Rebrand for healthcare giant Aetna

The prolonged uncertainty over the future of the Health Law in the U.S. has forced many insurers to increase prices or finding solutions like diversifying their services. That is why Aetna, known for its health insurance, shows its transition to a consumer-focused health partner with a new campaign. But a new approach to health requires a new image and in order to reflect this major change, the company has gone through a reimage.

'You don't join us, we join you' is the slogan Aetna uses to portray the relationship it expects with its clients. In charge of the image renewal was Brand Union, brand and positioning agency, in collaboration with WPP subsidiary agency Ogilvy & Mather.

Sam Becker, Brand Union executive creative director, says, “To be sure, repositioning a health insurance giant such as Aetna, as a future-oriented tech/health company was no easy task. In order to change consumers’ perceptions of a brand like Aetna, virtually synonymous with the insurance category it sits in, required us to think differently about the strategy, the brief and even some of our own processes.”

Brand Union gave Aetna a fresh visual identity that included a simplified colour palette, typography, and photography for its new campaign. The iconography on green, purple and fuchsia is very customer-friendly, as well as the typefaces, Domaine, which evokes empathy and Open Sans, a familiar font for digital environments. A massive campaign presenting the new image and aiming at repositioning the brand is on television, radio and print media, as well as in digital media.

Aetna's VP of enterprise marketing, Wendy Wahl, says, “Brand Union was an essential element of our rebranding success – a true partner from start to finish. They listened to the challenges we were facing and helped us to create a strategy that felt right for us, now and in the future.”