How Dropbox is Channeling Global Creative Energy Through a Bold Rebranding Effort

Few companies have mastered the art of channeling creative energy through a focused rebranding effort better than Dropbox. On this episode of Renegade Thinkers Unite, Drew interviews CMO of Dropbox Carolyn Feinstein. Their shared love of creative energy and authentic storytelling makes for a podcast episode you don’t want to miss.

Carolyn discusses her passion for connecting deeply with consumers through stories as well as why Dropbox chose to “fix something that wasn’t broken” all on this episode. Be sure to listen to discover how Carolyn’s team shifted the market’s perspective about the well-loved company and its offerings.

With over half a billion worldwide users, Dropbox is among the best for workflow technology companies. Their ability to roll out massive internal changes while simultaneously conveying the right story to loyal consumers is encouraging.

Hear all about the challenges tackled, lessons learned, and joyful successes on this episode of Renegade Thinkers Unite. Click here to listen now.

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How did Dropbox approach such a massive project? By following these three main ideas

Carolyn’s team is passionate about storytelling. She explains to Drew on this episode of Renegade Thinkers Unite that connecting people to one another through quality products and touching stories is the best way to begin a rebranding project. After realizing that Dropbox wanted to reinvent itself, Carolyn followed three main ideas that dictated their path: the art of storytelling, achieving buy-in from internal audiences, and listening to the voice of loyal customers. To hear how she skillfully knit these steps together into one successful mission be sure to listen to this episode.

Rebranding should not be incremental – bold actions conquer fear and allow your company to make huge strides forward

Dropbox’s biggest success throughout the rebranding process was persuading every member on the team that bold actions were the way to achieve ultimate success. Drew is also a huge proponent of the idea that incremental steps don’t move companies forward. Carolyn knew she needed to snap people to attention and have them understand that Dropbox is more than cloud storage. While there will always be some concerns about restructuring a brand’s identity, moving forward with confidence is the ultimate way to launch your company into the next chapter of success. You’ll surely learn from this episode of Renegade Thinkers Unite so be sure to give it your full attention.

The crisis of modern work is “death by distraction” – hear how Dropbox is channeling the world’s creative energy and allowing people to work to their full potential

The modern workplace is plagued with notifications, emails, and deadlines. Carolyn and her team at Dropbox recognized this issue and wanted to solve it. Their solution? Streamlined services and products geared at freeing teams from monotonous and time-consuming tasks so they can unleash their creative energy. The goal? Global teams working on a united platform to create projects that will change the world. That’s why Dropbox continues to be a leader in workplace technology and creative storytelling. This interview is one you don’t want to miss.

What You’ll Learn

[0:30] Drew asks the question, “if it’s not broken, should you break it anyway?”
[2:00] Carolyn’s go-to story to share with marketers
[6:16] The biggest moment for Carolyn when she was with Electronic Arts
[11:03] The massive rebranding project Carolyn helped Dropbox navigate
[14:27] Shifting the consumers’ perspective of Dropbox
[16:57] How Dropbox handled the fear of changing a well-loved brand
[21:40] The internal rollout of Dropbox’s rebranding project
[23:57] Dropbox is becoming an eponym and approaching the level of Google or FedEx
[26:00] The art of a living, dynamic workspace product
[28:15] Distraction = death in the modern workplace, and how Dropbox is unleashing global creative energy
[31:08] The biggest lessons learned throughout this bold rebranding mission and the 3 main measures used to measure a storytelling effort
[35:06] Drew summarizes this inspiring episode of Renegade Thinkers Unite

Connect With Carolyn:

Dropbox’s blog on Carolyn
Connect with Carolyn on LinkedIn
Follow Carolyn on Facebook

Resources & People Mentioned

Connect with Drew

Meet the Guest

Carolyn Feinstein is Dropbox’s Chief Marketing Officer. She leads Dropbox’s global marketing organization, driving initiatives to develop the company’s iconic and enduring brand.

A creative pioneer, Carolyn has nearly 20 years experience leading marketing teams and building creative branding and messaging strategies for high-profile companies. She ran Global Consumer Marketing at Electronic Arts (EA) for over 15 years, helping to define the strength and personality of EA SPORTS, and developing award winning, high-impact brand campaigns for franchises from Madden Football and FIFA, to Battlefield and The Sims. Most recently, Carolyn was at Pure Storage where she was responsible for building the company’s digital marketing strategy and developing their brand and messaging architecture.

Quotes from Carolyn Feinstein

A story is an articulation of who your company, your brand, or your product, intends to be in the world. It's an articulation of the role that you want to play, and the impact that you hope to have.
Sometimes we believe that storytelling is just for consumers. In truth, no matter who we're selling to- people in a consumer environment or in a business environment- we're all people, and at our core we all connect and receive information through story.
It was going to be hard internally, it was going to cause reactions externally, but we decided that we great with that because we wanted to snap people's attention to this new reality of who we are, and incrementalism wasn't going to get us there.