RealNetworks Rinse

Summary

In the spring of 2011, RealNetworks was about to deliver a product whose time had most certainly come—a digital music utility that automatically organizes and repairs iTunes libraries. If you’ve ever taken a close look at yours, you know it’s not a bad idea. What with all the duplicate songs, missing album art, typos, and great swaths of empty fields where some genre tags could be really helpful.

Realizing that every great product needs some rock solid branding, RealNetworks asked us to start at the beginning and give this utility the works. First, we built a brand platform that articulated the product’s straightforward but elegant idea. Then we tested and validated the platform against competing products and the needs of potential customers to ensure it was both unique and authentic.

Once we had our single source of truth locked, we moved on to the deliberate, rigorous, and tasty process of naming. After brainstorms, collaborations, trademark searches, and rounds of narrowing it down, we arrived at Rinse, supported by the benefit-laden URL RinseMyMusic.com.

The branding process also included extending the overarching RealNetworks brand architecture we had established in 2010. This step established a long-term strategic direction by cementing the relationships between Rinse and other RealNetworks brands and allowing them all to draw strength from one another.

Finally, we dug into visual identity by exploring a range of marks that each distinctively expressed the function and feel of the product. We turned to the other RealNetworks brands to inspire our color and type selections. And then we conjured unique visual elements to allude to and reinforce the simple, powerful, and beautiful nature of the Rinse product itself.