From Monitronics to MONI: Inside a 10-Month Rebranding Campaign
Monitronics contracted with marketing firm Thoma Thoma of Little Rock, Ark., to guide it through an arduous process to redefine and rebrand the organization and its namesake.
Glance above to the logo, go ahead. Check out the two triangular shapes that overlap to form the intersection of what is supposed to represent certain values at the core of MONI.
I didn’t make that up. The description resulted from a discussion I had with Bruce Mungiguerra, senior vice president of operations for the mega monitoring firm formerly known as Monitronics. There’s more to come on that logo. To help navigate a deeply labored rebranding endeavor – the company’s first since being established in 1994 – Monitronics brought in Thoma Thoma, a marketing and branding firm based in Little Rock, Ark.
“They were heavily engaged from the very beginning to walk us through how we should approach this, how we should develop and come up with what our brand should look like and what our brand pillars will look like,” Mungiguerra told me.
READ NEXT: Monitronics Rebrands as MONI; Will Aim to Grow Direct-to-Consumer Sales
To say the decision-makers and rebranding team members considered a good many iterations of the new logo is an understatement. “Probably more than any of us care to count,” he said.
There was much to deliberate, not simply geometrics. What are the primary hues and styles used by the competition? What should distinguish MONI’s corporate emblem from the rest of the field?
“We didn’t want to be the traditional blue security company like most others. Our marketing team spent a lot of time working through color theories and thinking what would be the best for us. That’s how it was designed when it was all said and done,” he said.
MONI’S color schematic was presented to me as such: The choice of purple and green for the logo comes from the principles of color theory. Purple is commonly known as a color of imagination and originates from a blend of red (energy) and blue (stability). Purple is a perfect choice for MONI’s mission of being forward-thinking, fast and dependable, as the explanation goes. Green is said to be well known for safety, growth and health. It’s also an emotionally positive color. Taken all together and you have the aforementioned core values.
Along with Thoma Thoma, and public relations assistance from McGrath/Power, Monitronics enlisted a core team of 30 staffers from its ranks who were involved in the rebranding since its onset. Surveys galore were administered on the Q.T. – the rebranding was to be kept under tight wraps – including to customers, dealer members and employees. The point wasn’t necessarily to determine “do you like our name or do you not like our name,” but rather a deeper dive into who is Monitronics. What do consumers want from their security company? What do dealers perceive as the strengths of the company today? Where can improvements be made? What are the things Monitronics can build and grow upon as an organization?
“Those were labor intensive. It wasn’t easy. We have kept this as close to the vest as much as we can,” Mungiguerra said.
About 75 other staffers were selected as team ambassadors. Some of them engaged individually with other colleagues, making sure they were all thinking about who they want to be as a company and what they want the organization to look like.
“There has been a lot of involvement without sharing the official name and brand,” Mungiguerra said. [The company hosted an official brand unveiling for its employees on Thursday.]
Monitronics has used the MONI designation previously, including in August when the company partnered with Mission 500 to host a charitable run, the MONI 5K for Children, to support youngsters in need throughout North Texas. However, it was never a sure bet to become the focal point of the rebranding campaign. In fact, myriad possibilities were bandied about and ultimately tossed on a veritable namesake scrap heap.
“It was a real evolution of going through a lot of names and a lot of strategy sessions around ‘name’ and who we want to be and why before deciding on MONI,” Mungiguerra said. “We see it as more of an approachable and contemporary name, but one that is also very familiar today with our employees and our dealers and even our customers. It’s shorter; it’s faster, simpler. It is a little more edgy than the long-outdated name like Monitronics.”
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About the Author
Rodney Bosch, Senior Editor
Although Bosch’s name is quite familiar to those in the security industry, his previous experience has been in daily newspaper journalism. Prior to joining SECURITY SALES & INTEGRATION in 2006, he spent 15 years with the Los Angeles Times, where he performed a wide assortment of editorial responsibilities, including feature and metro department assignments as well as content producing for latimes.com. Bosch is a graduate of California State University, Fresno with a degree in Mass Communication & Journalism. In 2007, he successfully completed the National Burglar and Fire Alarm Association’s National Training School coursework to become a Certified Level I Alarm Technician.
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