A Fresh Coat on a Durable Brand
The Challenge
Pulling off the relaunch of a national brand that relies on the buy-in of a network of independent dealers.
The Approach
Pay close attention to what Rhino Shield dealers need to succeed, and build a robust branding package paired with marketing materials that covers any need.
Paint a house – Shield your home.
Launched in 2000, the Rhino Shield Brand is a nationally recognized and respected leader in premium exterior coatings. Superior to paint, Rhino Shield’s proprietary formula protects against the elements, boasting durability and flexibility and comes in just about every color you can imagine – especially the one your wife wants!
Rhino Shield is different because the certified applicators complete extensive prep work on the surface, removing paint and applying long-lasting caulk. The product is then sprayed on to create a thick and flexible elastomeric ceramic coating that stands up to the elements.
Rhino Shield’s company ethos is about more than just selling a product, it’s about adding a benefit to the lives of their customers and dealers through a truly unique product. With a legacy of more than 20 years of proven product, Rhino Shield provides dealers with an opportunity to create a longstanding business of their own.
Rhino Shield also comes with a dependable 25 year warranty providing peace of mind and the guarantee that you won’t have to worry about the exterior of your home and business for decades to come. While your neighbors are paying to paint their home every 5-7 years, you will enjoy consistent color and protection.
In 2021, new ownership purchased the company and set to work growing and improving the established brand. What they discovered is that despite having a dedicated network of independent dealers across the country who knew the product inside and out, they were lacking important resources that could help make Rhino Shield even more successful.
By focusing on their values of integrity, excellence, innovation and teamwork, a relaunch of Rhino Shield would enable the company to provide better service to its customers and its dealers. That’s where we came in.
During discovery, we went in deep to get to the root of what Rhino Shield needed most to succeed. We held extensive interviews, and not just with the high level ownership. By speaking with dealers, contractors and sales employees, we discovered gaps that inhibited individual success, left customers questioning, and left dealers without important resources.
Beyond identifying problem issues, these interviews also highlighted the most valuable selling points of Rhino Shield. Dealers with a dozen or more years in the business knew exactly what makes their customers tick, and provided important feedback that informed headlines and other brand copy.
Most importantly, we learned that dealers were hungry for more. More guidance, more contact from Rhino Shield, and more information to better inform their customers.
We then brought Rhino Shield leadership together for a workshop to present all of our findings and walk through the plan for the brand expansion and priorities, as well .
Often one of the most complicated elements of a product is figuring out how to explain and justify the ‘why.’ What makes a product better than a dozen others on the market?
Fortunately for Rhino Shield, the elastomeric coating and application is one of a kind. Like AirBnB or Uber, Rhino Shield is an industry disruptor and provides a product that stands above the competition and is continuously improving and evolving their proprietary technology. Even the way Rhino Shield is applied is unique as it must be applied by certified Rhino Shield dealers and contractors.
Further, the product’s closest competition, basic paint, is full of flaws that Rhino Shield seeks to improve. Long lasting, more durable, easier to clean and maintain – it’s not even a close call.
Of course the biggest limiting factor when positioning Rhino Shield in the market is the cost. The preparation and application of the coating goes on similar to paint, but costs several times more than what you can find in your favorite home improvement store. However, when you look at lifetime cost, Rhino Shield blows the competition away as its product lasts 25 years as opposed to paint which needs to be reapplied every 5-7 years. The message – Rhino Shield saves you serious money over time.
The messaging for Rhino Shield needed to be dynamic to reach not only the buyers of the product, but prospective dealers as well. We knew that we were filling in a marketing gap that often left dealers without resources and information to bring the best to their customers, which would take a significant investment to correct.
- Homeowners
- Business owners
- Dealers
We wanted to make it easy for Rhino Shield to reach each and every niche in their market, which meant putting ample resources close at hand. For homeowners, this meant proving the quality and long-lasting nature of Rhino Shield and providing peace of mind. For business owners, it meant reducing costs and inconvenience long term so they could put their energy into growing their business. And for dealers, it meant guaranteeing a quality product, valuable support, and a reliable business they could grow and be proud of.
Focusing on these key audiences, we created an extensive list of headlines which could be used continually in marketing efforts across all of the Rhino Shield’s districts.
- Built on quality.
- Protect what protects you with Rhino Shield superior coating.
- Rhino Shield quality, technology and protection.
- Elevate your exterior with Rhino Shield elastomeric coating.
- Whether rain or shine, snow or salt, mold or mildew, rest assured that your home is protected from Mother Nature’s daily wear and tear.
With the overarching headlines established, we drilled down to key points for each of the unique audiences. This made it easy for dealers across the country to quickly identify language and launch campaigns best suited to their district. Here are a few of those headlines:
Homeowners
- Paint a house. Shield your home.®
- Engineered to outlast paint.® Formulated to outsmart the elements.
- Be the best on the block, 25 years running.
Business Owners
- Coat your greatest investment in quality.
- We’re in the business of protecting yours.
- Protect your profits by eliminating preventable downtime.
Dealers
- Installing premium coatings, instilling peace of mind.
- Growing dealers, shielding cities. One job at a time. Rhino Shield.
- A business in a box. A proven path to profits. Become a Rhino Shield dealer today.
Coming into it, we knew that Rhino Shield’s logo was a keeper. With a 20-year established brand, customers nationwide recognized the logo and name of Rhino Shield as it was. We used the established font and color as a jumping off point to grow and expand the rest of the brand for a full refresh.
The main colors of the brand, a bright and inviting yellow and a calming, dependable blue are complimented by a variety of earth tones that hearken back to the materials Rhino Shield can often see paired with in the real world – forest green shrubs and trees, slate stone accents, and moody grays and blues for unexpected and enduring weather conditions that put Rhino Shield to the test.
To round out the visual package, we created a variety of icons in a flat and minimalist style featuring construction material and signage.
The most important element of the visual system is a massive library of digital assets that were shared with dealers across all markets. These elements included unifying graphics, patterns, slogans, and logos that could be utilized on items from website blog pages to billboards to yard signs to home convention banners.
Brand standards like standardized illustration style, chart and graphic color palette, and a library of patterns help accent the strength of a unified brand across different dealers and businesses.
One highly requested asset from dealers and salespeople in the field was photography and documentation of the product on different surfaces and materials, and a better demonstration of the application through before and after shots. The photography suite we created shows not just Rhino Coated homes, but the satisfied homeowners celebrating them. The photos also show protected homes in different extreme weather circumstances – from beating sun to pouring rain.
In addition to the library of visual assets and list of headlines, Rhino Shield’s dealers were provided with ample examples of how they could apply graphics and visuals to products in the real world. We know that each dealer’s market is different, and that a one-size-fits-all approach wouldn’t cut it, but we also knew dealers were struggling with a lack of resources and guidance when it came to how to market Rhino Shield.
From truck wraps to newly branded product cans, billboards and digital ads, these samples make it easy for dealers to plug in their contact information and go. The valuable library of visuals and application guidance gives dealers the flexibility and support they need, without being forced to market in a way that doesn’t work for them.
No more trying to make ads from scratch, and no more inconsistencies across the board. By throwing the kitchen sink at them, we hoped to capture the needs of all with few limitations.
One of the most important things we wanted to focus on for this brand refresh was to really highlight happy homeowners who had used Rhino Shield for years. These are people who have invited their families over for holiday meals, have seen their children grow up, and have made important memories all safely inside a Rhino Shield-coated home.
We partnered with Lensea Film who created an incredibly in-depth video showing homes across the country, in wildly different climates, all who had successfully benefitted from Rhino Shield for years. Through sweeping aerial shots and close-ups in all weather, you see homes that haven’t been painted in 12 years looking pristine.
From Richard Forti in Cape Cod with the salty, cold air to retirees Art and Maria Carinci in snowy Detroit, the video shows their Rhino Coated homes looking vibrant and protected in all weather. More importantly, it shows the human element. Viewers learn about the unique conditions and motivations for each happy customer and can imagine themselves just as satisfied.
As the brand refresh was rolled out, Rhino Shield worked closely with their dealers to help them learn how to make the most of the new assets. They held sales meetings, provided video tutorials, and made themselves available for multiple meetings to ensure their dealers felt supported.
The results were shocking.
Rhino Shield took care to survey their dealers and the market to measure the success of their hard work. For a rebrand that relied on the buy-in and compliance from independent dealers, Rhino Shield found that 6 months after the rollout, 9 out of the top 10 Rhino Shield dealers had completed a full adoption of the new materials.
For one dealer, they saw their close rate of 20% increase to the mid-40’s without a change in the amount of money they were spending on marketing just by using the new guidelines and products.
These were dealers who had been selling this single product for up to 20 years, experts in their field, and yet they found the new materials and processes useful enough to shift within six months.
The audit also uncovered that of the brand’s lowest performing dealers, eighty percent had not adopted the rebrand. By tracking these adoption rates, Rhino Shield felt confident that there was a direct correlation between the updated graphics and marketing and growing success for their dealers.
This clear data could only encourage further adoption, helping prove the utility of our work to more reluctant dealers. In the first year, the brand as a whole experienced a 40% lift in revenue, which the marketing efforts were a key factor in impacting.
