Make your Way
Case Study

In 2015, the recruitment company epunkt was rebranded, the brand’s communication was focused on candidates and their needs. It is now 2019, 4 years after said relaunch, and epunkt has been the Austrian market leader for some time. The company now has almost 170 employees and fills around 1,600 positions every year.

Today, the recruitment market is saturated and the scope for growth is becoming increasingly limited. New sales strategies are making the call for a B2B campaign louder. At the same time, a new generation of jobseekers, the Generation Z, is entering the market. epunkt’s “meaning” campaign doesn’t really seem to be working for them.

So we take a step back and look at the brand as a whole. We use the same methodology we used four years ago and compare the results. After all, some people openly question whether the brand is positioned correctly.

The brand expresses exactly what epunkt is all about. But some new aspects need attention.

So that’s a good thing. Or is it not?

The seemingly good news has a big flaw, because it also reveals the actual problem: the explorer is not necessarily compatible with the new target groups. To put it bluntly, explorer brands promise excitement and adventure. This resonates with the Generation Y (the brand’s core target group just a few years ago). Other audiences tend to be scared away:

Business customers are looking for guarantees that only a market leader can offer: They are under pressure and need to fill vacancies reliably and fast despite a shortage of skilled labour. Generation Z craves stability and security in their career choices. They need someone to believe in them and help them avoid missteps. And the participants at the Recruiting Campus (epunkts training centre for HR professionals from a wide range of companies, note) want to put their new expertise tu use and recruit better and more successfully.

This means that in the four central target groups, three basic motives are represented, some of which are contradictory: security, prestige and self-fulfilment. epunkt’s meaning campaign addresses only one of these: the need for fulfilment.

With these new insights, our task of adapting the existing campaign for the younger generation and extending it to B2B and campus audiences just doesn’t feel right. Although our initial ideas work well in isolation, they no longer function in media where the different messages collide. In fact, they create contradictions. The brand loses focus.

That worries me. And Sam Zibuschka (the epunkt board member responsible for marketing) does not seem happy either: He misses the courage in the new proposals. So we decide to take a new approach and do the only right thing: We completely ignore the previous campaign – and while doing so, we ignore our briefing.

From campaign to key visual

Together with Daniel Kovacs, a great word artist and conceptualist, we search for a character that embodies everything epunkt stands for: an explorer and pioneer who has the desire and courage to break new ground, take risks, question boundaries and change his world for the better.

In an evening of brainstorming, we finally give birth to the epunkt astronaut.

And with him, a visual bracket that holds the various messages together and serves as a narrative anchor for epunkt’s storytelling. In this way, initially isolated campaigns become storylines of one and the same narrative. The protagonist is the constant, the plot adapts to its context.

The astronaut embodies epunkt’s identity and attitude. He is an icon and a role model, representing excellence and epunkt’s habit to think big. Above all, he represents the human ability to follow one’s dreams and surpass oneself in reaching for the stars.

But as a symbol it is still too crude. It is the surprise twist that makes his story exciting. That’s why we bring the astronaut back to Earth (a little roughly, I admit). And create a tragicomic image of a hero who seems to have fallen from the sky and now longs to return to the stars.

Today I am brave.

In the night after this “brainstorming” session, I stare at the ceiling. I can barely fall asleep. I wonder how I should explain this idea to Sam – after all, he wants an update tomorrow. Our solution doesn’t complement the original campaign; on the contrary, it throws it overboard.

Thank you, Sam.

Two weeks later, I present our idea to the assembled board of epunkt. “Today I’m brave” is the title of one of my slides. The board is totally confused, but fortunately for me, also very enthusiastic. We get the green light, but it takes a while for me to realise it.

So we expand the team and bring on board Marlene Leichtfried, an experienced project manager and conceptualiser who has already brought complex projects to life as part of Vienna Design Week. One of her contacts, Elli Schindler from production studio apart, is to help us plan, organise and execute the shoot.

Two weeks later, we order an outrageously expensive replica of Neil Armstrong’s spacesuit and fulfil student Urban Niedermayr’s secret childhood dream: He becomes our astronaut.

The power of irritation

Irritation is a powerful instrument. In branding as well as in marketing. Because irritation attracts attention and burns itself into the memory. Niko Havranek’s ruthlessly honest photographic style amplifies this effect. The images seem to be taken from real life – as unaffected and genuine as an astronaut in a hot dog stand can be.

The astronaut works in any medium: as a key visual for print and web, in microstories on social media, even in guerrilla marketing as a party crasher. As a symbol of epunkt’s brand personality, it can communicate any topic without diluting the brand’s focus. epunkt always remains the courageous pioneer and explorer, but is given more freedom in its communication to place new topics and products.

The astronaut becomes a star during the shoot. Unofficially, mind you, because the epunkt staff are not allowed to know anything yet. Keeping the shoot a secret becomes an almost impossible task. Vienna has a lot of inhabitants. And no matter where we appear with the astronaut, he stands out and is soon immortalised in private Instagram stories.

Note to self: the logo on the collar was a bad idea.

And the Astronaut goes to …

Successful branding requires a talented team. More than a dozen creatives contribute their ideas and skills to create four narrative strands that address the needs of epunkt’s key target groups in text and image. Niko Havranek takes over 700 photographs in 8 days of shooting at over 20 different locations in Vienna. In addition, around 300 sideshots are taken by Franziska Safranek, who is also responsible for around 60 GIFs for social media. Together with Andrea Holzner, I document the shoot in an entertaining making-of.

Designer Vinzenz Luger, art director behind the 2015 graphic rebranding, creates a new, contemporary layout for more than 30 ad motifs. He brings the 5-year-old brand carefully but firmly into the present. And finally, Linz-based web agency Fredmansky is responsible for designing and programming the website.

I find it remarkable how many of the designs, photos and texts were completely spontaneous and unplanned. The output of the project far exceeded the defined goal – no wonder, because the team is having fun and is given a lot of freedom by epunkt’s marketing manager Tom Niedermair. We enjoy a level of trust that we have never experienced from a customer before.

Finally, in mid-March 2020, the long-awaited brand launch is just around the corner. And with it, glamour and glory. That’s what we think.

Then comes the pandemic.

Client: epunkt GmbH. Industry: Recruiting. Region: Linz, Vienna, Graz. Target Market: Austria. Cathegory: Kampagne, Rebranding. Project Scope: Umbrella Brand Strategy, Target Group Analysis, Storytelling Concept, Claim, Copywriting, Slogans, Graphic Design, Imagery, Photography, Posters, Social Media, Animation, Guidelines, Image Editing.