Hylark

Sector:
Private sector, Software
Team:
Leadership, business development, marketing, development
Expertise:
Branding, interface design, website design and development, copywriting

EllisJames helped parent company, Ezekia, launch their brand new platform – Hylark – with standout branding and a beautiful, integrated website.

What’s the deal?

Ezekia provides a comprehensive platform for Search Firms – consultancies specialising in matching leading corporate talent with leading corporate businesses. A couple of years back, they started developing a new version of the Ezekia platform, one that was modular and gave their clients a wider range of functionality and personalisation options.

So positive were the early signs for Ezekia 2.0, the team felt confident that it could be adapted for a much wider, domestic (as well as business) customer base. ‘Hylark’ would allow users of all types organise their lives and careers with an integrated modular web app.

The market for planning and time management web apps is pretty intense though. As much as Hylark offered something truly unique, it would need stand-out branding and a magnetic website to convince prospective users. That’s where we came in.

So what?

Ezekia came to us with the name already chosen, and we didn’t have a problem with it. It’s a nice lyrical name. But what exactly was a ‘Hylark’? That in itself presented a challenge. The branding also needed to reflect the platform’s modularity as it is key to its differentiated value proposition.

Our branding approach is iterative and collaborates with our clients all the way through a multi-round process where concepts are promoted or ditched, refined and eventually, finalised. The first couple of rounds are really useful for ‘feeling’ our way into the brand. They promote plenty of discussion and debate, and we (by which I mean EllisJames and our clients) can rapidly iterate and refine our way to a winning solution.

Such was our approach with Hylark, with the less demonstrative, more abstract concepts finding favour with the Ezekia team.

Yeah, but, so what?

A brand needs to reach far deeper than the logo alone of course. With the core identity agreed, our next phase builds this out to a fully provisioned brand ecosystem. That’s colour palettes, font selections, icon styles, interface elements and so on. For Hylark, it also included a gorgeous little bird character.

With the brand buttoned down, our work began to design Hylark’s interface. We worked in sync with the Hylark development team who were simultaneously applying our designs to the platform as it neared launch.

We also designed and built the Hylark front-of-house website, which markets the platform and links directly back into the app system with seamless sign up.

Favourite element?

The interface. Although our cheeky little Lark character comes a close second. But the interface is elegant, uncluttered and uses a range of colours with a soft deftness.

Hylark begin with nothing but an idea and great development skills. EllisJames were able to bring the concept to life and enable Ezekia to establish a wholly new brand, aimed at a previously untapped market for them.