When OfficeMax approached us to help strengthen growth within the SMB market, the challenge initially appeared straightforward. Like many established brands, they wanted more effective marketing, sharper communication, and stronger customer engagement.
But before creative work began, we needed to answer a far more important question.
Were they even talking to the right people?
In many businesses, assumptions about the “decision maker” become deeply embedded over time. Marketing strategies, messaging, imagery, offers, and media placement all start revolving around a version of the customer that feels logical on paper but may not reflect reality.
That was exactly what we uncovered during our research into the SMB office supplies market.
Like much of the category, OfficeMax had been heavily focused on business owners, particularly senior male decision makers, as the central target audience. The assumption was that these were the people driving purchasing decisions and controlling supplier relationships.
But the reality inside small and medium-sized businesses looked very different.
The people actually managing the day-to-day purchasing, organising office operations, solving problems, handling suppliers, juggling competing priorities, and keeping businesses functioning were often female Office Managers and Admin Assistants. They were the operational backbone of countless businesses, yet they were largely invisible within the category’s marketing.
They were doing the work, but not being recognised.
That insight became the turning point for the entire project.
Rather than simply refining existing messaging, Brand IQ helped reposition OfficeMax around a completely different customer story. We built empathy around this overlooked audience, recognising the pressure many of these women were under as they balanced multiple responsibilities, tight budgets, demanding workplaces, and the often thankless task of keeping offices running smoothly.
Every strong story needs tension, and in this case the “villain” was not a competitor. It was the reality of being overworked, underappreciated, and expected to hold everything together behind the scenes.
Once the true audience had been identified, the entire brand experience began to shift.
We reworked OfficeMax’s communication strategy, introducing a more relatable and supportive tone of voice that acknowledged the realities these customers faced every day. Messaging was redesigned to place the real hero, the Office Manager or Admin Assistant, at the centre of the brand story rather than treating them as secondary influencers.
Offers, content, and campaigns were rebuilt around their practical challenges, frustrations, and needs. The communication became more human, more emotionally intelligent, and far more relevant to the people actually interacting with the brand.
The transformation extended beyond messaging alone. New media channels were introduced to better connect with the target audience, while the broader visual identity evolved to support the refreshed positioning. As part of the rebrand, we even developed a bespoke typeface exclusive to OfficeMax, helping create a more distinctive and ownable brand presence in a highly competitive market.
Importantly, the shift was grounded in insight rather than assumption.
By identifying the true audience and building genuine empathy into the brand strategy, OfficeMax was able to fundamentally rethink how they approached SMB marketing. Instead of speaking over the heads of the people doing the work, they started recognising and valuing them directly.
The impact was significant.
With the right audience finally feeling seen, understood, and appreciated, OfficeMax achieved its strongest sales performance in a decade. The repositioning not only helped grow market share, but also permanently changed the way the company approached its marketing strategy moving forward.
More than anything, the project demonstrated a simple but powerful truth about branding and storytelling: sometimes growth does not come from shouting louder at the obvious audience. Sometimes it comes from recognising the overlooked people quietly holding everything together behind the scenes.
TESTIMONIAL: Sonja Webb, marketing manager of OfficeMax
“Steve has been a valued brand strategist for OfficeMax over the last 5 years and spearheaded the strategic thinking behind the re-positioning of our OfficeMax brand a number of years ago. He has a deep knowledge of business storytelling narratives and the ability to see where the perceptual white space is in the market and create a brand positioning strategy to successfully fill it.”
