Cisco/AppDynamics
Client:
Cisco/AppDynamics
Project:
Global Branding and Marcom
Challenge:
By the time Cisco bought AppDynamics, the company was nine years old and still didn’t have a meaningful brand, voice, or clear message. Application Performance Management doesn’t roll off the tongue, nor is it easy to grasp. An outside design team developed a brand identity system with shapes they referred to as electrons, but it wasn’t clear exactly what it meant.
Results:
I developed the rationale, message, and context for the brand identity system so it clearly communicated the AppDynamics story to gain internal company wide support. My anthem “Agents of Transformation” bridged the gap between the digital agents used to monitor customer applications and the employees of AppDynamics who became “Agents.” It became a defacto tagline and campaign theme. To facilitate internal buy in, each Agent of AppDynamics was presented with a Welcome Kit delivered to their desk. The kit contained their first “mission” as an agent of transformation. It contained a Field Guide explaining their mission, their new identity as an agent, company values, and an invitation to personalize their security badge, business cards, and assorted company schwag. They personalized their unique code (made up of the electrons) with a code generator.
Shortly thereafter, the new brand went global and is the most successful global brand campaign effort ever for AppDynamics in terms of awareness, clicks, and sales leads.
