On Aug. 7 during the 77th APCO International Annual Conference & Exposition, APCO International rolled out its new logo during the Attendee Welcome Reception at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia. The logo, shown here, is just one aspect of a much larger branding initiative that was launched almost two years ago. The project began by examining our association’s history and how it has represented itself over the years. It has culminated in revised mission and vision statements, and the creation of a new logo and tagline that pays homage to our past while positioning the association to move forward with a more modern design.

The breadth of APCO’s mission—its expertise, professional development, technical assistance, advocacy and outreach—creates great benefits for the industry.

In August 2010 at the annual conference in Houston, APCO introduced its revised mission and vision statements:

• Our Mission: The Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials (APCO) is an international leader committed to providing complete public safety communications expertise, professional development, technical assistance, advocacy and outreach to benefit our members and the public.
• Our Vision: APCO International commits to strengthen our communities by empowering and educating public safety communications professionals.

The association’s challenge is how to clearly portray this mission and its relative strengths to its diverse membership, while allowing it to recruit new members. It’s essential that APCO be able to clearly and concisely define who it is and how it wants to be perceived. APCO’s brand is the foundation for this messaging and will differentiate us from other organizations.

‘Why Do We Need a New Logo?’
This has been the most common question asked during the branding process. Although it seems simple, some branding information and historical perspective will help answer this question.

A brand is defined as a person’s perception of a product, service, experience or organization. Our brand is not just our logo or any one product or service. It’s all aspects of APCO that generate in our members, potential members and anyone we come in contact with a perception of who we are and what we can do for them.

Updating our brand means staying relevant. Things that were relevant when a brand was initially created may not be relevant to younger and potential new members. Over the years, APCO’s branding became mottled and was allowed to change without guidelines or direction.

APCO has many touch points, which are ways that members and customers come into contact with our brand (e.g., websites, magazine, Annual Conference & Expo, reports and marketing materials). Good branding generates unity across multiple touch points, which will result in similar perceptions and reactions of APCO in the individuals coming into contact with us through any of these methods.

Recognizing the need to make our branding more consistent and current, APCO’s Executive Committee convened an exploratory committee of members, staff, sponsors and consultants in November 2009. Based on the exploratory committee’s recommendations, APCO’s Branding Taskforce was created that December.

The Branding Taskforce comprises the members of the exploratory committee, with additional active members from around the country. Members were selected to provide a balance and represent a cross-section of APCO’s membership, including longtime members, recent recruits, commercial members, older and younger demographics. We deliberately invited younger people to participate in this process so we could ensure our new brand had “youth appeal” and, thus, aid in future membership drives. All of these members shared their feelings and thoughts about APCO’s brand. Additionally, we worked closely with a third-party consultant that has a long-term partnership with APCO and specializes in marketing and branding.

The Branding Taskforce approached updating the association’s logo with APCO’s mission clearly in mind, and the Executive Committee and Board of Directors commends its members for delivering a strong, new brand that leverages our past. The new logo retains the essential shield shape and incorporates symbols clearly recognizable as people connected along a radio sine wave. Our new tag line is simple and demonstrates our identity: Leaders in Public Safety Communications.

The Process
After completing the brand strategy, revised mission and vision statements, and revised boilerplate by the 2010 APCO conference, the taskforce started the process of reviewing our trademark (logo) and tagline. We analyzed our current logo and realized that, although it heavily reflected our history, it spoke only to one segment of our diverse membership: law enforcement, leaving out our EMS, fire and public agency colleagues.

Without favoring any of our target audiences—telecommunicators for police, fire and/or EMS agencies, and IT and radio engineering professionals—our trademark must be able to speak to public safety professionals across all disciplines within the industry. On this issue, the taskforce realized the benefit of working closely with APCO’s consultant throughout the process. They understood the diversity that comprises APCO’s membership and who we serve.

Armed with our needs and concerns, this group provided the taskforce with five potential logos in mid May 2010. After much input and discussion, the taskforce looked at five additional logos in September 2010, including four versions with shields and one without. The discussion continued through mid November, when we began to hone in on our preferred shapes and graphics. At this point, we were looking at nine different logos.

Based on feedback from the taskforce and staff, we narrowed the number down to four in late January 2011. These four logos were presented to the APCO Board of Officers in mid March. With their input, three new designs were created. At this stage, the tagline was added to clearly indicate our mission of “public safety.” We revised this group of logos twice, as well as made six revisions to the shield shape itself.

The taskforce members were then asked to vote on their top three choices. These top three choices were presented to the Board of Directors at our May meeting. The Board voted to accept the taskforce’s top candidate, which is now your new logo. In all, we saw 21 versions of the APCO logo, including all the variations to the graphics, types and shields.

Next Steps
One of the Branding Taskforce’s main deliverables is to create a Brand Manual and style guide for the APCO chapters to use. This document will allow for the effective use of our logo, generating a positive impact and consistent messaging.

Also, the association has put a centralized Marketing and Communications department into place to carry out the deliverables of implementing the new brand and maintaining its integrity throughout our products, services and initiatives.

In the coming year, staff and taskforce members will work to establish and implement a phased approach to applying the new brand, which includes the launch of a new website in the late 2011.

The primary result of this effort will be clarity and consistency among all facets of APCO International so that the breadth and depth of APCO is easily recognized. People will be able to better distinguish who we are and what we do because our look and our message will be consistent. APCO International’s goal is to better serve the needs of public safety communications practitioners worldwide—and the welfare of the general public—by providing expertise, professional development, technical assistance, advocacy and outreach as the world’s largest organization of public safety communications professionals. Through our renewed brand and the recognition it will create, we can truly establish ourselves as leaders in the public safety communications industry.

About the Author
David W. Clemons is chair of APCO International’s Branding Taskforce and director of Emergency Communications for the City of Worcester, Ma. Contact him via e-mail at clemonsd@worcesterma.gov.

Special thanks to APCO International Marketing & Communications Manager Lindsey Coburn for her contributions to this article and branding process.

Sidebar: APCO Branding Taskforce Members

• David Clemons, Atlantic (chair)
• Jim Acosta, CPRA
• Joshua Billis, Arkansas
• Kevin Bostrom, Washington
• Derek Dofelmire, Idaho
• Cheryl Ducharme, Harris Corp.
• Steve Proctor, Utah
• Cyndi Sauter, Texas