TALOS
THE CHALLENGE
Digital assets are today believed by many people across the
spectrum to be on the cusp of fundamentally reshaping financial markets
globally. And while it seems that not a day goes by without some major news of
increasing institutional participation in the space, that was not always the
case. The founders of Talos — both of whom bring serious institutional
pedigrees — have been longtime believers in the power of digital assets, but
also know that the focus should be on substance when attempting to communicate
with their peer group. When they approached Forefront to launch them out of
stealth mode, the mandate was clear — create a brand that not only reflects
the tech-forward firm they are, but one that also resonates with the
institutional audience they needed to reach.
THE STRATEGY
Talos provides the end-to-end infrastructure technology that traditional capital markets participants require to meaningfully enter the digital asset space. The more we dug in with the company and their customers about the key problems Talos solved, it became clear that they were ultimately providing the critical foundation for trading on which managers, prime brokers, custodians, lenders, and exchanges could rely. This concept also enabled us to modify Talos’ original logo in a way that would fit with the brand story we would create: Talos provided the building blocks for institutional digital asset trading.
EXECUTION
Leveraging the building blocks theme, we developed a brand strategy that made heavy use of the concept throughout the site and all brand materials. Animations throughout the site showed the Talos blocks form a variety of shapes and configurations, but always emanating from or ending at the six blocks found in the logo, which also represented the six client segments Talos served. The simple elegance of the animations were a nod to the technological sophistication of the Talos technology, while the understated nature of the Talos colors — black, white and mint green — underscored the humble nature of the firm and its founders. All other brand elements — typography, design look and feel, tone and approach to copywriting, etc. — were deliberately chosen to support this positioning, while the rollout and subsequent marketing strategy was intended to reinforce that idea that Talos was a group of confident but not arrogant professionals that the institutional investment community could identify with.
RESULTS
In May 2022, Talos announced the completion of a Series B round that saw the company valued at $1.25B.
“We are technologists, not marketers, but we knew what we wanted in a marketing partner: a firm who not only understood our business, but also could ensure that all the hard work we did to create the kind of company we envisioned during the early years was accurately translated into a physical brand that felt authentic. We assumed that finding an agency that could do both well would be difficult if not impossible, but Forefront did just that, and has been an incredible partner for us throughout our journey.” — Anton Katz, Co-Founder and CEO