Forefront Communications

The Building Blocks of Institutional Digital Asset Trading

TALOS

CLIENT TYPE:

Fintech/RegTech

Categories:

Brand/Website, Marketing, PR, Content, Outsourced Marketing Department

ONLINE:

Launching an institutional-grade trading platform into the digital asset market – where it achieved a $1.25 billion valuation in just four years

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.

We wanted a marketing partner who understood our business and could translate our vision for the company into a brand that felt authentic.

Anton Katz, CEO

We assumed that finding an agency that could do both would be impossible, but Forefront did just that, and has been an incredible partner for us through our journey.

Anton Katz, CEO

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. 

Launched in 2020, Series B Round in 2022 valued company at $1.25B