Employment Hero Partners With Creative Agency Design By Twist For Playful Brand Refresh

All-in-one HR, payroll and benefits platform, Employment Hero, has unveiled a new website and brand expression as part of a major branding project.

The refresh has been designed in partnership with Sydney-based creative agency, Design by Twist, after conducting extensive research with thousands of existing and potential customers around the world.

The initiative was driven by a global creative collaboration, reflecting the company’s international expansion efforts and includes illustrations from UK-based artist, Alec Doherty, and French-Canadian designer, Catherine Potvin, with photography from Sydney-based Benito Martin, sonic design by Smith and Western and motion design by Never Sit Still.

The brand refresh reveals a refreshed, joyful persona for the brand, reinforcing its existing purpose – to make employment easier and more rewarding for everyone. The initiative consists of a revamped brand strategy, website, visual tone, motion design and sonic branding, all tying in seamlessly with Employment Hero’s mission to launch SMEs on the path to success with its end-to-end payroll, people management and productivity solutions.

Employment Hero’s new website was led by Digital agency, Frank, and is a reflection of the company’s continuing commitment to its customers, offering visitors a simple, intuitive and frictionless experience.

Doubling down on existing success with digital content, Employment Hero’s new website includes a comprehensive resource centre with visitors able to access useful resources, insights reports, online events and articles – all personalised to the individual’s needs through an intelligent recommendation engine.

In addition to the brand refresh, Employment Hero has also announced the launch of its first major above-the-line advertising campaign to further embed the company as the world’s best-in-class solution for SMEs looking to optimise and simplify their HR and people management journey. Using high impact display and online video combined with first and second party data sources, the campaign balances high reach with a high degree of targeting.

Complementing the digital activity, SMEs will find it hard to miss Employment Hero on the airwaves with significant radio activity also running in various markets. The new campaign is set to accelerate the company’s growth and international footprint as it expands across Southeast Asian markets.

The initiative coincides with a significant capital raise, which saw the Australian scale-up raise $140 million in a funding round led by US-based Insight Partners. Employment Hero’s platform currently serves over 6,000 businesses, collectively managing over 250,000 employees.

In the 2020-2021 fiscal year, the company grew recurring revenue by 113 per cent and increased its headcount by 65 per cent, bringing the team to 325 FTEs. Employment Hero’s platform also processed $14 billion in gross wages in the past 12 months. In October 2020 Employment Hero launched internationally including New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia and the UK.

Tasman Page, marketing director at Employment Hero, said: “Our brand refresh goes far beyond a simple update. It’s the next step in our continued commitment to better understand and support our customers.”

“We’ve already published extensive research into the pain points, challenges and pressing issues affecting business leaders, are consistently developing resources to inform our customers and have appointed a dedicated insights function within our marketing team.”

“This brand refresh is an investment into improving our customer experience. At its core, it’s human-centred and we’ve poured a huge amount of energy into testing and research to ensure the strategy was aligned with our customers’ expectations and evolving needs. We’re confident that it reflects our deep understanding of our customers across all markets and are excited to see how it will ultimately enhance their experience with us,” he added.

Alex Dalmau, founder and creative director at Design by Twist, said: “It’s been a real pleasure to work with the Employment Hero team to help consolidate their vision to make employment easier and more rewarding for everyone.”

“The amount of consideration that has gone into the project is unparalleled and, as a result, we have created a compelling and unexpected brand system that makes Employment Hero stand out in a cluttered category.”

Josh Roseberg, senior designer at Employment Hero, said: “Everything from the illustration styles, through to the colour palette and tone of voice has been informed and backed by the strategy behind this project.”

“Informed by rich, customer-focussed insights and driven by Employment Hero’s passion for creating joyful and rewarding experiences – each brand touchpoint has been considered. We’re very happy with how the brand refresh has materialised and we’re excited to keep elevating and developing our brand experience as we evolve.”