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Evolving Brands on the Fly
A brand is what people think of you. And with the multitude of
messages bombarding your target market, the only thing tougher
than establishing your target’s thoughts is changing them.
Consider my client, Ontario’s air ambulance services. After
a long crusade that ended in victory this past January, Chris Mazza,
a dynamic emergency medicine doctor, convinced the Ontario Ministry
of Health to combine its disparate air ambulance services into a
single coordinated unit.
The need to consolidate its fleet of helicopters and fixed-wing
aircraft was severe. In a jurisdiction over one million kilometers
square, major hospitals had clustered themselves into "centres
of excellence," making it more difficult to quickly - under
the highest level of care - transport acute and trauma patients
to the specialized treatment they required.
Although people think of the air ambulance brand as essentially
a road ambulance with wings, the reality is extraordinary. They
are virtual hospitals, staffed by Cracker Jack paramedics who
give care and receive training and equipment unheard of - even
in the medical and emergency services community itself.
Changing perception of the service in the world at large was thus
a matter of positioning it:
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As a single, coordinated, elite service |
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As a critical component of the centres of excellence
approach |
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As a brand that would carry its
reputation at home and abroad – creating new and wider
revenue streams from government, private donations, corporate
sponsorship and consulting and training. |
What did the Brand Coach coach?
Change the name. Change the vocabulary. Reframe the proposition.
 In
our hyper-messaged world, folks defend themselves from the onslaught
by screening out data they think they already know. So we pulled
the plug on the "air ambulance" vocabulary because people
would simply avoid the new brand information that came along with
it. A new term, "Transport Medicine," was introduced.
Then we embraced and enhanced the strongest visual associated with
the original service – the orange accents on the aircraft –
and made it the new brand name: "ornge".
Packaged with an identity that speaks to their caring hands and
the speed of angel wings, people will cheer on ornge as they thunder
overhead or land on downtown hospital roofs, busy expressways and
the evening news.
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