SEED Communications is a marketing communications agency whose client, Crossroads Care, is Britain's leading provider of support for carers and the people they care for.
Crossroads is geared towards helping carers make a life of their own outside of caring, by providing the special quality of care that gives them the peace of mind to let someone else step into their shoes.
Crossroads Care had undergone a re-branding exercise to adopt a more modern, fresh and bold identity. Our task was to produce a 10-minute film to communicate the new brand and the strategy behind it to staff and stakeholders throughout the country.
The central aim of the film was to gain ‘buy-in’ from staff towards the new identity the film was unveiling and for them to take away key messages about the importance of the new brand. Core messages included: what the new brand stands for, why Crossroads have bothered to re-brand, and how to embrace and use the brand in the course of everyday work.
Storytelling is central to the way we approach filmmaking at Fullrange as we believe it’s the strongest way to convey messages. We already knew from SEED Communications’ initial focus group and survey work that there were some great reactions to the new brand among staff. We knew there would be some strong stories out there about how the brand had been long anticipated, and how it would be helpful in reaching out to those who may not realise that Crossroads could help them.
We chose to film staff members talking personally to camera through filmed interviews, describing in their own words the core aims of Crossroads, their personal reactions to the new branding and how they thought it would help spread positive messages to potential customers.
To relate some key statistics from the brand survey findings we came up with the idea of presenting them visually on big printed boards. This made the film feel much more personal to the audience than a removed ‘voice’ presenting dry information back to them.
Our goal to include a wide range of Crossroads staff as brand champions provided a fun logistical challenge, as both SEED and Fullrange worked hard to span a large geographical area throughout the three-day shoot!
The finished film included a splendid voiceover by none other than Esther Ransen, a prominent champion and supporter of Crossroads Care. Esther’s performance brought the structure of the film together – adding a voice which was respected, authoritative, trustworthy, but also felt to be very much from within the organization as someone who knows the work of the charity very well. This tone was extremely important to what the film was aiming to achieve as a piece of shared internal communication.
SEED’S Client Testimonial:
“As a charity wanting to be better known, we were fully aware of the pitfalls of re-branding and fully aware of the level of what for us was a very significant investment we were demanding. For this work to be a success we had to gain the buy-in of over 130 local Crossroads schemes so that the new brand would not be something imposed from the centre but something they would love and promote. We chose to work with SEED Communications. They tackled the brief with enthusiasm and commitment, setting out an extensive programme of face-to-face consultation with schemes, supported by questionnaires and telephone interviews. Most importantly they delivered a new brand for Crossroads that has been accepted and in the majority of cases loved.”
Anne Roberts CEO Crossroads Care Association
Martin Thurley, Managing Partner - SEED Communications
’SEED is an ex Saatchi strategic marketing agency delivering brand strategy through to campaign implementation. Our strength is in the quality of our people - people like Fullrange who we partner with on all our film related projects. They’re a great bunch. Full of creativity, highly personable, and experts at bringing stories to life! The recent Crossroads film was a great success and its extensive use as a communications tool was the key reason a charity of 5,000 individuals all embraced the new brand with open arms.