Engineering advantage

The Challenge

Over ten years Merj’s strong reputation had fuelled growth and word of mouth referrals. However the brand and identity hadn’t kept pace with the growing business, becoming inconsistent.

Our brief was to evolve the brand and website to reflect Merj’s position at the intersection of search, data and cutting-edge digital infrastructure, and to refresh the brand identity.

Our Approach

We kicked off the project with our insight session. This workshop with key team members explored the what, why and how of the business alongside an audit of competitors and deep dive into customer personas.

It became clear that the team loved getting their ‘hands dirty’. They didn’t just diagnose their clients’ issues or find opportunities, Merj are doers.

Relationships were also key to the team. Embedding people in clients’ businesses means Merj were offering much more than just a service, they were partners.

The other insight we developed was around the team’s understanding of new technologies and its capabilities. This meant they could think differently to competitors, and were able to consider things that others haven’t yet.

What We Delivered

We developed a strategic brand platform that centred around Merj’s ability to work in partnership with clients and bring together the right data, systems and people to create meaningful performance. We defined this as: Engineering advantage.

The identity development focused on communicating that Merj were in the world of data engineering and SEO to provide reassurance to their target of large, global businesses.

We also created distinctiveness to distance Merj from their competitors. This centred around ‘simplicity’ – cut-through, bold language designed to grab attention through typography.

Central to activating the brand was helping the Merj team to update their website and working with their partners who were building the site. We therefore developed a UI toolkit, including a component library.

We kicked off the website project with a workshop to agree the scope, review wireframes along with the key templates the team would need. Following the workshop, we developed a series of wireframes and high fidelity designs ready for Figma. These showed the team how to apply the visual identity in digital spaces through a responsive design system.

The first major opportunity for the team to share the brand with customers was at a high-level industry event. To showcase the brand and achieve as much impact as possible, we worked with the team to develop a range of branded merchandise.

As a digital-first business and a leader in the online space, it was critical that Merj had a brand that offered a compelling shop window for potential clients. Bringing together our design and visual identity expertise with their inhouse web team meant we could work together to deliver a brand that truly reflects Merj’s ambition to be leaders in the category.

Ben Hostler – Digital Director, FutureKings