Goodtel

Overview

Damien Gould came to Marlin with a dream of bringing a new social enterprise to life.   He had decades of experience in the Telco industry and wanted to use his industry knowledge to create a new company that could do good. His business would give 50% of the company’s profits to charity. He needed a business name and brand and this is where Marlin came in.

Marlin worked closely with Damien to:

• Create a new brand to launch his social enterprise.
• Determine the right mechanism for his profits to go to charity.
• Determine which charities to partner with.

The result was Goodtel – a fresh, simple, professional, fun and caring telco brand that charities wanted to associate with and the target audiences wanted to sign up to.

Problem

Create a new brand that charities wanted to associate with.

Solution

Created the ‘Goodtel’ brand with a brand book that captured the essence of Goodtel.  We also provided strategy advice on how to approach charities and turn them in to partners.

Results

Currently 10 different charities have partnered with Goodtel. Only a few weeks after launching, Goodtel gave $5,000 to it’s first partner ‘Sleepbus’, who provide safe sleeps for vulnerable people.

The Challenge

The brand had to feel authentic to Damien’s personal values and although he was essentially a pioneer in his industry, he wasn’t comfortable being labelled a changemaker. 

He wanted the brand to have a sense of humour without losing the professionalism or gravitas that would attract potential charity partners.

Our key challenges were:

The business had to appeal to multiple audiences. 

• Small to medium businesses that wanted professional telecommunication services.
• Residents needing an NBN provider.
• Millenials who liked to choose for-purpose providers.
• Charities that could be potential partners.

The key messaging was layered.

• We needed to introduce a new business.
• We had to sell how good the product and services were.  
• We had to explain how the business would be doing good by giving 50% of profits to causes.

Budget was tight and so were timings as the NBN rollout had commenced.

• Funds were limited and needed to be spread across several third parties to launch the new company.
• Many competitors were already in the market.
• If it took too long to launch, potential customers may have already signed a contract with another provider. Each month reduced the potential market.

The mechanism for how to do good needed to be decided.

• Should the company stand for one cause or many?
• How should the charities be chosen?
• Could the customers have a choice in a cause?
• How should the charities be approached?

The Solution

An authentic brand

Marlin used an archetype assessment to help uncover Damien’s personal character traits. We then cross-checked our conceptual territories and ideas against these archetypes to ensure every element of the brand we developed from business name, look and feel, language and personality matched him.

Audiences and messaging

Market research was conducted to get to know the audiences and it revealed two trending concerns; people wanted to be sure that the service would be good and that there were no hidden fees or some other ‘catch’ that enabled the business to give to causes. We ensured that the key messaging put the customer’s needs first, with the purpose for doing good, second as a bonus. We also highlighted the ‘good guarantee’ that offered a  14-day cancellation period.  

Budget and timings

Marlin developed a brand book that captured the essence of Goodtel and provided a style and language guide. The tone of voice and language guide gave Damien the tools he needed to write some of his own communications which helped reduce his expenses.  The book also gave specific guidance on how to treat images of beneficiaries of charities to ensure they would be presented with the right dignity and respect. 

The cause mechanism

Marlin provided strategic advice on how to approach various charities to partner with and also assisted Damien in choosing the cause mechanic journey that was right for him, for Goodtel and for his customers.

The Results

Marlin created a fresh new brand from scratch for a wonderful social enterprise idea that delivered on all aspects of the brief and was authentically Damien. The unique logo with its cheeky winking smile and bold tagline ‘A better world needs a Goodtel’ encapsulated the simplicity, professionalism, purpose and sense of humour that Damien desired. The brand book is an invaluable tool for all future Goodtel communications that can easily be built on as the business grows.

Along with the good professional services that are expected from a telecommunications company, Goodtel is able to provide customers with a choice of causal categories – meaning that they can pick the cause which resonates most for them and that’s where 50% of profits made from their accounts goes to. Currently 10 different charities have partnered with Goodtel. 

Only a few weeks after launching, Goodtel gave $5,000 to it’s first partner ‘Sleepbus’, who provide safe sleeps for vulnerable people.

Wrapping Up

Working with Damien on a brand new social enterprise for the telecommunications industry was an exciting and challenging first for Marlin. 

Together we developed a brand for a brilliant business idea that we’re both extremely proud of.

The unique brief enabled us to combine our strategic and creative skills with our knowledge of the not-for-profit sector to help a commercial business partner with charities and offer customers the chance to do good just by choosing Goodtel as their telco provider.

The world needs more companies like Goodtel so if you have the dream and the means to do something similar in your industry, we would love to help you achieve it.