Moody’s is one of the most trusted voices in financial risk assessment. Facing an increasingly complex risk environment, the brand needed to better integrate its evolving portfolio while maintaining an emphasis on its 115+ year legacy as an industry leader.
This brand transformation was rooted in comprehensive research—including focus groups with customers across the globe, dozens of executive interviews, and internal employee surveys. The research revealed a need for more integrated capabilities from Moody’s. Internally, employees expressed desire to be more collaborative and show up as one company. And while individual customers had a limited view of Moody’s rapidly expanding and category-defying portfolio of data, analytics, and AI solutions, they overwhelmingly stated that the Moody’s brand has the credibility to operate in new markets and industries.
To fully capitalize on this insight, the Moody’s brand needed to evolve from an insular view today to a customer-centric view tomorrow. We set out to create a strategic foundation for a more integrated, transparent, and human brand that would resonate with its diverse audience set of investors, analysts, and regulators.
A new bold, clear, and perceptive brand strategy and visual identity was created to reflect this internal shift—centered around the new brand purpose, “To uncover meaning amid uncertainty so that individuals and organizations can thrive.”
To make it easier to navigate our portfolio, Moody’s simplified its brand architecture, updating the names of our 2 major operating units: "Moody’s Analytics" was rebranded simply as "Moody’s," reflecting our broad spectrum of data, intelligence, and analytical tools. "Moody’s Investors Service," our credit rating agency, has changed to "Moody’s Ratings," underscoring its unique offering in global debt capital markets.
Moody’s also developed a new brand identity that was bold, clear, and perceptive. This was brought to life through an organized set of key messages, an updated logo inspired by the original Moody’s ratings manuals, and a new visual design system. As a key element of the new brand, we also updated our tone of voice that embodies and reflects our industry leadership with humanity and conviction. Every aspect of the brand, from business cards to digital signage, was considered as part of the rollout plan.
To engage all of Moody’s audiences and ensure consistent implementation, we established a comprehensive rollout plan culminating in a global launch with events in New York, London, and Costa Rica. Internally, region-by-region brand training sessions were held for key audiences across the globe. The sessions were interactive and tailored by audience, with tone of voice and messaging exercises for brand communicators and creative exercises for visual designers. Leadership and human resources were also engaged across multiple sessions, with a focus on brand strategy and the Moody’s employer brand. These sessions ensured buy-in from those most responsible for implementing and embodying the brand; a brand hub with AI integration was also established to offer guidance and aid with consistency.
The brand refresh has been an incredible success and has injected new life into our iconic brand. It has helped us achieve record engagement across all channels—including 17% growth in web traffic, 65% increase in social engagement, a 12% increase in social followers, and a 14% upward shift in positive brand sentiment.
The result is a new Moody’s—a more cohesive, differentiated, and relevant brand with the confidence to own its category of one—that is firmly grounded in its 115+ year history as the leading name in risk assessment. The company’s proprietary data, analytics, and domain expertise remain the best in the business, and collectively provide a 360-degree view of how risks intersect, empowering our customers to unlock new opportunities and create prosperity. Our commitment and relentless focus on our customers’ needs continue to be at the core of what we do, including the high quality of innovation, analysis, expertise, and professionalism that underpin our work. In the words of one client, the rebrand “unlocked the full potential of the Moody’s brand as a key asset in our journey to become the leading source of relevant insights on exponential risk.”
