Why I Rebranded my Company 4 months After Launching It
Four months ago, I opened the doors to Creative Quo, a boutique marketing agency with a vision of making professional marketing services accessible to all. Within a week of announcing our launch, the projects started rolling in from referrals or leads acquired through my personal social media. This type of response we didn’t anticipate and by June, we were already adding to the full-time team.
However, I soon questioned if the direction in which we were headed was one that I wanted to go. One night, while codifying our values, vision, and mission statement, it occurred to me the amount of good that would be wasted if we continued to remain unfocused and leave our potential untapped. Our mission itself, while noble, wasn’t one that particularly mobilized us. It didn’t mobilize us because we knew we could quite literally change the world. In the grand scheme of things, excellent work is fueled by passion. Anything less is subpar. I simply did not want to settle.
I could have kept Creative Quo as a cash generator. It would’ve given me a steady pay cheque and cushy lifestyle. But if you’ve been following me since my early entrepreneurial days, you’ll know that my journey has been far from cushy (nor is cushiness even something I necessarily want).
I started my first business, an online magazine, out of university and kept it running for a year until it ultimately failed. I then worked in corporate marketing for two years. It was at that time that I slipped into a clinical depression that culminated in an attempt to take my own life. The significance of having survived didn’t occur to me until days later, when I became aware of the windowless surroundings of the hospital in which I was. Paradoxically, for the first time in my life, I felt truly free. I felt freed from the expectations I had placed on myself and from those that others had placed on me. Rock bottom had a silver lining. In feeling like I had nothing to live for, I also had nothing to lose.
This newfound enlightenment inspired boldness in me in the coming weeks. After being discharged from the hospital, I immediately quit my full-time job with no Plan B. Shortly after, the MVP for Targeted Tweets was born. That summer, I sold my first business and by fall, I had begun the blueprints to what would ultimately become Creative Quo.
And now, here we are. July 2016. After a whirlwind that began after a spike in interest from VCs and larger clientele, we realized we had grown too big, too fast. The idea for a rebrand came in a phone call with my COO Chelsea at an airport bar. We were discussing a repackaging of services when we realized that our name could no longer carry the pace at which we were growing. I remember spewing out, “The Incubator” as a suggestion (my mouth full of pasta). Chelsea repeated it back. A lightbulb (much like the one you see in our new logo) simultaneously flashed above our heads.
The Incubator: a marketing accelerator for the brands you’ll know and love. The official home of Targeted Tweets. We have an exciting few months up ahead and big partnerships in the works, but today, I’m also on the lookout for our next big, homegrown success story.
If you’re a fledgling business with a great product/service, we would like to hear from you. We’ll set you on the proper foundation and establish you as a household name. This is not an objective. It’s a promise. We can launch you to the top if that is where you truly want to be. Our mission, fueled by passion, is to be the catalyst through which you can conquer yours.
In this way, we are not just another marketing services firm. You can see now why “Creative Quo” had to go.
