“Creativity is inventing, experimenting, growing, taking risks, breaking rules, making mistakes, and having fun." - Mary Lou Cook
Back in 2017, the creative team at Access Care sat down, pulled out our colourful pens and stacks of paper, and decided to hatch a plan on how to take the Access Care brand to the next level. For us the most challenging element was to visually grow a brand which represented our fun office team, a female-led business, colourful personalities behind the brand - yet keep Access Care a serious company within the live-in care industry.
Where We Started
The first thing which happens when you're looking at pushing a brand further visually is to know your industry and other companies within it - there is a lot of research. Feedback from our team, looking at our industry at exhibitions, looking at websites, and requesting a stack of brochures all taught us that we wanted to know how other businesses represent themselves, and make sure we were completely different. From initial concepts of using a rich dark navy with elements of gold, to looking at a more earthy colour scheme - we decided that there is really only one colour which would truly speak Access Care, loud and proud, and that is - pink!
We wanted our brand to immediately tell you that we don't operate like any other livein care agencies - at the forefront of what we do are our clients, and we believe that live in care represents independence, better quality of life, and the ability to live life on your own terms. The sea of blue and greens felt clinical to us, and as a family-owned business none of these colours typically used in home care agencies inspired us.
The colour pink symbolises youth, good health, and playfulness. It's the flush of first love and stands for nurturing femininity. It is also the colour of our brand mascot - the orchid! There is a reason why the orchid is the mascot of Access Care - we wrote a whole blog post on this a while ago, click here to read it.
However fun the colour pink is, we also needed to choose a more 'practical' colour - you see, there is quite a lot that goes in to creating brand assets, most people don't know this but time is spent choosing not only colours we like and connect with, but also colours which will work across our marketing assets(printing and online), fonts which will be versatile and not only provoke a certain emotion but also will be legible across devices and print materials, and logos which will stand the test of time and be easily recognisable.
With this in mind, we revisited the rich navy - it's a darker font which will be easy to read in
articles online and also in print. The colour navy represents intelligence, stability, unity, trust, loyalty and wisdom. It also carries a sense of elegance and sophistication. The perfect partner for our accent pink!
As I mentioned a little earlier, there is also a reason why we chose the fonts we did - we use a combination of header fonts called Playfair Display, and our body fonts which are Raleway. We chose this combination not only because it looks great, but because visually these two fonts represent classic, heritage, more dramatic elements from Playfair Display, and the modern, clean and crisp edges of Raleway. This totally represents our brand because we use a mix of traditional and modern techniques across all we do - for example, our team will match you with the perfect live-in carers using good old fashioned common sense, not robots, and they always speak to clients over the phone, or over Zoom where preferred.
Seeing and talking to people is, in our eyes, the only way we can get a sense of what and who you really need. And our team always meet the home carers in person or over Zoom before they register with Access Care. That is a very traditional aspect of the agency. However, our team are also very excited and energetic to jump on the latest technologies and trends especially when it comes to our marketing - most of which is done digitally. This mix of old and new is what keeps us thriving as a brand.
Brand Imagery
Now another important visual element of a brand are images. We like to keep our imagery fresh and new, and where possible we will always use our brand photos, or photos of real clients and living in carers. We like using real photos because we want to convey trust to our audience, bring a sense of community, and also share inspiring stories of our clients and our domiciliary carers! But as you can imagine not everyone wants to be on camera so we're mindful of always asking for permission or organising photoshoots with those people who don't mind a little bit of limelight. And when we can't use our own photos, we take great take to select only those images which we feel will make you smile and feel empowered. Because that's what we're here to do - bring happiness, peace of mind, and put a smile on people's faces!
This is just a small insight of behind our brand - we wanted to share with you the story of how we came to look like this, and most importantly why. We love receiving positive feedback on our website and social media channels - so far many people have said they chose to pick up the phone and talk to us because they felt our website was easy to navigate, friendly, and trusted.
Our carers also love landing on our website - they think it's fun, easy to use, and we seem very friendly. Which is 100% correct!
I hope you enjoyed reading this article - and if we've caught your eye, pick up the phone and give our team a call on 01264 319399 today, or send us an email on hello@access-care.co.uk.
Best Wishes
Lana
Digital Marketing