Flow Pilots · Case study
Workshopping a brand with the team behind it.
Flow Pilots, a digital product studio in Antwerp, wanted a brand that its clients, its people and the people it hopes to hire would all recognise. I designed and ran a brand exploration workshop to find it with the team, then turned what we found into a new identity.
One brand had to speak to clients, colleagues and future hires.
Flow Pilots designs and builds digital products, with a full-service approach from strategy to building and growth. The team wanted clarity for marketing and design, a brand story that reflects what its clients value, and a brand its own people would want to carry.
Each audience looks for something different. A CEO wants to be inspired, and to believe it. A CTO wants a partner that’s reliable and thorough. Employees want to be proud, and applicants want to see a place they’d like to work. The brand had to hold all of that, grounded in the people who would carry it.
How we got there
Agree what the brand has to do. We started with the goals: clarity for the marketing and design team, a brand story built on what clients value, and the foundations for visuals, creative briefs and campaigns.
Look outward. A competitor audit showed how others position themselves, and where Flow Pilots could stand apart. An audience audit mapped, for each audience, what the brand should make them feel and what they need to find.
Four audiences, what each should feel, and what each needs to find. Find the personality. Through brand archetypes, personality traits and tone of voice, the team chose what the brand should be, and just as clearly, what it shouldn’t.
Twelve archetypes, narrowed down to a yes and a no. Shape the story. Mind mapping, narrative hooks and a big idea turned those choices into the start of a brand story: what Flow Pilots does, how and why, and a fresh look at its tagline.
Six values, and an identity built on them.
The workshop came down to six values: taking the worry off clients’ hands, humanity, co-creation, simplicity, reliability and professionalism. And to one clear line on what Flow Pilots does: it creates digital products for industries, gov tech and service companies.
The identity grew from there: a lowercase wordmark and an fp monogram, Lexend for type, warm gradients and photography that puts people first.
Carried from the website to recruitment.
The new website went live with the brand, and it carried through case studies and blog posts, sales decks and print, and a recruitment campaign, giving marketing and design a shared foundation agreed by the people who carry it.
Shortly after, Flow Pilots became part of ACA Group.
