We knew there had to be a better way to find brand clarity and give direction to our clients that is engaging, enjoyable and most importantly accurate. That’s when we began to develop our Uncover app – Mezzanine’s own unique brand tool.

It’s been quite the journey to create this valuable tool to enhance our brand strategy experience. Along the way, we’ve made discoveries that have led to deep insights that inform all of our design decisions. Here are some notable points about our process:

Human-Centred Design and Development

In order to efficiently identify our client’s needs and home in on the right solution, we started with brand decks, character cards and printed booklets with all the separate indicators to take clients through the clarity phase of our Uncover process. From this, we began designing a series of interactive experiences for the Uncover app, and based on previous behaviour observations and client feedback, we found that our user/s need the format of the questions to differ for increased focus levels and to experience a more creative communication style.

Agile Problem Solving

Incremental steps are essential to large scope projects, ensuring efficiency and detail-orientation in the design process. These steps brought the Uncover app to life as we planned milestones, project goals and implemented research outcomes through user-testing in every phase. Including users in the process helps to quickly identify things like the common level of visual literacy for cues and image association. This points us in the right direction early on and keeps us on the right path to creating an app that serves clients with the most accurate results.

Apple AirPlay

The Workshop Facilitator’s iPad uses AirPlay to display the Uncover process results in real-time as participants submit every answer. This helps the Facilitator monitor and present the findings in a flexible way to suit the group in session.

Honest Feedback

When people give feedback, politeness tends to get in the way of constructive criticism, especially in face-to-face situations. The fear of offending others or putting oneself in an uncomfortable work situation also influences how questions are answered. We found this during our user-testing and our intention is to always create a space for people to engage with their brand freely, enabling them to give anonymous answers via their own devices. The importance of getting accurate answers is vital when developing an effective strategy for the future of your business.

Overcoming Bias in Results

Perception and reality often collide when it comes to clear communication. There are many reasons for how people come to conclusions about their work, from situations like having inconsistent communication that leads to a lack of knowledge or to holding an outdated mindset. Considering all our findings, we curated and rephrased questions to bring forward specific answers, provoking the user’s thinking towards the values that uphold the business and that will determine its future.

Final Product

Functional and interactive design should be so seamless that it goes unnoticed during the operation of an app. After months of testing with clients, the Uncover app has been used to successfully identify a clear brand direction for each business that has used it, serving as a guide to take aligned action towards their higher purpose and vision. For us, it provides insight into their core values and innate drive, which enables us to empower clients with the right knowledge, ideas and solutions to build their brand.

If this post has got you asking more questions, it is because there is so much more! Want to read a little more? Here’s an ebook to get you thining – the Brand Clarity and Authenticity Guide.

Ready to get started? Drop us a line to find out more about our Uncover Workshops.