Content that Moves People

by Renee Bolz | June 17, 2014

According to this report by branding firm Wolff Olins, we’ve gone from 7% of people creating online content in 2006 to 77% in 2013. That’s a lot of people, and a lot of content.

Imagine that you run a news organization — a legitimate one that’s been objectively reporting on important global issues for more than 100 years. And all of a sudden, people are creating and reading content all over the place. Accessing news and views instantaneously from wherever they are. Often not paying attention to the source or finishing what they start. Do they still need you? Want you? Even know who you are? How can you possibly break through?

When we started working with The Christian Science Monitor in 2012 it was at the height of frenzy in the world of news media, with mobile usage exploding and people reading more news than ever before — and turning to new sources and media channels to do so. Brand loyalty and willingness to pay for content was going down, down, down.

We developed a brand strategy for the Monitor to help them stand out in this content-saturated world. The strategy is centered around the impact that their unbiased, balanced reporting has on people: Monitor content helps people understand important issues from multiple perspectives, it motivates them to shift their thinking, it helps them form their own opinions, and it even gives people a way get directly involved with the issues they care about. In short, Monitor content moves people.

Once the brand strategy was in place we re-energized their visual identity with new colors, fonts, graphic icons/conventions and a new tagline to help them evoke the feeling of a brand that has the capacity to move people. This new graphic identity was the foundation for the work the Monitor did with BEAM Interactive to redesign their website. The new site launched last week and it’s amazing! New features like the “Take Action” section are not only well-aligned with the strategy, they’re truly distinct in the category.

Congrats guys. Glad to have played a role in it all!

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