Citizens State Bank (CSB) is proud of its small-town agricultural roots, and its employees are dedicated to quality customer service. CSB partnered with UNANIMOUS to develop a communication platform to create a consistent tone of voice and develop a strong brand identity that will support the bank's future growth.
CSB needed a robust internal and external communication strategy to enhance the brand with the growth the bank was experiencing. UNANIMOUS started this process with a discovery meeting where we discussed goals and challenges with key CSB stakeholders. We then conducted external research that laid the foundation for the project. UNANIMOUS led two different demographic focus groups with employees to better understand current communication efforts. A series of phone interviews followed, and we also sent a survey to both customers and non-customers to get a well-rounded view from all different types of consumers.
After the data was collected, our analysis led to a deeper understanding of CSB and ways to accommodate continuous growth. We provided a communication strategy with a full list of key findings from our research, key messages that accurately described the new and improved CSB, and provided marketing recommendations.
After the communication strategy laid the foundation, UNANIMOUS updated the brand’s logo. Since CSB has been a small-town favorite for more than 130 years, proudly serving five generations of people, it was important that the new logo wasn’t a dramatic change. Instead, the bank wanted to energize the brand with subtle changes without diluting its origins and remain recognizable within the communities it serves. The previous logo was elongated with a dark green color, and CSB needed a more dynamic look. UNANIMOUS implemented a simple refinement, changing the shade of green to a more vibrant, energetic tone and creating movement while retaining the ‘C’ shape CSB wanted to keep. The new ‘C’ dimension gives the logo action, and the stacked lettering allows for versatility to accommodate subset categories within the brand. UNANIMOUS designed a new brand guide to allow CSB how to use the new fonts and colors properly.
"UNANIMOUS was a phone call or email away every single time we needed them throughout our rebranding process, the staff is incredible. They drove two hours multiple times to meet with us and made the whole process very smooth and enjoyable for the whole team. UNANIMOUS really immersed themselves in our atmosphere to understand our brand and ultimately ended up providing us with amazing results. We 100% recommend using UNANIMOUS for any upcoming projects or re-brand."
