At Signifi, we are all about customer-centricity. We believe that companies perform best when they think from the “outside in” – meaning they design their products, services, customer service, and lots of other things with clients foremost in mind. That is why we are strong believers in market research, user testing and other forms of intelligence that give voice to customers’ needs, requirements, and preferences. And we believe applying those insights helps organizations excel in strategy, branding, customer experience (CX) and marketing and sales performance.
The name Signifi is the product of two words: significant and identification.
Significant is defined as “important, of consequence; having or expressing a meaning; indicative; suggestive.” In statistics, significant refers to “observations that are unlikely to occur by chance and that therefore indicate a systematic cause.”
Identification connotes “an act or instance of identifying; the state of being identified; something that identifies a person, animal, or thing.” In Sociology identification means “acceptance as one’s own of the values and interests of a social group.” In Psychology it refers to “a process by which one ascribes to oneself the qualities or characteristics of another person.”
Since the words significance and identification spoke so clearly to branding, marketing, research and consulting, we thought it would be clever to name the company Signifi.
Signifi’s mission is to help clients improve commercial performance in four main areas of their business: Strategy, Branding, Customer Experience (CX) and Marketing and Sales performance.
Our vision is to be viewed by clients as their most customer-centric, highly specialized, and valued consulting firm.
The values that define Signifi are:
Customer-centricity — we aim to provide the highest levels of service to our clients and build lasting, valued relationships.
Collaborative and consultative — we are collaborative and consultative by nature.
Informative and insightful — we take pride in providing coherence and direction to our clients by generating insights supported by research.
Honesty and integrity — we carry out our work with honesty and integrity, protecting your confidential information and conducting research in an ethical manner.
Plain talk with no pretensions — we enjoy communicating with our clients in a friendly, open and unpretentious manner.
Good will — we embrace diversity, internationalism, and a mutual respect for all people and cultures.
Fun — we like fun. We encourage our clients, employees, and vendors to live balanced, active, healthy and fun lifestyles.
Signifi was created by Joseph Bedford, Ph.D., leveraging his specialized expertise and experience as a corporate and marketing leader. Joe possesses over 25 years of commercial experience working at consulting firms and serving in senior management and executive levels at large corporations (mainly contract research organizations) serving the pharmaceuticals, food and chemical industries. Joe has proven capabilities in helping businesses succeed both from inside and outside of their organizations.
Early in his career Joe supported the branding, strategy, and marketing communications efforts of Fortune 500 companies through research and external communications. In 2002 Joe accepted a position at Covance, the world’s second largest CRO, where he headed a market research and business intelligence function. In that role he focused on a broad array of industry dynamics including market sizing/forecasting, customer needs and purchasing behavior, opportunity analysis, due diligence, competitive intelligence, and customer satisfaction/experience. Joe also played a key role in establishing Covance’s strategic outsourcing and strategic account programs. His department’s work provided essential customer and market insights that helped Covance double its revenue from $800M in 2002 to $1.7B in 2008.
Joe was then recruited by Almac Clinical Technologies to head its Marketing department, where he was responsible for all aspects of marketing, including strategy, research, branding, external communications, web site, digital and traditional marketing communications, lead generation, trade shows, and the customer experience. Partnering with a new VP in Sales, Joe helped quadruple revenues and profits on his business unit (Clinical Technologies) and led a corporate effort inside Almac to successfully sell integrated services to clients across Almac business units.
After more than five years at Almac, Joe was recruited as Vice President of Taconic Farms, where he renamed and rebranded the company as Taconic Biosciences, helped engineer a commercial turnaround, and positioned the firm for several successful years. During this period, Joe sharpened his existing skills and knowledge in marketing to scientists in the drug discovery and preclinical phases of pharmaceutical development.
In 2014 Joe was hired by Huntingdon Life Sciences and Harlan Laboratories, two recently merged firms that required a unified brand and corporate identity. Joe led an intensive global rebranding effort that resulted in the launch of the Envigo brand in 2015. As a member of Envigo’s Executive Leadership team, Joe was executive sponsor of key company integration programs, including strategic planning and branding.
Throughout his career Joe has focused on strategy, branding, commercial effectiveness and the customer experience, spearheading efforts in those areas at each one of his employers. As a result, he has established a strong personal brand as a change agent and growth specialist. He now wishes to return to his roots in consulting to share his experience and skill set with companies requiring it. He does so with a full roster of proven vendors and consultants that he can utilize for clients in the areas of market research, branding, strategy, marketing and sales effectiveness, and customer experience programs.
It can be summed up one phrase: in an informed and understanding way.
Before we even speak with you personally, we do our best to learn something about your organization. Then as we engage with you, we take the time required to understand your business, industry, customers, products and services, and most importantly your individual goals, challenges and needs.
From our initial consultation with you to the realization of your goals, Signifi stays focused on a few main things: understanding your needs, delivering upon them, and making the customer experience exceptional for you.
Rather than build a large organization of in-house market researchers, strategy professionals, customer experience experts, and commercial professionals, Signifi partners with contributing consultants and firms that have proven skill sets, histories of success, and most importantly are customer-centric. This empowers Signifi’s clients to tap into pre-screened and pre-selected vendors possessing specialized expertise and proven capabilities. This business model keeps Signifi lean, focused on customer needs rather than internal matters, and cost effective for clients.
Stay tuned in coming weeks for announcements and feature stories on Signifi’s allied firms and contributing consultants.