The corporate image.

• Author: Beck, Bill
• Position: Image-building services to Indiana firms by video service companies - Industry Overview

Eroding customer loyalty forces companies to focus on identity and image--with new and old tools.

It used to be that corporations interested in building a new image--or upgrading the old image--could go to their ad agency, rework the logo and update the advertising slogan.

No more. Eroding brand loyalty and interest-group politics have forced corporations interested in refurbishing their image to embark on sophisticated campaigns involving public relations, product and image advertising and new sales and marketing materials. Increasingly, video is becoming a major tool for corporate image and identity campaigns, and interactive computer-driven video may well be the wave of the future for corporate image.

"When a corporation sets out to change an image, that's a very big thing to do," says David Smith of Creative Street, an Indianapolis corporate communications firm. "It takes a lot of integrated activities with a long-range plan."

Image work is much more than just running an ad campaign, he continues. "It's saying, 'how do we want to be seen in the marketplace?' If you have a product in the marketplace, you have an image, whether you know it or not. Image is part of and should be part of everything that you do, every communication that there is. It's something that should permeate your culture."

"Every piece of communication to the consumer out there should be orchestrated, so it all speaks with the same tone of voice," agrees Al Samuelson, director of creative services at Keller-Crescent Co. in Evansville. Changes should be made with great care, he adds. "The company already has been in business and has an image in place, and presumably it's working even if it's not up to full speed. You have to take into consideration the past and incorporate it into the future."

"Clients today are looking for a presentation that concisely captures the uniqueness of their corporate personality, mission and vision," says Joe Ellsworth, founder and president of Rainbow Productions in Evansville. Ellsworth, a veteran of public and commercial television, was a documentary filmmaker before starting Rainbow in 1981. Today, the video-production house has 12 people on staff.

"The didactic approach is dying," Ellsworth says, adding that Rainbow does corporate image work for a number of clients, including Alcoa, Atlas Van Lines, Motorola and American General Finance. "The image presentation should be woven into a story that becomes part of corporate lore. Video effects for their own sake are passe, and strong concepts and writing are more important than ever."

Vaughn Hickman, a 25-year veteran of the Indianapolis advertising-agency scene, cautions that corporate identity and corporate image "are not one and the same, although they're frequently referred to as such."

Hickman, president of Indianapolis-based KDH...