When a Fin-tech startup wants a brand that balances their Tech and Finance roots…
CleverCX creates financial tools that aim to level the financial market and bring financial advice to everyone. After expanding their offerings to multiple sub-brands, they wanted to update their visual identity to align better with their new goals and demographic.
One of the tools I like to use are called stylecapes. At the beginning of a brand process, a stylescape is a prototyping tool that uses found imagery and existing design to help determine the tone/mood we are shooting for as we develop the brand. As a brand takes shape and finalizes, the chose stylescape is updated with the elements of the new brand and example imagery to help demonstrate the overall effect.
Below, you'll find the near final styles cape for CleverCX. As a glimpse into the branding process, you'll find the initial stylescapes provided to the client to see how multiple directions were initially presented to help solidify the chosen direction.
The up-and-to-the-right ‘c’ mark is both a symbol of the momentum they hope to generate, but also a nod to their past (previously named “onTrajectory” and their symbol was a chevron up-and-to-the-right). It’s a simple, organic mark that remains warm to the consumer, but clean enough for the professional world.
CleverCX creates tools that enhance the financial planning process for both B2B and B2C applications. Given their broad appeal, they wanted a brand that could speak to both audiences, while maintaining a professional edge without becoming too stiff. They wanted their logo adaptable to their product away.
As the brand took shape, Clever wanted to create an eye-catching into video to help show the range of their product offerings. A.I. VoiceOver was used as a means to help reduce the cost to the client.
Behind the Scenes
Below are the initial stylescapes that were created after a brand strategy workshop with the client. These each represented a different core value expressed while building the strategy, and used different visual languages to help determine where the client truly saw their brand heading. Hear, you can see that the bulk of the brand took it's inspiration from the fourth option, while pulling back from the almost athletic edge it started off with. Elements and ideas were pulled from the other stylescapes to help soften and refine the visual identity till we created what you see today.
