Blinkist Audio Branding
BETTER SOUND 2020 | Category: 4.2 Audio Branding
Entrants
Blinks Labs GmbH, aconica, Greatest Kidz
Abstract
In 2018, we at Blinkist started developing our audio brand to improve the brand experience for our more than 14 million users. The Blinkist core brand values are reflected in our audio DNA. The brand concept features great flexibility and future adaptability, allowing for custom-fit use in product and marketing, uniting the overall brand appearance.
Description
With more than 14 million users, Blinkist is a market-leading app that inspires people to keep learning by transforming the key ideas from bestselling non-fiction books into capsules you can read or listen to in 15-20 minutes. Blinkist transforms ordinary moments into extraordinary learning opportunities, with content focused on practical takeaways, innovative storytelling, and dynamic formats. We make important and powerful ideas easily accessible, empowering people to learn.
The ever-growing demand for audio, along with the expansion of our business strategy in 2018, was the starting point for the Blinkist audio brand development. Our then slogan, “Big Ideas In Small Packages”, was not only the basis for the marketing messages, and visual branding principles and guidelines, but it also served as a foundation for the first stage of the audio branding process. This stage consisted of research, as well as several workshops that brought together stakeholders from across our company. The aim was to develop a common understanding of the Blinkist brand and its values: Human Insightful Curious Encouraging. These values were then translated into sound-related attributes that represent Blinkist: warm & unique, experimental & playful, stimulating & striking, uplifting & empowering.
Together, the attributes served as a North Star for the composition of three tracks, which not only had to complement each other in their entirety, but also needed to work together on a single track/stem basis, forming the Blinkist audio brand DNA. From these DNA tracks, we created an audio toolkit, to enable Blinkist’s audio professionals to independently develop the audio brand further. The toolkit contains every element and layer of the compositions that make up our audio brand DNA, providing a great deal of flexibility to apply the toolkit creatively, dynamically, and distinctively to any current or future touchpoint. The process of creating the toolkit also allowed and encouraged the audio team at Blinkist to become intimately familiar with the audio brand’s functionality. In short, the Blinkist audio toolkit provides a vast range of musical sounds and elements, which serve as modules for the creation of further branded sound applications.
The Blinkist audio logo can be thought of as a condensed version of our audio brand DNA, communicating the Blinkist brand personality and promise concisely and effectively. The logo elements are derived from the audio brand DNA. The audio logo is simple, memorable, and easily identifiable. In terms of music and sound, it aims to delight, uplift, and generate curiosity. It also expresses the core values Human and Curious in its arrangement and instrumentation. The logo is the most consistent element of our audio brand – while we’re able to develop the audio brand by creating new musical arrangements, the logo is the one brand aspect that doesn’t change.