Creative Director Discovery, Research, Naming Strategy, UX, Art Direction, Consultation.
My TEAM
Kristina A, Art Direction + UX Eric C, Illustration Clay Global, Agency
Launching a brand within a brand within another brand is nothing short of a magic trick. However, it's one that Cisco Meraki pulled off in 2019 with the launch of Meraki Go.
Aiming a new line of products at an unfamiliar audience is a daunting task, so my team and I helped craft a creative-driven customer experience that would alleviate any confusion and prevent cannibalization of our enterprise product line.
Project Highlights
UX strategy & fully responsive design
Promotional video spot
Branding and art direction
The Problem Statement
Cisco Meraki products are powerful and full featured enterprise-quality products. However, not every business is an enterprise, and great networking is important to everybody. So when we saw the need in the marketplace for a product that was dead simple to use and quicker to deploy for busy business owners with no dedicated IT staff, we thought- "we know how to do this."
The resulting product line was Meraki Go. But when you're known for powerful cloud managed technology, how do you message that to small business owners on the go?
Meraki Go product introduction promo
Allow us to re-introduce ourselves
Aiming an enterprise-quality product at a customer that doesn't traditionally buy them was a tricky prospect. We made sure to humanize the product with fun art direction and an approachable overall tone, like with this promo video.
Clarifying the brand within a brand
For the creative strategy, my team and I stepped away from typical B2B marketing and design and really focused on communicating a transformational business product to folks who are used to a B2C buying motion. The result is a hybrid B2B/B2C website that really focused on storytelling, branding, and the user experience while still driving home business impact for buyers.
We leaned heavily into a consumer-look to increase comfort throughout the user journey, which includes a robust mobile experience that doesn't compromise any functionality. We used amble white space, more fashion-forward typography, clean iconography, and we shot our own gorgeous photography with a local photographer.
Typography
Orpheus Pro
Proxima Soft
COLOR PALETTE
Te Papa Green #213A44
Cornflower Blue #6C62FE
Picton Blue #1CAFEE
White Ice #EDFCFC
Selago #F7F7FE
Icon Set
Photography art direction
More than a facelift
Oddly enough, there was already had a functional website up and running before the product launch. It had been built hastily to support the beta launch and it left a lot to be desired.
Rather than simply apply the updated branding to the site, I threw out the old site and together with my team, we focused on a two key areas to improve. 1. Discoverability. Through SEO-compliant hierarchy, we were able to implement a better type scale and iconography to quickly communicate important information and boost organic traffic.
2. Visual richness. Through a layered art direction, video, animation, and interactivity, we were able to reveal content as the user scrolled and tell a brand story visually- not just with copy.
Key Takeaways
By crafting a strong creative strategy, we were able to support the product line and the launch. While the goal here was simply to launch, we were able to help rapidly mature the marketing strategy to focus on three main personas:
Small Office (ex. a dentist office or a start up company), Hospitality/Restaurant (ex. a cafe or bed & breakfast) Independent Retail (ex. barber shop, or a flower store)
By developing beautiful customizable web templates, we enabled support of not only organic discovery through search and social media, but also targeted digital marketing campaigns.
