# Change is Good – We are Rebranding!

- Link: https://kollersearch.com/change-is-good-we-are-rebranding/
- Published: 2015-12-21T03:00:46-05:00
- Author: Vincent

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=”800″][vc_column_text]**As we prepared to relaunch our Company’s brand to the market,
and change our name from Howard-Sloan-Koller Group to Koller Search Partners, I 
was concurrently brainstorming my first blog post for our new site. A consistent
theme emerged, and it’s one that has impacted me both personally and professionally
as of late. This is the theme of “Change.”**[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]I have
experienced many positive changes in my life over the past two months, two of significant
note for this post. The first was getting married and permanently removing myself
from NYC’s single scene. The second is our Company’s rebrand, which I am excited
to announce now. As of December 7^(th) 2015, we are Koller Search Partners.  I couldn’t
be more excited about it and want to share some thoughts around the significance
of it all with you.

To date, our firm has played a key role in helping our clients transform their businesses,
scale revenue, increase profitability, streamline operations, and make acquisitions.
A number of our clients have sold for big premiums, even some revenue exit multiples
of five to 10 times. We have had a first-hand look at their businesses before and
after, and here are some trends we’ve witnessed:

 * A concerted effort by traditional multi-platform content publishers to hire key
   digital executives to lead a digital first strategy and content everywhere distribution
   across all platforms, and realign their organizations to maximize efficiency.
 * The demand from VC-driven marketing technology and entrepreneurial digital businesses
   for operational and revenue leadership to help scale quickly.
 * Explosive digital video growth, the demand for leaders of video businesses and
   content studios at publishers, the formation of digital “new fronts” and the 
   move towards a “TV Everywhere”model, with video content distributed across all
   platforms.
 * The rise and rapid growth inprogrammatic buying and new skill sets needed to 
   succeedin today’s media and ad-tech marketplace. Programmatic is embracedas an
   efficient, transparent, targeted way to transact media rather than being competitive.
 * Advertising technology and marketing technology firms who have transformed from
   a managed services model to a platform-driven, software-as-a-service recurring
   revenue model. This transformation is in large part due to the premium valuations
   of SaaS-driven revenue models.
 * Growth in spending controlled by the CMO and as a result, the entrance of large
   global enterprise technology/SaaS/B2B Analytics making a big push into marketing
   tech through acquisition(Salesforce, Oracle, IBM, Salesforce, Adobe to name a
   few).
 * There is red-hot demand for leaders of Insights and Analytics functions within
   marketing tech and media businesses, in addition to the push in the last two 
   years for heads of Video Content Studios and Chief Content Officers.
 * The lines between publisher, technology company and agency continue to blur at
   a rapid pace.
    - Agencies have formed big marketing/ad-tech businesses through their trading
      desk, and those are HUGE revenue drivers for the holding companies. Agencies
      have also formed their own newsrooms and content marketing practices.
    - Publishers who have great content built on strong platform technology are 
      winning and are seen as technology companies,and have built in-house creative
      studios/creative agencies.
 * B2B media and marketing services have enhanced focus on growing digital and custom
   content revenue, and diversifying revenue into data, information, and analytics
   to offer must-have information and build market share and recurring revenues.

With all this change among our clients, we, as an influencer and as advisors to 
clients and candidates felt **it was about time that we took a play out of our clients’
and candidates’ playbook and make some changes ourselves.**

We realized we had to do a better job at marketing the work we have doneand the 
value we bring; we needed to tell a concise and consistent story to the market. 
We knew who we are and what we stand for, but were surprised to learn that number
of key people around the industry didn’t know how our capabilities had changed over
the years(more than 75% of our firm’s revenue comes from digital, content marketing,
technology and analytics).  We hired an external marketing consultant to help us
repositionand bring a fresh perspective, while ensuring the market that our core
values remain unchanged.

Change is hard, and it takes time, focus, flexibility and commitment.  We have been
very collaborative with our team throughout the process, and we have gotten great
ideas and suggestions from them.  When we first announced internally that we were
changing the logo (after 25 years), repositioning ourselves and launching a new 
site and marketing effort, I could see the excitement around the office.  We gathered
feedback at each stage and everyone felt invested in our new branding.

To start the process, we thought about why we are different, what really sets us
apart, why do clients and candidates work with us, what have we done right over 
the last 25 years, what can we improve upon, and what are we going to change to 
help us take the business to the next level.  We collected feedback from a number
of clients and candidates who know our firm well, and they gave us valuable insight.

We also looked at our Core Values, including who we are as a firm and the principles
that drive how we work with our clients and candidates.  We wanted to bring these
front and center, and they are:

 * Trust, Integrity, Honesty
 * Commitment to Helping Clients’ Businesses
 * Commitment to Representing Clients’ Brands to the Highest Standards, and being
   Counted On as a True Partner
 * Commitment to Our Team

The wheels are in motion and change has begun – and December 7, 2015 is a redefining
moment in our firm’s history and in our future success.  Both revolutionary and 
evolutionary, we will continue to refine our messaging as well as everything that
we do as a firm to ensure that we are consistently on brand.  Just like the clients,
whom we respect and value.

I would like to present to you – **Koller Search Partners** – new name, logo, positioning
and enhanced industry focus, with the same core values and principles![/vc_column_text][/
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