The Apuliarentals story

Apuliarentals is a property agency specialising in the rental and sale of holiday homes in Puglia, southern Italy. Its portfolio comprises more than 50 properties, from villas to apartments, with rates starting at €2,000 per week.

Apuliarentals’ clients come from all over the world: Germany, the United Kingdom, Scandinavia, the USA, as well as Italy.

Apuliarentals operates in a highly competitive market, dominated by international players with whom there is a considerable gap.

The client’s objective, therefore, was to improve its online presence by communicating its brand identity effectively and, in doing so, giving proper weight to its differentiating idea.

The project began with a strategic analysis of Apuliarentals and its services, to capture the brand’s starting position relative to its market.

Through online strategic analysis we explored several crucial facets of the business. A SWOT analysis gave a clear view of the company’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.

At the same time, analysis of the brand, the website, the market and its competitors produced a precise picture of the landscape Apuliarentals operates in.

That investigation allowed us to develop a positioning strategy for the client, making the website the central engine of its online communication.

But not only that.

Applying our I.A.R. method (Ideas, Actions, Results) to the principles of brand design, we structured the rebranding process together with the client.

The first phase allowed us to define the brand’s values (captured in 5 defining expressions: Welcome to Apulia, Exclusive Experiences, Natural Heart, Unique Culture, Raw Beauty) along with the company’s vision and mission:

“We let you live the culture, the beauty and the warm hospitality of the Apulian land, whenever (and however much) you want.”

That phase, concerned more with values than with business matters, highlighted the need for a general renewal of the company’s identity.

Applying brand archetypes allowed us to define the brand’s personality (the lover, forever in search of intense emotions and of beauty everywhere) and its correspondingly dreamlike tone of voice, conveying balance while using language that is spare and sensory, evoking suggestive, dreamlike images in the reader’s mind.

Next we defined the payoff: Indulge in Luxury

• Indulge: to answer the desire to give oneself over to something unexpected.
• Luxury: a word that positions the brand immediately at the top end of hospitality.

Luxury, as Apuliarentals understands it, is authentic beauty, contact with nature rediscovered, life lived slowly.

The process continued with the design of the logo and the visual identity.

In this phase we gave the new brand identity its visual expression. The new logo is closely tied to the brand’s vision and helps communicate the value of change through new forms that echo those of nature, the sea, the coastline and the olive trees of the Valle d’Itria, the client’s principal area of operation

The website was another fundamental area of work. Recognising that it is the beating heart of Apuliarentals’ digital presence, it was thoroughly rebuilt.

With the aim of improving navigation, usability and ease of access to information, the site’s new design was conceived to reflect the company’s current identity.

The need to present and explain the company’s offering, its expertise, its services and its network of local partners was central to the site’s development.

Particular attention was paid to integrating the right tools to meet those objectives, and to the use of evocative, dreamlike language able to capture the user’s attention and stir their curiosity.

The next phase also involved renewing and actively using the social channels to create interest and strengthen Apuliarentals’ position in the digital market, communicating the radical transformation of its identity.

The rebranding allows Apuliarentals to communicate its renewed identity, improving how the brand’s value is perceived and reflecting the evolution of its values and its vision.

The development of the new website gives Apuliarentals a tool for communicating clearly both the brand and the breadth of its portfolio, as well as the ability for guests to book their villa directly on the site.