The Evolution of VAV Personnel: A Case Study in Branding

Introduction

VAV Synergy approached us with a request for help. They wanted to launch a new business line. The first step was to develop a name and logo that would reflect the new direction and be connected to their main brand. Our task was to set the direction of the new brand, which had a high potential for successful development and scaling in the international market.

Client

VAV Synergy is an outstaffing company that helps Ukrainians find work abroad. The company’s history is closely linked to its founder, who himself went from being a “migrant worker” to a successful business owner. It became an essential element in our work on the project.

Context

VAV Synergy’s core business is outstaffing workers from Eastern Europe. Among VAV Synergy’s clients are leading Western European employers offering formal employment, social protection, and transparent conditions for employees.  However, this market has several drawbacks:

1. Limited margins. The company’s profit depends on the employee’s salary, and this figure is quite stable. 

2. The company assumes all the risks and costs associated with workers’ activities during their entire period of employment. 

Therefore, the company decided to open a new business line: recruiting. This model allows the company to increase margins and reduce risks. It is also a way to diversify its business. However, recruiting has a number of peculiarities, so its success requires a separate brand that would maintain a connection with the main one but clearly indicate a new area of activity.

The vision of the new brand, like the business line itself, tends to be international expansion. In the future, the brand should become the leader of the recruitment market in the EU. At the same time, the company plans to cover the entire range of professions, expanding its profile from blue-collar jobs to recruiting any kind of specialist.

Request

Our task was to develop a name and logo for the new brand. An important criterion for the new name was the connection with the already well-known parent brand, VAV Synergy. At the same time, the new name had to convey the recruitment activities.

Solution

First of all, we conducted market research in the form of desk research. We analyzed the existing competitors, their names, and logos, evaluating them according to the following criteria:

▪️ ease of pronunciation 

▪️ clarity, 

▪️ euphony, 

▪️ ease of use in the Latin alphabet. 

We found that a certain standard of the category is the use of a descriptor in the name that indicates the field of activity or key product. In addition, the study showed that most companies are focused on the local market, and their names are not adapted enough to the international presence, considering the peculiarities of pronunciation and spelling. We used all these findings in further work on the project.

Dmytro Kudinov, CEO of inseed.agency:

This project was very interesting for me for several reasons:

1. I really like it when Ukrainian businesses grow and move into the big leagues. The element of international expansion of such companies is what stimulates and fuels interest in the project.

2. The client’s team is self-made people who have built a company from scratch and reached the top positions in their market. I have great respect for such entrepreneurs and always try to learn something from them.

3. The Ukrainian market in this niche needs to catch up to the European market in terms of strong brands with the potential for international growth. Therefore, it was interesting to bridge this gap and set a new bar to stimulate the entire market’s development.

4. I am also concerned about the company’s social and economic impact. After all, VAV Personnel will create additional inflows of funds into our economy from abroad, and the company’s clients will be able to provide a high standard of living for their families, quality education for their children, etc.

 

Brand name development

In our agency, we always adhere to certain principles when developing naming:

▪️ uniqueness, 

▪️ compliance with the category, 

▪️ compactness, 

▪️ euphony, 

▪️ beautiful spelling, 

▪️ scalability, 

▪️ no negative values, and 

▪️ accessible URL. 

Over the years, VAV Synergy has built a strong reputation and wide knowledge among its target audience. Therefore, taking into account the need to maintain a connection with the parent brand, we kept the recognizable VAV abbreviation in the name of the new brand.

The next step was to develop new names. During this process, we created 976 name options. 

From this list, we selected 13 ideas that best met our criteria. It was also important to ensure that the selected names would not only allow us to register the corresponding domain but also that they were not registered trademarks in Ukraine or the EU. After completing the relevant checks, we presented these names to the client’s team.

To ensure that these ideas were in line with the business’s goals and spirit, we held a vote and an open discussion with the company’s employees. This way, we identified a shortlist of names that were chosen by the majority of employees.

We have chosen the final name from this shortlist. That’s how the name VAV Personnel was born. It retained the connection with the main brand and clearly indicated a new area of activity. The name was euphonious, easy to pronounce in Latin, and suitable for the international market.

Logo development

Before designing the logo, we created a list of criteria for the final product. These criteria included:

▪️ emphasis on the VAV abbreviation as the most recognizable brand resource

▪️ perception of the brand as a reliable and professional partner

▪️ conveying the recruitment of quality personnel as a key value proposition

Based on the new name, we created several logo options. 

Each was carefully thought out to reflect the company’s new direction and maintain a connection with the core brand. After several rounds of discussions and revisions, we presented the final version of the logo to the client.

The result