Case Study: Olive Media Products
Liquid Agency, San Jose, is a “branding farm” delivering brand strategy and execution. Founder Alfredo Muccino has 25 years experience in the field, mainly with technology companies in Silicon Valley, including Apple and Intel. He worked with a long-term client on the development of Olive, which offers the versatility of digital music management and the quality of high-definition files, doing a lot of the copywriting himself.
creating and launching a new product and company brand
A brand is the relationship you create with the consumer: how they feel about it, how it reflects on them. Technical companies tend to have a problem with communication. Engineers speak to engineers, but customers don’t want to know how something works, they want to know what it will do for them.
The iPod gives you 1000 songs in your pocket – convenience and portability. It’s an accepted way to digest music, but people are giving up on sound quality. Olive’s founder is a technologist and audiophile. He combined his interests to develop a new system to store and play large, uncompressed files, retaining the original quality. It replaces hundreds of CDs, yet is a return to the idea of quality of experience. There is a truly remarkable difference in the sound it delivers.
We worked out the brief together. In Silicon Valley it can be informal: meetings were usually over lunch or dinner, sketching out the marketplace and the audience. At Liquid we have a formalized briefing process that includes discussion with the client to define the objective, in-depth evaluation of market landscapes, and audience profiling. We develop an idea of where we can take a brand and how we can differentiate it. The target audience here are ‘early adopters’ who will pay a premium for the latest and greatest technology. We focused on audiophiles (competing with $10,000 systems).
The Approach:
ensuring a strong, clear identity
The quickest way to create disappointment on these projects is not to clarify communication at the start, both for the agency and the client. Creatives are not always disciplined and we need to strike a balance between logic and magic.
The idea we developed is “save the sound,” a call to arms protecting the quality musicians create. Naming can be complicated, as lots of names and URLs are registered. In the bar having Martinis we came up with “Olive.” The client’s name is Oliver, so this was one connection. He had always admired Apple; this is a similar quirky approach, where the brand comes across seamlessly in each expression. We looked at lots of alternatives before settling on Olive, adding “Live Better” to highlight the quality of the experience and reference “live” with “Olive.”
There was a lot of trust on both sides, enabling us to develop every aspect of the brand. On our small scale we were able to get every expression right. Industrial design in this sector of music equipment is not sophisticated and we upped the level of design. The surface of the product is etched with jazz and opera symbols, subtly suggesting the range of music. It connects with people, and has a depth of design that the customer can discover.
The copy we use is crucial, and it’s the little things that make the difference. When you buy an Olive system, you send your CDs to Olive and they load them up, so on the box we say “hear, hear, your music is here.” The copy forms conversations with the customer – on a one-to-one. The brand is friendly and approachable. A brand’s relationship with a customer has certain expectations, including consistency. If it goes from informal to formal it can become confusing. Design uses a consistent color and typeface, and in the same way copy has to maintain a consistent tone and voice.
We needed names for Olive products. Starting with a long list, we settled on “Opus” for the key product. It has the “O” of Olive, is short, stands for a work of art, and has classical-music references. This represents both the product and the music the product enables. Other names we use for products include “Melody” and “Sinatra” – both have a music link and are obvious at some level. If Olive is the main trademark, we can then use names such as Melody – Olive Melody. Olive is all about music, and everything we do is connected to that ideal.
The Result:
a strong brand generating widespread interest
The brand connects on an intellectual and an emotional level and the press we’ve had has led to substantial sales. The first product was launched in September and by November sold over 1000 units. We did some clever marketing: American Express offered discounts to members, generating sales of 750 units in three days. We were watching the figures and getting excited as we sold one, then 10, then 50, then 80. We couldn’t believe it reached 750!
Olive is only a couple of years old, yet enjoys more coverage than many larger companies. Rolling Stone, Playboy, Business Week and the New York Times all requested information when Olive launched. As a firm it is incredibly small. It’s super-efficient, with four to five people achieving these great results, showing the power of a strong brand. It is a good product with a good story. Music companies that create content are looking at Olive as a distribution channel; Time Warner is talking to us about creating high-definition music files. I’m very proud of it: I was trusted to build the brand and it’s a major success.