup that initial fee in no time. Brands also typically find that they make more when they spend on side-projects that make their business look good. Take this page from Apple’s site: “How Apple Volunteers are Helping Transform Lives.” The more world-weary among us might point out that do-gooder companies give off a whiff of paradox, but this article does a convincing job highlighting how Apple employees help out at food banks or teach coding to high school students. The more Apple gives back, the better people feel about buying from them, especially when their outreach programs reinforce values that those consumers already hold.

A well-thought-out brand isn’t just a shinier logo on a bag of rice. Rather, it’s the culmination of all the research you’ve done on your customers — the surveys they filled out, the comments they left on Yelp!, the Google Analytics you pored over. Listen to what they’re saying. Track their spending patterns and adjust your pricing (if advisable). Segment off the clients you want to attract, then position your brand so that it speaks to them. A company without branding in today’s market has pretty much told their customers that they aren’t interested in providing value for them, which can get costly. After all, your very survival may depend on it.

How Branding Affects Consumer Behavior

Some people believe we’re living in the golden age of branding. But what does that mean? Before “branding” became an industry term, it referred to the process of scorching livestock with a heated poker to identify which animals belonged to which owners. Hence the metaphor: Branding helps companies make their mark in a field already cluttered with competition. Yes, branding is copy and design, but at its core is an emotional appeal — and the more authentic that appeal, the more effective the marketing. So how do companies lay claim to consumers’ attention through their branding? Read on to find out.

Project an Image

Often the decision to make a purchase stems from psychological motivations, rather than a straight X’s-and-O’s calculus. You can get Derrick Rose basketball shoes from Adidas for $120, but if you’re a LeBron James fan, you’ll probably shell out $200 to Nike to don his line of footwear. Why? Because, on some level, you feel like you’re stepping into the King’s shoes whenever you lace up your LeBrons. Brands allow consumers to identify with or suit up as their heroes, and consumers reward those brands richly for that feeling of empowerment.

Establish Familiarity

Research indicates that six out of ten consumers prefer buying products from brands that are familiar to them. Which makes sense: We network through our connections, we buy property in areas we feel safe in, and we buy things from companies who have shown their value to us already. Consider coming across a package of bread on an empty shelf in the store. You’re probably not going to pick it up — who knows why it’s been tossed aside? Now imagine that loaf has the Sara Lee logo on it. You might still inspect it, but at least you know that a multinational company guarantees its quality. For all our carping about corporations, that logo will likely reassure a lot of people that the bread is edible and safe (and only 45 calories). In other words, branding is a seal of approval that we consumers learn to trust.

Instill Loyalty

Even if you trust Sara Lee, you might trust a bevy of other global bread-brands as well. All their brand designs may be distinct, but they need something else to vie for your attention — and that “something” could have nothing to do with the product they’re selling. Instead, they could project a good-guy image because they pay a minimum wage of $70,000. Or, like KFC, they could launch the  “I Love You, Colonel Sanders! Dating Simulator,” a campaign intended to inject sex appeal into a brand ambassador who consumers today may have difficulty engaging with, skeptical as we are of any figure that still nods to antebellum plantation motifs. 

Too much of a disconnect between what’s sold and what’s said can be fodder for cynicism — and with reason. When Starbucks teams up with the Wounded Warrior Project, you’ve got to wonder: What does this have to do with coffee? Corporate flirtations with social commentary may strike consumers as ploys to grab their attention and empty their pockets, and, as in the case of Starbucks’ anti-racism initiative, face backlash. Yet Ben & Jerry’s earned praise for a similar campaign. How people react to brand positions can sometimes be guesswork, but the more authentic those positions seem to us, the more likely we’ll stay loyal to them.

Brand The Brand

In a way, branding is a feedback loop that influences company decisions nearly as much as it drives consumer behavior. Since what’s said is as important as what’s sold, what’s said about a business can sway its profits. According to the Better Business Bureau, 88% of consumers read up to 10 reviews before they trust a business. So prospective customers are likely to skip on companies with negative reviews and call their competitors whose Yelp! pages gleam with compliments. Similarly, when a CEO makes an inappropriate comment during an internal call, the brand loyalty is compromised and the CEO will probably resign. Whereas titans of industry were once throned at the head of the board, now they, too, are subject to how consumers relate to the brand position they helped forge.

As a brand agency, we get it — all this talk about branding makes it seem like companies should adopt values and bullhorn beliefs just to drum up awareness about themselves. Yet we believe branding is not a gussied-up facsimile of the real thing. Quite the opposite: Branding is the most fundamental insight about your business, the drilled-down core that marks you as you. We could blast on, because we love talking about brands, but let’s cut to the chase: Wanna talk about yours?

How to Build Landing Pages that Convert

Not all landing pages are created equal. “Static page,” “destination page,” “lead capture page,” “single property page” — these are all names for the coveted landing page, which is a web page generally set up to promote an offer. The goal of said landing page is to lure visitors into the tractor-beam of your marketing strategy: First you get them in the sales funnel, then you guide them through the suite of services your business provides. Simple enough.

Except here’s the rub: Prospective clients can crash-land on a landing page and not “convert” — that is, act on the deal being advertised. The average conversion rate on a landing page is 2.35%. The top quarter of companies enjoy conversion rates north of 5%, while a rate higher than 11% is bragging rights. So how do you build landing pages that convert in the 5–11%+ range? That question has befuddled many a marketer and agency, but here are a few tips we’ve learned along the way.

Be Transparent

“Get them in the nose!” That’s an old newspaperman’s line about blasting the reader with the most important information in the first few sentences, and the same advice applies to landing pages. Figure out your core message and slap it in the header so your audience knows what the landing page wants them to do. Enter a raffle to win a truck, buy an all-inclusive trip to Kauai, take a virtual tour of a senior living community — whatever the conversion is, hone in on it and make it clear why your visitors are here in the first place. 

Show, Don’t Tell

Whatever you’re selling, show it. If you’re a vineyard, don’t just bullet out the perks of being a member. Include pictures of bottles of cab sauv and pebbled courtyards where you can get pleasantly snockered on those bottles. Feature testimonials from happy customers — but make sure they’re real (people catch on). Add in case studies, which fulfill much the same purpose. And, of course, you must connect with users on an emotional level. “Buy an all-inclusive trip to Kauai” is clear, but an effective landing page design will embed videos of waterfalls pouring through rainforest canopies or work in descriptions of whales singing beneath the waves.

Up Your CTA Game

Another reason you should remove clutter from landing pages is to make sure your CTA is easy to find. Place the CTA above the fold so your audience doesn’t have to unfurl the Dead Sea Scrolls just to get to it. Copywriters, this is not your moment to be clever. Visitors with vision impairments may be clicking around your site with a Screen Reader, which translates on-screen copy into speech. So to make CTAs accessible, keep them informative. 

What’s an accessible way to ask a visitor to subscribe to your newsletter? Something like “Subscribe to my newsletter.” If that sounds humdrum, that’s the point: Avoid addy-style puns that confuse the purpose of the page. And include no more than one or two CTAs. Remember, simplicity means sales.

Boost Your Cred

Landing pages often have forms that ask for a visitor’s name, email, and even credit card information. The more security you can provide, the more likely strangers will cough up the most important data in their lives. Especially if you’re a known quantity, trot out that logo — the Starbucks mermaid, for instance, will stamp considerable trustworthiness onto any landing page (a Starbucks landing page, of course). A data security badge also conveys that you’re legit. And go over your spelling with holy fervor. Nothing kills your cred quite like janky grammar.

Monitor and Optimize

The best landing pages buoy up to the top of Google searches because they’re optimized. To boost your page ranking, incorporate keywords into the headlines and body copy and the metadata in the back-end. Run A/B testing to gauge what’s working and what’s not. Let’s say Option A is performing at a conversion rate of 1%. Embed a new video (or shorten it if it’s over three minutes), swap out the headlines, mix and match the brand colors, and — boom! — you’ve got Option B, which now sports a conversion rate of 10%. Whatever the numbers are, keep tweaking the layout and settings till those numbers trend up, up, up.

Finally, consider adding in additional links or related content that redirect your audience to your larger website or blog. Connecting all your channels lets users extend their journey and find more information about what you do and how to contact you in case they want you to create a landing page for them that’s a cut above the rest.

Jacob Tyler Wins Gold!

Congratulations to Richard Truss for submitting his Fireside Restaurant Ad in the 2020 Graphis Advertising Competition! We always knew the ad was awesome!!

Jacob Tyler wins gold in Graphis 2020 Advertising Competition
Jacob Tyler wins gold in Graphis 2020 Advertising Competition

Jacob Tyler’s Solutions to Common Remote Work Complaints. (#3 Is Kinda Controversial)

As a business that’s created a successful hybrid workforce (more about that in this blog post), I wanted to start sharing more about our methods and philosophies regarding remote work. The way I see it, if we can make it work, so can you. So this is the first of many blog posts you’ll see. I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments.

Common complaint 1: More productivity comes at the cost of less social bonding.

With 91% of people surveyed expressing that they were more productive outside of the office, it’s no wonder remote work is taking off. But it has to be noted that in the process we’re missing out on some serious bonding opportunities. When you’re in a creative field like we are, you need those bonds to help drive ideas and client results. As a solution to this we use BlueJeans — a video conference product — to help stay connected with each other and our clients (we have a less formal solution for off-the-cuff needs in the next paragraph). You’d be surprised at how well video calls bring people together. You get to see expressions, body language, and emotions. Those are the foundations of strong relationships. Phone calls just don’t cut it. The key here is making sure everyone understands that although you can dial in and turn your video off, we expect your video to be on — unless you’re having a bad hair day and you think you’ll be called out for it like I was once by a remote contractor. : )

Common complaint 2: Communication suffers with remote work.

In Adam Heitzman’s article for Inc. he writes, “A major drawback to remote work is that you can’t walk across the office when you need something”.  Well, Adam, that’s right, but if you plan around not having a physical office with all of your staff present, it’s not that hard to overcome. Here are the policies that work for us for both on-site and remote staff.

  1. Be available and flexible most of the core working day. If you’re not going to be around, let your immediate teammates know. Even if one person is in New York and one person is San Diego, there’s still five working hours overlap to collab and communicate.
  2. Use technology that works. As I mentioned in the previous paragraph, technology is our friend. We use Slack and an app that integrates with Slack called Whereby (super cheap and easy) for off-the-cuff group conversations, video calls, and meetings. Highly recommended.
  3. Buy into “over communicating” and hire those who buy into it as well. You know what’s never pissed me off once? A staff member making sure I saw an important email, text, or calendar invite. That goes double for getting clarity on a project or creative direction. The “hey, did you see my email from last night” double check takes less than a minute and saves countless hours if something gets missed. Over. Communicate. Often.

Common complaint 3: Managing people is too hard remotely.

After 20 years of running this business, I can safely say that managing people is hard no matter what, and if someone is not physically present you may have a tougher time. I don’t, because I came up with a sure-fire solution that will probably be seen as controversial (that’s kinda my brand, btw): Don’t hire people that you need to manage. Ok, there you go, see you later. Just kidding. I wouldn’t leave you hanging. What I’m saying is that in my experience and from what others have told me, the primary qualifier of a successful remote work staff is having people who are highly-organized self starters. When you work with people like that you’ll find that managing isn’t an issue. They manage themselves. That doesn’t mean you won’ have to give direction or discuss projects, because you will. At Jacob Tyler, we only hire people with 10 years+ experience for most roles and at least a couple years remote work experience. That’s our policy and it works. Depending on your industry more or less experience could work for you.

“Don’t hire people that you need to manage … the primary qualifier of a successful remote work staff is having people who are highly-organized self starters.”

There you have it. If you have any questions about remote work just hit us up on LinkedIn or Twitter.

-Les

Our Agency Uses a Hybrid Staffing Model, and it’s Awesome. Here’s Why.

It’s all about the client.

When we started almost 20 years ago we never thought that we’d get big quickly. But it happened. Through hard work, handshakes, and more coffee and whiskey than one should safely consume we built Jacob Tyler to a big SoCal agency. I personally made the mistake of trying to be everything to everyone and hiring for all types of agency positions. By 2012 we had over 35 employees and clients all over the country. And then, the sh!t hit the fan… we became the agency I really never wanted to be. In fact, I promised myself we would never be. Our work started to suffer because we had the wrong team in place, a couple accounts took their work in-house, and a couple more went with other agencies.

As a result, some employees left (which was in some cases a good thing) and some got laid off. It’s the nature of the advertising/marketing/branding industries (especially with technology changing so fast) but even still, honestly, it completely sucked. You build something special. Your dream. And you watch it become something you didn’t plan for and then fall apart. The worst thing? You put other people’s lives in flux. So, after licking our wounds for a while… okay, more than a while, more like 5 years, I knew that I had to go back to my roots and ask, “Is there a better way? A way that’s more flexible to roll with the punches of this industry? A way to come out on top year in and year out?” Turns out, there was. The answer was a hybrid workforce. And after years of trying it, it’s awesome.

What do we mean by “hybrid workforce”? It’s having a core group of full-time employees to handle the everyday necessities of running a business — new business, project management, client strategy and services, etc. — and a crack team of subject matter specialists that can work nimbly on projects as our needs and our clients’ needs change.

‘I knew that I had to go back to my roots and ask, “Is there a better way? A way that’s more flexible to roll with the punches of this industry? A way to come out on top year in and year out?” Turns out, there was.’

Why We Do It

  1. Scalability – Less overhead for our client to cover our costs.
  2. Increased Expertise – We bring in the best people when we need ‘em and we are not limited by the talent of our internal teams.
  3. Internal Knowledge Building – The more people with diverse experience we’re exposed to, the smarter we all become.

How We Make It Work

  1. Smart Selections – We pick people with a minimum of 10 years of experience and those who are self-defined “organizational freaks” or “self starters” because they have to be more accountable.
  2. Video Conferencing – As we have become a global agency, it has been necessary to adopt technology that lets us communicate with our clients and vendors in an efficient and personable manner. It’s great being face-to-face even though sometimes we’re across town, across the country, or in another continent.
  3. Flexibility – Everyone here is flexible. It’s an old trope that in advertising you’re always working. We don’t play by that but more by… hey we give you the freedom you want, all we ask in return is a bit of flexibility to make things work when the client needs it.

When Jacob Tyler was founded, clients really wanted to make sure we were staffed internally and felt it was important to have that “marble” entryway with someone at a front desk welcoming them and getting coffee while they entered a large conference room and felt important. I have noticed that recently (in the past 2-3 years), meeting requests AT our office have slowly declined. With technology really making it easy to meet “in-person” from a distance and create new efficiencies, our clients have realized that it’s just not as important to be face-to-face. They would rather a smart, nimble, and small team to handle their account. That doesn’t mean we’re not willing to host a meeting in person or travel to a client’s office. We always go above and beyond to help our clients feel comfortable when working with us. But the reality is that if we can use technology to save money, save time, and do better work that gets better results, we’re gonna do it. That’s just how we roll around here.

Jacob Tyler recognized as a Top Beer Logo Design Company on DesignRush

This year we are proud to have been named one of the top 25 agencies for Beer Logo design on DesignRush. Thanks for the Kudos and we appreciate you loving our rebranding work!

As well, we have made the best of lists for: Food & Beverage Branding Agencies, Small Business Branding Agencies, and Naming Agencies. We are excited to be honored by Design Rush for our work.

The Jacob Tyler Rebranding Guide

When & How to Rebrand

How To Take Your Company’s Branding To The Next Level

By The Jacob Tyler Agency

Every successful company needs to have a strong brand. Your brand isn’t just a logo, your brand name, or simply a piece of marketing strategy. It’s all of these things and so much more. It’s your brand’s identity. It’s the story you tell current and potential clients or customers that tells them why they should spend their money with you. It’s a central piece of the puzzle of your success or failure.

What do you do, then, when your brand isn’t strong enough or is out-of-date and out-of-touch? If this is the case, then it is probably time for you to rebrand. Rebranding, however, can be a terrifying proposition for companies to undertake. Change is rarely easy, especially ones as potentially costly and risky as rebranding.

At Jacob Tyler, we’re experts at successfully helping our clients in their rebranding efforts with years of experience and success stories on our side, and we want to share our wealth of knowledge with you! To do that, we’ve put together this helpful (and a bit lengthy) rebranding guide to walk you through the essential components to successfully rebranding.

In this guide, we will cover the essential aspects of successful rebranding strategy and execution, including:

Brand vs. Branding vs. Brand Strategy

What sets your brand apart and tells your story?

Before we dive into the ins and outs of the rebranding process, it’s important to understand what the differences are between a few things. Let’s take a look at the often confused concepts of brand, branding, and brand strategy, what differentiates each of them, and what role they play in the rebranding process.

Brand

A brand is much more than the definitions you’ll find in the top search results of Google. It’s not just a mark or a logo or a name. Branding is everything a business, organization, or entity does.

Your website experience is your brand. How your receptionist answers your phone is your brand. The condition of your bathroom is your brand. A brand is the thread that runs through every piece of your business. This is why a brand is so important.

defiition of a brand

If you want someone to know what you stand for, it should be displayed in everything you do, spoken or unspoken, written or unwritten, explicit or implicit. We love it when we see a 100% effort to get brand right, and we’re over the moon when clients get it.

Branding

This one is a little more cut and dry. Branding is all the ownable, identifiable marks that make an organization stand out in the product landscape.

Good branding has the ability to bring a brand name to mind even when the name isn’t present. It’s a look, a tone, and a feel, and even a sound—everything that is uniquely your brand. For example, that sound when your Macbook starts up? Branding. The way the Apple lights up on the lid? Branding.

definition of branding by jacob tyler

You’ve probably got this one down. Let’s move on.

Brand Strategy

Brand strategy uses the above points and creates a framework that lays out the who, what, when, where, how, and why of your organization’s communication of its identity.

Just as it is with a communication strategy or social strategy, brand strategy is the roadmap that allows you, your employees, and your partners to build equity in the way you want it to be built. It’s an absolutely critical piece of building something meaningful and for the long haul.

jacob tyler rebranding strategy

Creative Processes

Discover. Plan. Build. Launch.

Every brand has a unique story to tell. Your story drives every marketing and creative move for a strong brand and digital strategy. Your story should build your brand from the ground up. For that to happen, there needs to be strong creative processes in place to translate your brand’s story into tangible branding.

For a more customized approach, Jacob Tyler will hand select a team of experts and trusted partners for additional support throughout the process including digital search engine marketing and back-end technical support for a complete and focused campaign strategy.

Our Process

jacob tyler rebranding process

Identify Challenges

We start by exploring the primary challenges for your business or industry. This is key for us to understand where we need to go with the remainder of our process. Only by understanding what challenges your brand faces can we see where our destination lies.

With challenges identified, we can then develop cutting-edge solutions through a strategic process where we will discover, plan, build, and launch a custom-tailored brand experience to grow your business.

Discover

This is the most important stage of our rebranding process here at Jacob Tyler. The most important part of our relationship with a new client is getting to know them. We often tell clients we will never know their business as much as they do, but the closer we get, the better our creative will be. Furthermore, we will be able to deliver creative more efficiently and effectively.

Our research isn’t just academic either. We take the time to get to know our clients and their business in person. We don’t just want to know facts or tidbits about what they do. We want to know how their business feels, and we aren’t afraid to roll up our sleeves and get our hands dirty to do so. Sometimes literally!


“We spend a lot of time with our clients initially to get to know them. For example, when we did the rebrand for NuVasive, a 2.5 billion dollar medical device company, our team actually did cadaver training in their San Diego corporate headquarters.

We did this to help understand how their innovative spine technology was implanted and how doctors were trained to do so. It was helpful in how we thought about the brand moving forward.”

-Les Kollegian, CEO & Chief Creative Officer

Plan

Every client strategy is custom and the plan is developed: first, based on the specific target market and, second, by the budget. We choose what we feel the most effective strategy will be and then go from there down the line based on the client budget.

Build

With our strategy approved and budgets in line, we bring our cross-departmental team together to kick off the build process. At the ground level, we create a timeline that lays out expectations for progress and when our client can expect deliverables that need approval leading all the way up to launch. Our strategists, creatives, and account executives then get to work with our developers, social media team and digital media team to start the rebranding process as it relates to each form of media.

Launch

As we reach the end of the build stage, our clients have provided comprehensive feedback and we’ve agreed upon our strategy, creative assets, campaigns, as well as key performance indicators and benchmarks for reporting. The launch date we laid out in our timeline marks the official launch of the rebrand. But the work isn’t done when we press “go.” In fact, it’s really just beginning!

Upon launch, we test everything that can be tested to make sure it’s working properly. Whether that’s a website, an interactive trade show booth, digital display ads, social media campaigns or something else entirely, we triple check to make sure every single thing is built properly, working as we promised, and in a way that delivers results for our clients. This process can take anywhere from hours to a couple of weeks depending on the size and scope of the rebranding project.

Solution

After launch, the work is not over, however. We still need to be sure the project is truly a solution to the challenge we set out to solve. To do that, we find the best metrics to gauge the success of the project, not only right now at the client’s current scale but in the future as the client grows as well.

Once we have tested our creative and solutions, we modify until we hit the right conversion, Cost Per Lead (CPL) and Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) for the specific project. Experimenting and adjusting post-launch until you have the answer is essential. No rebranding project should be assessed with the same metrics you have used before just because they worked on previous projects. You need to find the right one for the individual brand and project. Just as every brand is unique, so is every project.

This adaptability needs to continue as your company grows, as well. Continuing to find new solutions as your company grows is key. Ideally, your rebranding project will foster continued company growth, and your solutions and metrics used to gauge success might need to adapt and grow along with it.

Marketing Strategies

Developing successful brands by creating detailed and impactful solutions that reflect the visual soul of your business.

A successful rebrand does not look the same for every company or project. Depending on your specific industry, client base, size, goals, or countless other factors, there are a wide variety of marketing strategies that might be important for you to be truly successful. That is why it is important to understand the entire spectrum of marketing strategies and how they play into your rebranding efforts.

rebranding marketing strategies

At Jacob Tyler, we categorize these strategies into a few distinct categories: Insight & Research, Visual Communications, User Experience, and Design & Development. Let’s take a look at these categories, how they play into your rebranding efforts and the specific strategies that make up each category.

Insight & Research

Successful rebranding requires thoughtful, disciplined, and creative strategies to move them forward. Our extensive analytical and strategic methodologies provide a strong foundation to build a unique brand experience that will drive results for your business.

Insight & Research Services:

  • Brand Architecture
  • Brand Standards Guide
  • Focus Groups
  • Positioning
  • Brand Audit
  • Brand Tone + Voice
  • Messaging
  • Style Guide Design
  • Brand + Product Naming
  • Competitive Analysis
  • Market Research
  • Technical Audit

Visual Communications

Visual communication is paramount to your brand’s success. Be it logos, signage, packaging or digital displays, We craft eye-catching designs across all mediums that engage, excite and ensure your brand’s message is communicated with a single glance.

planck before and after logo by jacob tyler planck before and after logo by jacob tyler[/caption]

Visual Communications Services:

  • Logos + Corporate
  • Identity
  • Environmental Graphics
  • Packaging Systems
  • Marketing Campaigns
  • Printed Collateral
  • Tradeshow Booths
  • Annual Reports
  • Outdoor Advertising
  • Advertising Campaigns
  • Direct Marketing
  • Media Planning
  • Content Writing + Editing
  • Photography Direction
  • Public Relations Services

User Experience

Technology is constantly evolving, and your brand must evolve with it to remain successful. We ensure that your brand anticipates what’s next and remains relevant. We monitor your digital presence and implement a flawless user experience that increases engagement with every click, tap or swipe.

User Experience Services:

  • Wireframes
  • User Interface
  • Site Architecture
  • User Flows
  • User Testing
  • Statistics Analytics
  • Prototyping
  • Customer Journey
  • Information Architecture
  • Content Strategy

Design & Development

With a mobile-first mentality for the front-end and a flawless CMS on the back-end, our award-winning websites put our customers first. We create intuitive, simple, and engaging experiences for all users, on any screen size—and from any device.

Design & Development Services:

  • Web Design
  • Online Marketing
  • Email Marketing
  • SEO
  • Responsive Development
  • CMS
  • Online Advertising
  • eCommerce
  • Mobile Apps
  • Video Direction

Website Management

Stay true to your brand’s story.

The website is quite often a consumer’s (or business’s) first impression of your brand. This is where you have 3 seconds to pull the visitor in with an effective message or brand story. It is a make it or break it moment in many ways because if a user leaves, a very small percent ever return. Thus, it ends up in a loss of sales and brand equity.

tghe role of website management in rebranding


“It is extremely important that brands stay true to their story and continually evolve online to create and deliver messages that resonate to their audience.”

-Les Kollegian, CEO & Chief Creative Officer

Successful Trends

Harnessing trends that are sound and the right direction for our clients.

Harnessing trends can be monumental toward effectively rebranding your company. But how do you know which trends are worth jumping on and which ones are just a flash in the pan? Even once you’re sure a trend is a successful one, how do you use it to your advantage without the whole thing seeming forced?

In Touch With the Right Trends

These are questions that brands will likely struggle with for the rest of time, especially in our world where social media is ubiquitous and more and more importance is placed on how viral something is or what’s trending right in that moment.

However, not all trends are worth the effort, and this is something especially vital for brands undergoing the rebranding process. After all, few things can instantly make a brand seem more out of touch than unsuccessfully trying to jump onto a current trend.

There’s nothing less cool than obviously trying to look cool. Even worse, if you’re not careful this can even lead to serious PR headaches if you’re too eager to ride a trend without fully understanding the full context.

Flexible and Ready To Pivot

That said, successfully harnessing the right trends and technology for your brand and message can be a gamechanger for your rebrand. We are constantly keeping our eyes open and our ears to the ground to identify when it’s time to shift and try something new, and when it’s better to wait and see or hold off entirely. This flexibility combined with our team’s vast experience and expertise makes us the perfect partner.


“We look at trends and technology with an open mind, and we are always ready to pivot if it makes sense for the client and we believe it will create positive brand equity and increase sales.

With that said, we are not the people that line up for the new phone at the Apple store. We like to make sure the platforms and specific trends in any marketing capacity are sound and the right direction for our clients.”

-Les Kollegian, CEO & Chief Creative Officer

Avoiding Common Pitfalls

Experience makes all the difference.

Communication is Key.

The biggest common pitfall lies in communication with any agency. This is both external and internal. We use a collaborative project management software tool that helps us maintain great communication with our clients globally and keeps a record of conversations. We are painstakingly over communicative and that always creates better experiences.

Attention to Detail From Top to Bottom

The second biggest pitfall is that the big agencies have the Creative Director go to meetings (usually with 15+ years experience) to engage and close contracts. After the deal is signed, the project is handed off to juniors to work on the project. This is a great way to get the most profit, but also a recipe for disaster. We can tell you from experience– which is why we don’t do it.

Keeping Everyone on the Same Page

Here at Jacob Tyler, we have learned from our experiences and mistakes, and use that knowledge to avoid these common pitfalls that brands and agencies fall into during the rebranding process. Simply put, if you want to successfully rebrand, there needs to be great communication and attention to detail from the very top all the way down—between people within your company, at the agency you have hired, and the two sides working together. Everyone needs to be on the same page.

“We have people on our team with over 25 years experience (including me). It makes a difference.”

-Les Kollegian, CEO & Chief Creative Officer

Budget Forecasting

Doing whatever it takes to make sure the client has a great experience and make a return on their investment.

We will do whatever it takes to make sure the client has a great experience and make a return on their investment with us. We aren’t designing for designers or to get awards, but we are designing for the business. Our creative has to work.

Our client’s success is always the number one priority. This attitude drives us to find the right strategy for the client’s budget. We leave our egos at home and, instead, find the right solution. It doesn’t have to be flashy, it just has to be correct.


“From a marketing perspective, if I need to hire a guy to spin an arrow outside of the business, it sounds cheesy and ridiculous. But if it increases the daily revenue of that location 60%, is it worth it? I think so. I guess we won’t win any innovation awards for that specific tactical execution, but we don’t care.”

-Les Kollegian, CEO & Chief Creative Officer

Scalability

Always looking toward the future in order to build the right campaign—one that is solid, engaging, and will stand the test of time.

Everything we do from a marketing and creative execution standpoint always start with us thinking of scale. We spend a lot of time thinking about the future in order to build the right campaign. We don’t just want your rebranding efforts to be successful right now; we want them to be successful for years to come. As your company grows, we want our efforts to grow along with you.

scalability of rebranding

By the same token, we don’t want anything we do to feel dated after just a couple years, and neither should you. This is why we don’t chase concepts that are trendy just for the sake of doing so. We look at concepts that have stood the test of time and apply them to everything we do. We want to help you rebrand in a way that works today, next year, five years from now, and beyond.


“We don’t want our marketing to be “trendy”, we want it to be solid and engaging and, much like a song from AC/DC, stand the test of time.”

-Les Kollegian, CEO & Chief Creative Officer

Branding Guidelines

Consistent and Unique.

Successfully rebranding a company does not only require high-level creative product across multiple processes. It also requires a strategy and a set of cohesive principles. This is where branding guidelines come into play. The right branding guidelines are fundamental not only for rebranding, but for all future brand growth, scalability, marketing strategy, and brand success as well!

rebranding guidelines

The best brand guidelines go beyond a simple set of rules. They are more than color palettes or font choice. They are integral building blocks to a brand’s very identity. They create a full brand experience that customers, clients, and the public at large engage with before, during, and after their direct interaction with the company itself.

Case Studies

We win as a team or we don’t win at all.

Here at Jacob Tyler, we are incredibly proud of the work we do helping our clients successfully rebrand, and we aren’t afraid to show it off. After all, we can talk about our work all we want, but we think it’s better to just let it speak for itself.

rebranding case studies

San Diego YMCA | Invigorating an Online Community

See the full case study.

How Rebranding Can Improve ROI | A Case Study

“When we were chosen to redesign the San Diego YMCA online, we were thrilled for such an amazing and important opportunity. The San Diego County YMCA needed an efficient way to engage its growing and increasingly diverse audience – including online purchasing. We answered the call, building an intuitive cyber experience and eCommerce presence for the YMCA’s 17 San Diego County locations.”

Open for Business

Launching an online store is exciting. Launching 17 online stores simultaneously is downright thrilling. We pulled it off, and the results were eye-opening with online sales doubling almost immediately.

Design Without Boundaries

In the digital age, engaging with customers requires being where – and when – they are. Our device-agnostic design created a seamless online experience across all devices from mobile to desktop that made it simple for the YMCA to stay connected to its members 24/7.

CarnoSyn

See the full case study.

Bigger, Faster, Stronger

CarnoSyn®, a patented beta-alanine supplement that helps athletes reach peak performance, has been a crucial ingredient in sports nutrition formulas for years – but it had never been marketed as a product. The brand’s parent company NAI tapped Jacob Tyler to introduce CarnoSyn® to the world.

Digital Approach

Jacob Tyler serves as an integrated design and marketing partner, working closely with the CarnoSyn® team. Together, we produced multiple digital campaigns that included website landing pages, message development, video production, media buying strategies, and a robust social media campaign. Each campaign was focused on educating the fitness enthusiast and athlete audience on the benefits, uses and proper dosing of CarnoSyn®, and generating leads for retailers that sell the product as part of their sports nutrition formulas. The campaigns were wildly successful, making CarnoSyn® a known name in the fitness world.

Lead Generation

We created landing pages optimized to generate leads and position CarnoSyn® as a leader in the industry.

Advertising and Social Media

With Jacob Tyler’s social, mobile, and web advertising, the initial campaign generated over 39,000,000 ad impressions with an average Click-through rate above 0.60% and an average cost per click of $.19 in phase one. Two more campaigns are currently in motion.

The Gains

71%

Increased average website visits per day from 90 to 2,200 visits per day with 71% of traffic being first-time visits to CarnoSyn.com.

32%

Generated over 1,280,000 video views of educational content with an average View Through Rate of 32% (Average TrueView VTR are between 5% to 10%).

50%

Improved View through rate of TrueView to 50%+ which lowered Cost per View down to an average between $.03 -$.04.

The Importance of Choosing an Agency

We don’t just want to be your agency. We want to be part of your team.

Before going through the rebranding process, one of the most important steps you need to take is choosing an agency to partner with. This is vital to the process for a variety of reasons. Choosing the right agency to partner with is a relationship that not only steers the entire rebranding process, for better or worse, but can make all the difference between success or frustration.

This is not a place where you want to make a bad choice of trusting the wrong person. It would be similar to building a house without a floor plan.

The agency should be experienced. Not just in the specific business vertical, but in general. Everyone at Jacob Tyler, from full-time employees, to freelancers, and vendors, have 10+ years of experience as a requirement. This ensures not only the best strategic thinking for our clients but also a great experience.


“We pay more for the staff, our clients pay a little more for the work, but the outcomes are worth it.”

-Les Kollegian, CEO & Chief Creative Officer of Jacob Tyler

Don’t Just Take It From Us

Listen, we’re proud of our work at Jacob Tyler, and we aren’t afraid to say so. We understand, though, that compliments mean more when they come from someone else. Fortunately, we have a track record to back up what we have to say about our work!

Clutch, a leading platform for unbiased reviews of B2B service providers, lists Jacob Tyler not only as one of the top branding agencies in San Diego, but among the best branding agencies in the nation as well! We take this as a huge honor and are proud to be included on this list by Clutch, especially considering the process they use.


“We really respect the vetting process Clutch requires for authentic reviews and it saves a lot of time for our clients who don’t always have the time to get on the phone with our prospects.”

-Les Kollegian, CEO & Chief Creative Officer of Jacob Tyler

So don’t just take it from us. Here’s what people we have worked with have to say about their experience partnering with Jacob Tyler for their rebranding efforts.


“Before we engaged Jacob Tyler, our image had undergone so many revisions that the brand became diluted. Jacob Tyler helped us create a uniform brand identity that our company can rally behind. A few subtle changes by Jacob Tyler have boosted team morale and cooperation dramatically. We’re now proud to put the company name on the side of our office building.”

-Brendan Smith, CEO of Motive Interactive

“Jacob Tyler’s rebrand has contributed to a significant growth in business year over year.”

-Erik Mueller, President & CEO of Grasp Technologies, Inc.

“I was very impressed with their level of creativity and communication. I don’t have very much technical experience, so Jacob Tyler effectively discussed the project on my level, which I really appreciated. Additionally, they were extremely receptive to feedback and made changes with minimal pushback. The added layer of visibility we get from our website has generated an estimated $4 million in top-line revenue for our company.”

-G.A. Bartick, President & COO of R3 Consultants

 

We promise we didn’t just cherry-pick the reviews we wanted you to see. We invite you to go take a look at the rest of them over on our Clutch profile and see what our clients think of our work for yourself.

Professional Ghosting: The Disrespectful Art of Prospects & Clients Going Dark.

Recently I was sent an email from Robert Glazer, Founder & CEO, Acceleration Partners (included below) that is something I have been thinking about writing about for a while now. He beat me to it and frankly did a good job. This year alone… and yes, it’s only March, I have submitted three proposals that were requested by prospects with no response. As well, I have submitted four others to clients and prospects that I had to follow up several times before getting a response. In every case, I had a good conversation and was told how the project was a priority for the organization. It is really unprofessional and disrespectful… do they not realize it? It’s not like these were quick emails. These were comprehensive proposals that took multiple conversations with my team and hours to put together. Please just let me know your not interested if that’s the case and value my time. Also, please take the time to let me know why. I HAVE had many clients and prospects do this and it is extremely valuable feedback.

Robert also mentions an article by Adam Grant that I disagree with. Adam says “ignoring someone’s email is an act of incivility and how none of us are really too busy to respond”. I think there are cases where this does not apply. For example, I get approximately 150-200 “sales” emails each week asking to partner with Jacob Tyler Branding Agency . If I were to take time to acknowledge and respond to everyone of these, it would take at least an hour per day… which is frankly wasted time. I would rather be supporting my team and clients than responding to unsolicited requests.

Anyway, here’s the article from Robert below as reference.

As a professional services firm, prospective clients often ask members of our team to provide detailed proposals, estimates and supporting materials as part of their evaluation process. While there’s no guarantee we will get the work, fulfilling these requests takes time, energy and resources, something that most prospects value and appreciate. However, over the past few years, I’ve noticed a rise in professional “ghosting.”

Ghosting has become part of the dating nomenclature. Apparently, it’s the practice of ending a personal relationship with someone by abruptly – and without explanation—withdrawing from all communication with them. People with avoidant personality types seem to think this approach is faultless. But in reality, it’s just rude and disrespectful.

The fact that ghosting seems to be on the rise within professional interactions is disappointing. As mentioned above, we have seen our fair share of prospective clients suddenly stop all communication after we submit proposal information to them. Ironically, but maybe not coincidently, it is often been the ones who asked us to do the most work on the shortest notice who don’t have the decency to follow-up or reply.

I have also read a number of articles about the growing practice of ghosting in recruiting, whereby candidates who take the time to come in for an in-person interview never hear from the company again. Not only is this tremendously unprofessional, it may be psychologically damaging as it leaves the candidate to wonder if they did something wrong or offensive rather than it being because the hiring team just decided to go in a different direction.

If you have been practicing ghosting in any part of your life, it’s time to stop. Here’s why:

Ghosting is disrespectful; disrespect creates ill will and distrust that is often irreparable. It also provides fodder for others to say negative things about you or your company via a public forum.

It’s a small world out there. You never know when your ghosting may come back to haunt you. We’ve even had people apply for a job at our company and forget that they ghosted us in some way years before. Similarly, candidates who have been ghosted are highly unlikely to say good things about you or your organization out in the marketplace or on review sites. And they will never be a customer.

Being avoidant and indifferent in your communication is a bad look. It conveys cowardice and disregard.

Adam Grant recently wrote a great article on why he believes ignoring someone’s email is an act of incivility and how none of us are really “too busy” to respond.

If you care about someone or have used their time, have the courtesy to get back to them, even if it’s uncomfortable because the response isn’t positive. I’ve always found that people can handle the truth when it’s given respectfully.

The point is, be excellent in everything you do, even in how you learn to turn people down or say no. Taking this a step further, I’d suggest you actually go out of your way to respond to anyone who reaches out to you.

Years ago, I made the decision to try and respond to anyone who writes a personal note to me, even though my response is often a polite “no” to most requests for my time. Simply taking the time to reply and show respect for their time reflects my personal brand and our company’s values. Often, the person is both thankful and surprised to hear from me, meaning that I have exceeded their expectations.

If you ask for or use someone’s time or energy, respond back to them. Don’t burn your bridges by ghosting.

San Diego Web Design by Jacob Tyler