Innerout is a lifestyle entrepreneurship in itself, crafted around the background, expertise, common sense, intuition and limitations of its founder. As an entrepreneurial entity it acts as a versatile ad-hoc – aka project based – nutshell of senior people, from brand designers to UI/UX developers and PR entities. We gather a different team around a project and not wait for projects to feed the same team. We bring personalized resources according to the needs and profile of every project. This is a more efficient, honest and light-hearted mindset to start a job with.
Unless the branding process reaches a distilled essence of meaning that can be expressed in one or two words it remains un-functional. Brand DNA is the first and ultimate essence of a human entity relevant for its stakeholders, true to its intimate nature and therefore sustainable as a promise in the long run. A replicable code of identity that becomes signature. Yes, humans, you can be encapsulated in two words! Mastery inside capsule.
Brands speak in the same noise in which everyone speaks. If they are heard by whom they intended to address to it’s because they somehow chose well their words and delivered them effectively. Brands speak, relate, breathe, move and sweat telling non-epic stories. Words ignite behaviors and engage people who then return the favor, feeding good reputation. And the circle closes nicely. The right words definitely create a better world.
It is about the internal discipline of a brand. Branding should be a flawlessly logical and conceptual development from premises to conclusion. If you have this vision of the business, then its mission, values, personality, behavior, tone of voice and external promise should follow organically. It’s really amazing how people are not usually able to articulate neatly what they already have in their hearts and minds, although they live the very reality of the brand, as owners or employees. Obviously from the outside the perspective is much clearer. Objectivity seems to pay off.
Exposure is ozone to breathe for some, eternal hazard for others or just maybe a necessary dose of adrenaline from time to time. Either way, going publicly with a picture, a written speech, a public verbal delivery, or with any personal contribution subject to public judgment might be daunting. Anyways it should be subject to tweaking and refinement. Again, by an external eye that always gets to see the not so obvious.
What’s in a name? Sometimes a whole world. The art and science of giving names to a business project is a demiurgic act: a good name not only gives birth to a complex human reality, but it endows it for a long and happy life. Naming should be legible, intelligible, pronounceable, relevant for what it stands for, memorable for hearing and sight, outstanding through the surprise it contains – pretty much like a chocolate box, and last but not least available for intellectual protection. Phew! Naming is maybe the toughest of branding jobs, but among the most intellectually rewarding for sure.
Design is the epitome of thinking; design thinking is the reality and future of branding. We encourage design that is shaping a business much higher upstream, not decoratively at the end of the process, just “because a name should have a logo”. Great design has rules that only great designers master. Full stop. Innerout works with designers of talent and of know how. And the non-designer consultant does the rest: mitigation of subjective views, inspiring briefing, high eyebrows upon details and most of the times empathetic solidarity with client’s (in)decisions. Personal beliefs and biases leak inevitably into the judgment. And it’s ok to be so, we’ll find together the best visual expression of a business promise. Design has a human face and certainly a heart.
Brand strategy is pleonastic. Brand is strategy, at its innermost. Branding is the disciplined management of key representations that people hold of a reality. It calls for a strategic choice that is carefully drafted, well researched and consistently followed through. Brand strategy is what offers unity, clarity and single-mindedness. People find it easier to connect to brands that made a strategic choice, and took a well-defined path. Brands should grow organically from authentic little seeds, but not like weeds. In branding usually freedom equals chaos.
Corporate businesses place people under the flag of a promise, speak on their behalf and lock their CVs for a period of time. The more people are aligned under the flag, the higher the speaker volume, isn’t it? But instead of volume and frequency, more and more companies understand the need of more refined internal marketing programs to make employees belong where they work. Employees, especially in services brands, are actually the most important stakeholders. Programs can be complex but always tailored to the company’s specific challenges. There are no universal recipes whatsoever.
Clients’ perception about the overall performance of a business is a serious issue that cannot be left on the hands of an un-engaging questionnaire thrown on mail. Innerout pledges to reset the common practices of the so called “client satisfaction surveys” and offers an in-depth alternative, highly efficient, insightful, customized and much more rewarding. The perception audit by Innerout consists in guided one to one in-depth interviews under anonymity, conducted at the client’s premises with an external consultant. The profound analysis of a business through the stakeholders’ perception brings insightfulness, ideas, objectivity, personalized and actionable solutions. Last but not least, it is a sane prerequisite for any branding process.
Brand engagement sessions are unique experiences in the landscape of corporate trainings. They are at the crossroad of three main axes: corporate branding, organizational culture and personal development. The liaison between these three axes is stronger than it might seem and highly relevant for the intrinsic motivation of people.
They are usually the last step of a rebranding process or during change management where strategic shifts need to be internalized at all levels. Or even when there are too many things that remained unspoken during an accelerated growth process. New decisions have to be communicated with transparency, authenticity and seduction. Employer – employee is a “transactional space” almost like a theater of operations, in the most pacifist sense of the expression, where goals and objectives need emotional alignment.
Such sessions of symbolic “engagement” with the organizational values lead to intimate little revelations that people have about the umbilical link between the employer’s brand and their own personal brand. These sessions always leave behind fruitful introspection, positive outlook, a sense of belonging and group effervescence. That is why we call them the “togetherness tools.” “Organizations that focus beyond profit and instill a strong sense of purpose among their employees are more likely to find long-term success.” (Deloitte Research, 2013)
I’ve been working with Innerout since 2012 and it is one of the most rewarding professional journeys so far. The measurable result after less than 2 years of ongoing consultancy came quite quick: I was voted the entrepreneur of the year in a public opinion poll initiated by Biz Magazine and developed with Unlock market research company.
I was impressed by Mihaela’s correctness and prompt response, in a time I was in urgent need for my branding projects. A lot of nice ideas and a lot of professionalism from her side!
I wanted to understand where to go strategically with my personal brand, as an actress and public figure. My career path got a lot more clear after this.
What I got from working with Innerout is a brand new business of my own, around a set of personal competences among which I could finally make a strategic choice. From naming to brand strategy, design and rhetoric, I walked through a rewarding 4 months brand consultancy process. I’m proud of how my new business looks and speaks to the world now.
The most precious thing I learned from Mihaela and her team in several years of collaboration is the way to express publicly my ideas and projects so as to produce an impact. Through nothing but concepts, words and images. Last but not least, I got motivated and inspired big time along the way. She has a great ability to motivate and put people on their track. Very precious know how indeed!
When I got in contact with Innerout, I had a lot of knowledge in my field of expertise and little knowledge of how to transform it into a business. I had no idea where to start from. Innerout helped me with naming, brand positioning and brand design, all within a smooth, coaching-like process.
My work with Innerout gave a clear boost to my brand. I had the naming, I had a clear image of what I wanted to do (online fashion shop) but I lacked a vertebrated concept from top to toe as well as the right words to market it. I talked with Innerout about my plans and after two weeks I had a brand new piece of brand that represented me beautifully. Quick, efficient, inspiring.
I hated every second of working with Mihaela Radulescu as she was right all the time; in the end I reaped the benefits of her work. She is intelligent, articulate and experienced. You have no chance. She will prove you winner.
We worked with Innerout on brand strategy, especially in what concerns the internal engagement of our employees. We needed at the time a refreshment of values and what we received was not only a sound and well backed up set of opinions, but also concrete solutions for internal engagement. We went through several brand engagement sessions that were a real success as people were motivated, energized, infused with branding know how and corporate rhetoric. The trainer really generated enthusiasm around the brand.
Men in Black is an BTL advertising agency. We worked with Innerout for a complete rebranding process: from perceptional audit (in-depth one to one discussions with employees and clients altogether) to identity redesign and brand engagement sessions. It was a clarifying process from A to Z and we are thankful that it came along with lots of concrete business solutions and ideas. It went beyond branding and touched human and business environment.
Our collaboration with Innerout came in a moment where we needed to have a clear picture of how our company was perceived internally and externally. So we commissioned an extensive perceptional study both on employees and clients interviewed in depth, one to one. What I liked most was that the whole process was not only branding, but business strategy. So I understood how related these fields are. I strongly recommend an in-depth perceptional audit before any major shift in business decisions.
In 2015 my company at that time operating in field marketing communication went through an internal branding process. After lots of years of focus on performance for our clients, I wanted to focus a bit on ourselves. Innerout helped us understand better what we are about at the end of the day. They started with a perception audit on our clients, and then made internal engagement sessions and refreshment of our brand rhetoric: our vision, mission and values, we couldn’t have said them better. It was a great experience highly appreciated by our employees.
We developed with Innerout our brand strategy and then did several sessions of brand engagement with our employees, and the collaboration felt much more like a strategic partnership than just a one-time engagement. Mihaela understood quickly what our company was about in its essence. Together we went through a process of reshaping how we talked about our mission, vision and values and we redesigned our brand identity. It helped us create alignment between what our brand was expressing and who we really were - but also in the internal culture, and helped everyone align focus and aim higher.
I worked and learned in Romania and abroad, focused obsessively on my patients and never thought that my personal brand would matter. Well, I understood it does, I learned to position myself as a specialist, so I started to build it step by step, with discipline and results. I can now give an advice: once you do something well enough, start talking about it. For yourself and for the rest of the world.
Professionalism, good understanding of the market, well-documented presentations and sound strategy are what we received across our collaboration with Mihaela Radulescu. We were at a point where the reputation of our company seemed to have suffered across time. Innerout made a perceptional audit on collaborators as a basis for the rebranding and developed internal brand engagement sessions. We definitely had a more complete image of our tactics to follow after this.
I discovered in Innerout a senior counterpart in judging the strategy of my business. More to it, I found a great concept generator and talented content writing resource. I count on Innerout not only for a one shot collaboration but certainly for an on going partnership.
Foodwise owes its birth to Innerout in a certain sense. At the point we met we were pretty OK with our developing company in the field of marketing and advertising. We sensed somehow that we needed a sharper positioning and a more clearly asserted competence in a very competitive environment. Especially that this competence was already there, proven by the tens of projects in the food industry that we did so far, but it was never stated as such and capitalized upon. So this is the very idea of hiring a consultant: to see what you cannot see or define well. From a series of in depth interviews with our clients to the way our brand found its words back towards these clients, Innerout helped us pinpoint a critical asset for us, define it well, put it on a strategic map and finally inspired an entire rebranding process that brought us more clients. I believe this is how a nice collaboration looks like.
