CASE STUDY

New CEO. New Brand. 9 Weeks.

How Modus Create stopped shining light on the wall and started melting metal.

Work With Us

Industry: Product Engineering & Digital Consulting

Size: ~500 employees

HQ: Reston, VA

Trigger: Incoming CEO needed a brand that reflected new leadership and stood out in a crowded market

Timeline: 9 weeks

Scope:

  • Brand Strategy

  • Visual Identity

  • Figma Design System

  • New Website

  • Website Migration (WordPress to Sanity)

  • Sales Enablement Materials

When Sharon Lynch became CEO of Modus Create, she did what any good leader does: looked at the company through fresh eyes. What she saw wasn't encouraging.

"So many people were going to the website when they found out I became CEO and they're like, I don't really know what you do."

Modus Create is one of the top product engineering consultancies in the world — a team of experts who help companies modernize, build new products, and navigate complex technology transformation. But none of that was coming through. The brand was overly focused on AI at a moment when AI had become the loudest, most undifferentiated conversation in tech. In a category crowded with players like Accenture, Deloitte, and McKinsey, Modus looked like everyone else.

David Fitzpatrick, VP of Marketing, had felt it for a long time.

"We are in an incredibly competitive space and we're at a business situation where growth had stalled. Our inability to stand out and our lack of growth were both really not compatible with the actual DNA of the company."

He had a clear metaphor for what needed to change: "A laser is just light pointed at a singular thing. If we focus the laser, we're able to melt metal. If we don't focus the laser, all we've done is shine a light on the wall."

Modus needed to focus the laser. And they needed to do it in 9 weeks.

Why Most Rebrands Fail — and Why This One Couldn't

Previous brand attempts at Modus had stalled for a familiar reason: no executive buy-in, no unified direction, too many voices pulling in different directions. David had personally put together 12 different overview decks in seven years.

"What we were missing was executive buy-in all the way through — folks who understood what the big B brand word means, how it manifests, how it needs support across the entire organization."

This is one of the most common reasons B2B rebrands fail. A new visual identity without organizational alignment isn't a rebrand — it's a new set of colors that nobody uses consistently.

Sharon's arrival as CEO changed the dynamic. There was now a leader who would champion the rebrand visibly and personally—and who had a clear point of view on what Modus needed to become.

Sharon wanted clarity, consistency, and differentiation. She wanted the brand to speak to companies that had been overlooked — mid-market organizations between $500M and $5B who had real modernization work to do but weren't being spoken to. And she needed it to do something equally important internally.

"The employees needed a focal point. They needed to know where we were going. I needed this brand to do that — to give them something to be proud of, to stand behind."

"There was a very clear understanding that these pieces are all connected. We're going to do this foundational work and then the website is going to be day zero — not one day — a reflection of this new brand identity." 

-David Fitzpatrick, VP, Marketing

What Is a Brand System? (And Why Modus Needed One)

A brand system is more than a visual identity or a set of guidelines. It's the interconnected infrastructure that makes a brand actually usable at scale — the strategy that defines what you stand for, the design system that makes production consistent and fast, and the technology stack that puts the brand in the hands of everyone on the team, not just designers.

Modus didn't just need a new logo and color palette. They needed a brand system: one that would give their entire team a shared North Star, scale across channels and regions, and stay current as the company grew — without requiring a full rebrand every few years.

That's what OhSNAP! was brought in to build.

Why OhSNAP!?

David spoke to five agencies. Most got something wrong — too focused on visuals without the brand foundation, too focused on brand without touching the website, or simply the wrong energy for where Modus was headed.

What OhSNAP! had that others didn't was the ability to connect all three pieces — brand strategy, visual identity, and website — as an integrated brand system, delivered simultaneously on an aggressive timeline.

Sharon's reaction after the first call was simpler: "I felt taken care of. I felt like you heard us. It was a yes within five minutes."

The Results: What Changed

The day the new brand system launched, the Modus team had something to point to. A strategy the whole company had bought into. A visual identity that stood apart. A website that said exactly what they did. A system built to scale.

For David, the brand immediately became the operating lens for everything — hiring criteria, annual reviews, ICP definition, sales messaging.

"It dovetails so nicely with this parallel exercise of getting tight on ICP for new revenue capture. The brand, the service, the ICP — they formed this really nice connective chain."

For Sharon, the impact was more personal.

"I still go look at it. The more I see it, the more I fall in love with it."

And for the future of the relationship:

"You didn't try to get more money out of us than we could afford. Someday we will be a much bigger company than we are today. And we will never turn to a different company than OhSNAP!. You cemented a relationship with us that will continue forever." — Sharon Lynch, CEO

Key Outcomes

  • Full brand system delivered in 9 weeks: strategy, visual identity, Figma design system, and website

  • Website migration from WordPress to Sanity CMS cut update times by over 90%

  • Any marketer on the team can now update the website without developer support

  • Brand values directly informing hiring criteria, performance reviews, and ICP targeting

  • A modular design system that evolves with the company — no future rebrand needed

Modus Create is a global product engineering consultancy helping companies build new products, modernize their technology, and navigate complex digital transformation. moduscreate.com

Looking for a brand systems agency for your B2B rebrand? Let's talk.