Evolving Nex’s young brand
Nex’s first product, HomeCourt, had generated a vibrant community and devoted set of users. But the company’s marketing tactics on social were a bit scattered, and the visuals were inconsistent. A few short months later, Nex underwent major changes that called for a rethinking of the company mission, and the brand needed to follow suit.
Extending the product experience beyond the app
Many users were sharing highlights of their HomeCourt training performances on Instagram. Beyond re-posting, we didn’t have a strategy for engaging with the users that were following HomeCourt on that platform. We were missing out on an opportunity to build a deeper relationship with our users outside of the HomeCourt product. I worked with our marketing team to establish a plan for how to engage & inspire our users, with an additional goal of increasing word-of-mouth product awareness.
The plan began by assessing how users perceive the HomeCourt “brand”:
Helps them achieve their self-improvement goals
Understands the ambition of competing at a higher level
Acknowledges that getting better requires commitment
Recognizes that even the underdog can become a star through hard work and dedication
These characteristics became the foundation we used to create social media content that aligned with user’s expectations of the product and brand. Ultimately, HomeCourt exists to help them on their skills improvement journey, and when it comes to content, we were playing the role of inspirational mentor. The content strategy would primarily focus on these themes: Motivate & Inspire, Reward & Celebrate, and Educate. The secondary focus would be occasionally used for announcements, promotions or product demos.
Our social channels should exist to serve as an extension of users’ training journey, where they can find inspiration and content that augments the HomeCourt experience.
Our brand had been relatively unknown—the company name (Nex) was consistently referred to with the product name: HomeCourt. And because we pivoted our mission as a company, we felt the need to signal the larger ambition we were aiming for through the company name and logo. The Nex brand needed to grow up and become more recognizable.
As the company’s brand ambassador, I levied company co-founders and key executives to engage in a major rebrand that elevated the company’s identity and re-establish a new company mission along with it.
Taking Nex to the Next Level
The previous company logo. We removed the word Team to help eliminate overly specific associations with sports, and settled on simply Nex, to signal the broader impact we were aiming for.
The process started by referencing the company’s brand attributes, which we had recently established through a lengthy process conducted by brand strategy partners. Taking place during the height of the Covid epidemic, we plugged away on a wealth of interpretations, and regularly reviewed our progress through video chat.
Because the company was small, with many employees holding major equity in the company’s future, it was important for me to bring the entire company along on the journey so they all felt part of the process—and more importantly—felt aligned with the change. I walked them through the process and developed a document that explains the way we arrived at the final result. The response was overwhelmingly positive, thanks mostly to the method by which it was revealed:
