A NEW NAME TO REACH NEW HEIGHTS
Renaming a company to better tell its story
Challenge
This DC-based firm specializing in program management, data analytics and software development for local and regional clients—including the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), AMTRAK and the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA), among others—needed a new name.
Why? Because after operating for more than 15 years as IT Works!, founder Dawn Amore and her team felt that the company’s current name and visual identity no longer reflected their elite capabilities and forward-thinking company culture. They turned to LMO for help developing a new name and brand that more effectively told their story.
Solution
First, LMO conducted interviews with nearly every employee, as well as key client stakeholders, to ensure that we had a deep understanding of the attributes that made the company unique and successful, and the challenges and limitations posed by existing brand elements.
We then worked closely with IT Works! leadership to identify the qualities they felt a new name must possess, conducting a series of exercises designed to generate words and phrases that captured those qualities. To create a complementary logo and brand aesthetic, LMO designers carefully considered the various channels and assets that would house the company’s visual brand elements—including owned digital properties, email correspondence and sales collateral—before delivering logo options optimized for use across each of those channels. Once a logo was chosen, we developed a package of visual assets and created guidelines for how they should be used.
Results
We harnessed the team’s excitement and energy to guide us toward a name we knew would resonate: Volanno, derived from the Italian word for “they fly” or “flywheel” (an homage to Dawn’s Italian roots). In Volanno, Dawn and her team felt they had an authentic name that captured the traits that made them unique with elegance and sophistication.
Finally, we provided a plan for introducing the new brand internally and externally, in a way that generated excitement and built momentum for the future. By the end of the engagement, IT Works! had a new name and corporate identity that will compel prospective clients to seriously consider Dawn’s team when seeking exceptional IT solutions, and one that will inspire enthusiasm and pride in current employees.
