SUMMARY
Muse Street Marketing is a full service marketing agency that creates one-of-a-kind branding and strategy for their clients. Backed by data and research, they support their clients in expanding their reach and developing stronger relationships with the client's target audience.
With the help of their strong marketing background, I developed a rebrand for their company that better suited their ever-evolving business. This was one of the first projects I took on when I joined the Muse Street Marketing team as a freelance Graphic Designer & Branding Strategist.
The Muse Street team is a band of innovators with a passion for designing one-of-a-kind brands and developing strategies that convert. Even as a marketing authority, we truly view our relationship as a collaboration where your insights and opinions are heard.
PROBLEM DEFINITION AND NEED
Ariel, the Founder & Managing Director of Muse Street Marketing, was unsure of what direction to take her brand despite having general ideas of what the brand should reflect. The old logo did not reflect the sophistication and well thought out process that Muse Street Marketing employs when working with their clients. As the rest of the branding evolved slowly over time, the logo has since become outdated and does not represent the type of clients they take on or the work they do.
STRATEGY
Muse Street Marketing helps their clients develop strong branding and marketing tactics to better capture their target audiences. Because of how design-based their work is, the logo had to reflect the high level of work they produce. Rather than starting from scratch, taking successful aspects of the brand that already exists then developing a strategy that incorporated those would allow for an elevated rebrand that still reflects the origins of the company.
RESEARCH
With the rebrand already started when I was assigned the project, I first started by looking at different iterations and moodboards that were already developed. It was made clear that the existing design iterations were not directions that were viable for the company as it did not fully represent their high-level work. From there, I began doing research into other agencies that had a similar client base as Muse Street Marketing. This allowed me to see what was out in the market, and common themes throughout this industry. From there, I created moodboards for possible design directions I could head towards.
I began sketching possible options, then took them to the digital space to get an idea of what each design would look like on screen. Because the use of this logo will mainly be in the digital space, it was important to ensure it was legible digitally.
PROCESS
Although looking at competitor branding and messaging was important, it was also imperative that I looked at the developed brand Muse Street Marketing employed on their website and social media. Because they have a large presence on Instagram, it was important that this rebrand reflects the content that was being shared on social media. In addition, there was previous research and marketing work done to help with this rebrand. I was able to use that information to assess what exactly was needed to create a successful brand identity for Muse Street Marketing.
THE DESIGN SOLUTION
The logomark was first developed using different fonts as the base for the letter "M". There were multiple iterations before I landed on creating an "M" out of various straight lines and white space. The white space keeps the logo simple and clean, and the curve in the serif on the left side of the logo helps soften the look altogether.
After developing the logomark, the next step was to find a font that suited the design as a whole, as it would tie the whole rebrand together. Following a wide range of options, we went ahead with Flecha M, as it suited the style of the logomark and perfectly encapsulated the detailed work that went into the rebrand for Muse Street Marketing. It was also the perfect display font for web use as the typeface is clean and simple, but includes small details that reflects the elegance of the marketing agency.
CHALLENGES
With an already existing brand that strongly represents itself on social media, the main challenge was creating a rebranded logo that was still inline with the content and colour palette presented. To avoid creating a disconnection between the new logo and current brand presence, research into who Muse Street Marketing is was an important step that helped define where the rebranded logo was headed.
