Agiito, winner of the Highly Commended Marketing Initiative of the Year Award at the Famtastic Rocks awards, tells us how they pulled off an award-winning rebrand.
Formerly known as Capita travel and Events and NYS, agiito made the decision to combine it’s specialist brands into one unified name and brand, agiito. The small team of five worked relentlessly to achieve the rebrand in-house, with little external help. Two years later at the Famtastic Rocks Awards agiito won an award for its technique and finesse in representing its company, a corporate travel firm, concisely and with commendable marketing expertise.
Two key figures in this project were Neal Poole, Director of Marketing, and Toni Nickson, Creative Director, who spoke to H&E North about their rebrand initiative and how it felt to begin during tough times for the travel industry, Neal said: “Doing a rebrand at any time is hugely resource heavy and costly. But we made a very brave and bold decision to rebrand just at the end of the pandemic which really helped boost morale because the team could come out of a tough few years as a creative brand that represents our people.” Toni added: “All this was done with a really small five-person team. Just to give some sort of context, it took over 1,000 pages of collateral rebranded by the team, 4,000 individual graphic assets that had to be created, and 400 pages of guidance to be rewritten. And we even had everyone in the business to engage in these changes.”
Heading into the rebrand, it was crucial to agiito that it found an authentic voice. Something which felt a little more simplified, representative of its work culture and, as Neal said: “More human.” Toni reflected: “Businesses now want people to talk truthfully and directly, we’re all loosening
our ties a bit and saying it how it is. So, your brand strategy must articulate your corporate strategy – you need to be what you’re trying to be otherwise the public will see right through it. So, I think 90% of the effort is engaging everyone around the business and getting them to feel that the brand is our culture.”
All the hard work clearly paid off since agiito, only two weeks after it won an award for its rebrand, was bought by Clarity Business Travel. Neal says: “The future has always had a lot of potential for agiito, but even more so now under new ownership. It’s going to be a really exciting journey to see how our people, brands, culture, personality and technology all come together as a combined business under Clarity Business Travel, resulting in something that will be truly special.”
Reflecting on their rebrand journey in its entirety, Neal and Toni spoke about the moment after the award when it really sank in and they realised what a success the rebrand had been. Neal says: “As a result of the change in brand we quickly began appealing to wider audiences and customers. When we won our first new customer as a result, it was a very proud moment.”
Toni added the moment of realisation came for her at the awards ceremony, saying: “For me it was when somebody came up and requoted one of our brand taglines back at us. She remembered it and she was using it herself like it had really struck a chord. I think its when you get that connection with your audience, that you know you’ve been successful in talking to them.”