A new brand, identity and website for a purposeful business, advocating for sustainable, shared transport
A long-term, people-positive partnership to continually evolve brand, identity and website
Founded in 1980, CMA has spent the past four decades building a reputation for its value-led, consultative approach to recruitment. They are highly experienced across four key divisions: Accountancy & Finance, Practice, Executive and HR.
When we first met CMA their brand and visual identity had become dated, and their website did not offer the modern user experience that was required.
Our initial work focused on reinvigorating their brand, facilitating company-wide surveys and more intimate workshops with leadership to understand the sentiment behind their offer. We then went on to design a new, modern identity which enabled the company to better support its positioning and communicate its four divisions with consistency and clarity.
Once the visual identity had been developed, we began what is now a multi-year partnership to support the implementation of their identity and iteratively develop their website. Over the course of our partnership, we’ve worked together on many projects, from photoshoots and image development to PowerPoint presentations. And we continue to support them with both their digital presence and their visual identity, across all departments within the business.
“The initial project exceeded our expectations from a visual, content and brand perspective. The external validation we received reinforced our confidence that the website reflected how we wanted to be seen; a contemporary business with traditional values.”
Strategic foundation
As with many projects, we start with the fundamentals. We helped CMA make their plans concrete, and document their working culture through their long term vision and values, and tone of voice.
“Understanding who we are, what we do and how we communicate our proposition has been key to the longevity of our partnership. This has created the trust and confidence required to evolve our image and brand...”
Once we established a clear direction for the visual identity, and embedded it both within the organisation and their marketing channels, we’ve worked to keep it current. Over the years we’ve introduced illustration and found a way for them to make commissioned and stock photography own-able.
“Overtime, confirmation of a positive client and candidate experience has only increased our satisfaction with the project and our on-going evolution from a visual, tonal and functional perspective.”
Website development
Led by CMA’s needs, the website has been in a state of regular development and improvement. As always, our approach is strategic and user-focussed. Having increased job applications by 240% in the first six months, our considered approach has continued to evolve and deliver improvements.
“... the website conveys the trust and confidence, collaboration, integrity, knowledge and professionalism which we look to have entwined through all of our interactions.”
Our design and development cycle focuses on fine-tuning the user experience, planning out pages and sections in low and high-fidelity wireframes, and using the process to constantly consider how the identity evolves. And, with the intelligent, intuitive content management system in place, CMA’s marketing department can fine-tune the content without our intervention.
“Salad succeeded in strengthening our brand and created a modern identity that brings together all of our recruitment divisions.
The blend of expertise and experience across the Salad team has allowed us to mitigate any potential blindspots as everybody brings something different to the conversation.”