We are nearing the conclusion of a comprehensive rebranding project for APCO International, the world’s largest organization of public safety communication professionals. For the most part, it has been the model of how a major association should handle the process. The keys were the way the project was set up by APCO, the collaboration at all critical levels of the association, the leadership of a senior volunteer member who was able to spearhead the effort, and the creative process.

The set up

APCO has been in business for more than 75 years, but has not substantially updated its brand despite broadening its scope and membership considerably over that time period. Association leaders determined that refreshing the brand was needed. They assembled a meeting of engaged members, a corporate partner and senior staff which I facilitated to develop a strategy for executing the process. The full-day meeting was energetic, informative, and yielded a clear plan for moving forward.

Collaboration

Obviously, an association with 15,000 members can’t get input from everyone when refreshing its brand, but APCO did the next best thing by establishing a brand taskforce that represented a diverse group of members. The leader of the taskforce made regular presentations to several levels of the membership, including representatives of the association’s chapters, commercial members, the executive committee, and board of directors. This ensured that many voices were heard, and every opinion was seriously considered.

Senior member leadership

The real key, in my mind, was having a senior member spearhead the effort. Membership associations are operated through a rather delicate blending of staff management and volunteer oversight. In order for major decisions to be made and enacted, staff and members must work together. the taskforce leader was an evangelist for the need to refresh the brand which supported the staff’s desire, and communicated with all levels of membership as a peer, which made it clear to all that this was a collaborative effort that represented the best intentions of the association.

Creative process

The most visible component of the refreshed brand was a new logo, which Frost Miller Group designed. The taskforce gave us clear direction about the target audiences, goals of the association, and its mission and vision. From this input, we created a first round of logos that were targeted, but diverse. The logos were presented to the various levels of the membership and staff leadership and then revised and reviewed in a very orderly process. The taskforce leader spent hours on GoToMeeting presentations and personal presentations at annual meetings and board meetings. The result was a new logo that encompasses the… and will lead the association into the future.

I can’t post the logos quite yet as APCO will unveil them at their upcoming Annual Conference. Also, I am co-authoring a white paper with the COO of the association, which she will use as the basis of a presentation to other association leaders. That will be available here also, but if you want to reserve a copy, just email me at kmiller@frostmiller.com.

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