Appriss

Appriss was a leading provider of data and analytics solutions with public and private enterprise customers focused on public safety, fraud prevention and substance abuse. Its integrated workflow solutions served thousands of government and law enforcement, healthcare providers and large commercial enterprises across the globe. Appriss played a key role in keeping people safe, helping to identify criminal activity, and providing critical healthcare related insights to prevent and manage substance abuse.

We were first introduced to the copmpany in 2016. This came about as a recommendation to a certain Managing Director at Insight Venture Partners, given on our behalf by our principal client at ezCater (which like Appriss, was also an Insight-backed company).

Having recently completed a number of interesting acquisitions in the Public Safety, Healthcare, and Retail industries, Appriss had some challenges on its hands. Multiple promising data/analytics companies, each with their own brands, value propositions, ways of saying things, different philosophies on go-to-market and methods of platform engineering, each with incredibly strong-minded executive leadership teams, all coming together trying to be part of one global organization.

It was promising, but it sure wasn’t pretty. So the company fielded a national agency search / RFP for branding and digital services in order to obtain a professional viewpoint and execution of all the necessary services. We were obviously more than glad to participate, and within 2 days of winning the work we were off to their Louisville, KY headquarters to get started.

“A brand for a company is like a reputation for a person. You earn a reputation by trying to do hard things well.”

Jeff Bezos – Amazon

It was critical to merge the three acquired company brands together with the existing Appriss “parent” brand carefully, to avoid the kind of confusion that could result if the new branding wasn’t unified and logical. The visual elements, tone of voice, and messaging all needed to be integrated seamlessly. Each incoming company had its own website design, including different color schemes, logos, fonts, and layouts. And the parent company’s branding and website were quite out of date as well. Aligning all the elements in a sensible way at the corporate level, and among the business unit brands to create a cohesive new design, was challenging to say the least. Deciding which brand’s voice, design, and culture to retain (if any), or how to combine them, created lots of friction – but positive tension produced great outcomes.

The following snaps capture a look into what emerged.

The concept of Knowledge for Good – which we wrote and Appriss trademarked – was powerful. It meant something a bit different different at the corporate level in each of the businesses, but was positive, defensible, and sustainable. It was the common, core idea that drove everything.

The bright future of the Appriss Safety business unit could never have been predicted. When we got there, it was seen internally as the low-growth legacy business. But to universal surprise, the business experienced a huge growth resurgence following the initial rebranding, a subsequent repositioning as Appriss Insights, and all the smart, intense work of the group’s marketing and sales team.

In 2021, Equifax Inc. acquired Appriss Insights in an all-cash, $1.85BN transaction. Quite a turnaround and a spectacular strategic exit.

Also in 2021, as part of Appriss Health’s continuing growth trajectory, it announced an exciting strategic outcome of its own – a merger with health tech leader PatientPing.

The transaction valued the combined company at over $1.5 billion, it was rebranded at Bamboo Health, and we remain their digital agency today.

Appriss Retail has faced a tougher M&A market, but with an impressive new focus on strategic partnerships their prospects seem bright.

Appriss and its various businesses presented us with a pretty unprecedented assignment, which we ramped to complete (rebrand and inital website launch) in a matter of just four months. And although with all the M&A activity we’re servicing a different kind of Appriss today, it’s now been nine years of challenges and success.