The Challenge
On June 30, 2011, Marathon Oil Corporation completed the spinoff of its large oil refining, marketing and transportation business as a separate entity (now Marathon Petroleum Corporation). With this change, Marathon Oil Corporation became an independent, international exploration and production (upstream) company. The upstream operation retained the Marathon Oil Corporation name and, due to the retail nature of the downstream company, Marathon Petroleum retained the company's logo and existing brand identity. This created an opportunity to reinvigorate and reposition the new Marathon Oil.
The BrandExtract Solution
Members of BrandExtract had worked with Marathon for more than 10 years managing its online brand and had already developed two generations of Marathon's website. This made us a natural fit to not only produce the company's new website, but to assist with developing its new brand.
Strategically and legally, it was necessary to develop a new brand. The rebranding process began by working with Marathon Oil's investor relations and public affairs group and senior leadership to define the Company's new vision and then engage its employees in the conversation. Surveys were distributed to all Marathon Oil employees, asking what their vision is for the company, as well as how they view its values and character. This yielded a substantial response, with both verbal and visual comments that showed that the employees' vision closely aligned with management's. When asked about values, respondents listed such concepts as global, adaptable, principled, innovative, energetic and socially responsible.
This feedback was tabulated and formed into three major concept groups that informed the creative development. BrandExtract and Marathon used this information to develop a new identity that embodies who the new Marathon Oil is and where the company is heading. Thanks to this partnership and collaboration, we were able to determine the ideal look, feel and voice of the new brand, starting with the logo. The abstracted tri-color wave symbolizes the momentum resulting from Marathon Oil's activity in energy exploration and production, as well as the company's drive and innovation. The position of "Harnessing a wave of energy" was created for the launch to represent the unified focus of the new brand.
The website is an extension of the new identity, with a design focused on portraying Marathon Oil's forward-thinking vision and capturing the global, innovative and socially responsible nature of the company. It incorporates the latest web trends and technologies, and, for the first time since our engagement with Marathon, features social media tools such as Twitter and YouTube. We also utilized third-party content providers, such as ThomsonReuters and iCIMS, to add depth to the site. Through these media, the new site provides a more personal and transparent view of the new company for investors, media and other key audiences.
The site was developed in our SAM content management software to enable Marathon Oil to more effectively and easily manage web communications across the globe with more frequency.
Additionally, we developed and produced a launch video that was shown at Minute Maid Park after a Friday night Houston Astros baseball game, preceding a fireworks display sponsored by Marathon Oil. The video is an animated view of the company's new identity and the values it is built upon.
The Results
The entire rebranding program, including the website, was completed within an abbreviated timeframe to align with the official establishment of the new Marathon Oil.
The rebranding has received tremendous applause in the industry and beyond, evidenced in part by the interest in a press release we distributed over Businesswire announcing the brand launch. In just 24 hours, the release yielded almost 2,200 views.
The website received over 15,600 hits the day it launched, while the average daily number of visits was around 6,200. The percentage of new visitors to the site jumped 27% over the previous site's typical monthly average.
