Athlos College Coaching
Summary
Joe Accordino founded Athlos in 2021 to improve the golf recruiting process. After working at ESPN for ten years, he wanted to create a sports business. Athlos, which he built from the ground up in less than four years, aims to simplify the complex NCAA recruiting system that burdens many families. Now, Athlos serves over forty clients and is a leading college golf recruiting service in California. Joe asked me to develop a new brand and website for Athlos. Our goal was to create a friendly and trustworthy brand identity to launch the company.
Ideation
When Joe first approached me with the company concept, I immediately envisioned a pathway forward for each and every student. Athlos’ mission was to shepherd student-athletes through the recruitment process and transform a winding, complex road into something more straightforward. So I began to iterate on the capital A in Athlos, imagining the shape as the hand of a compass or a leading pathway
While the concept was well received, the mark didn’t quite hit the spot for me. There was still room for improvement. I learned that when parents looked at the NCAA recruiting process, they often felt overwhelmed by the paperwork and regulations. Athlos was offering a way forward and the logo needed to incorporate this notion.
The revised design was made more dynamic, adding the forward tilt to fit perfectly with the selected wordmark.
Developing the brand identity
Brand Identity involves so much more than a logo. It’s about how you present yourself. As a startup, one of their priorities was to be approachable and trustworthy. This was paramount as many of their first clients were taking a leap with an unproven newcomer.
Through color psychology, I designed a brand palette primarily to generate relief, hope, and joy. Blues are so often associated with trust and relief, I knew this would be the base. From there, I added shades of teal to bring in a sense of freshness. Small touches of yellow and red were added as accent colors to evoke joy and energy.
Designing the website
Athlos required a website that was both informative and easy to use. If one of your core tenets is simplification, the website experience needed to convey that. As a result, I designed a clean, six-page website that showcased their expertise, their process, and enabled quick conversion for prospective clients.
The result is a sophisticated look, balancing validation and information, with intuitive interactions.
Check it out at athloscollegecoaching.com
“The toughest part of running a small business is undoubtedly the early stages, before you establish a rhythm and a solid client base. Fortunately, Chris kickstarted everything creatively for Athlos, from building a complete brand identity to a fully functional, easy-to-use website.”
Joe Accordino
Co-Founder of Athlos College Coaching