Intranet branding: how intentional design drives adoption and culture

From flooring manufacturers and experiential agencies to global research firms and logistics companies, these winners share a common achievement: They built digital environments that genuinely reflect who they are. Thoughtful naming, consistent visual identity, and creative features that go beyond standard functionality have turned their intranets into destinations employees recognize and trust.

The Simpplr Employee Experience Excellence Award winners featured in this blog demonstrate that intranet design is not only an aesthetic decision but also a strategic one. Their approaches offer practical inspiration for intranet admins who want to infuse creativity into their digital workplaces.

Create a distinctive visual identity

Successful intranets reflect the organizations they serve. The winners of Best Branding built intranet platforms that showcase thoughtful design through color palettes, typography, and visual elements that reinforce company identity and strengthen employee connection to the company mission.

Interface

Interface is a global flooring solutions company and sustainability leader. The company designs and manufactures modular carpet tile, luxury vinyl tile, and rubber flooring for commercial and residential spaces across more than 40 countries.

Interface has a design-led culture. When the Global Communications team built their Simpplr intranet, myInterface, they brought that sensibility to every decision. Working closely with the creative team, they developed a bespoke visual identity including custom logos, icons, color palette, and branded content templates. 

Nearly all content published on myInterface is supported by custom cover images or photography. Recurring communications series like ELT in 3, which connects employees with executive leaders, have their own visual systems. Newsletters carry custom banners and a consistent look and feel throughout.

With the foundation in place, the team focused on carrying that consistency across regions. Site content managers across regions were trained on brand standards, visual expectations, and tone of voice. A site manager community supports ongoing collaboration through shared templates and resources. The result is an intranet that feels unified across functions and geographies while still leaving room for local storytelling.

myInterface demonstrates that deliberate, sustained investment in visual identity builds an intranet employees recognize and trust as their own.

“From the moment we chose to build on Simpplr, branding was treated as a strategic priority. myInterface reflects Interface’s design excellence, and that’s exactly what we wanted.” — Ashton Brasher, Director, Internal Communications

Lacy Maxwell

Lacy Maxwell Experiential (LME) is a boutique experiential marketing agency that connects brands and consumers through immersive, high-impact live events. The Inc. 5000 agency has built its reputation on creative development and flawless execution across brand activations, product launches, and cultural moments.

In 2025, LME asked a straightforward question. Why should their team’s daily digital experience feel any less intentional than the events they produce for clients? The Hive, their Simpplr intranet, was the answer. 

Every design element — typography, imagery, color, navigation — reflects the agency’s visual identity. Sites like LME Education, LME Life, and The Buzz — a curated embedded Spotify playlist — reinforce culture and daily operations. Recurring internal communications carry branded visual systems, and newsletters feature custom banners that match the platform’s overall look and feel.

The approach paid off in adoption. A workforce already attuned to quality design responded to an intranet that met their expectations.

The engagement numbers reflect this response:

• 92.5% of team members logged in, exceeding the industry benchmark by 50.7%
• 86.8% viewed content, 59% above the industry benchmark
• Most-visited sites span both culture and operations, from LME Education and LME Life to HR, Policies & Procedures, and Creative Administrative

“For a creative experience agency, brand is everything. With the Hive, we proved that internal brand experience is just as powerful as the experiences we create for the world.” — Nicol Davis, Director of Staff

Third Bridge

Third Bridge is a global research firm providing expert insights to professional investors, their advisors, and other users of research. Their team of more than 1,500 employees across 12 offices worldwide is dedicated to helping investors and business leaders accelerate and enhance their decision-making by unearthing unique expert insights across multiple sectors, geographies, and topics. 

Their Simpplr intranet, the Bridge, needed to carry the authority of a global corporate identity while feeling warm and human enough to engage employees day to day. The solution was functional color theory. Each area of the intranet uses a distinct tonal family from the corporate palette — purple for People sites, greens for Location hubs — so employees know where they are before reading a single headline. Color does the wayfinding.

A bespoke system of departmental icons and background textures reinforces the experience. These elements don’t exist in the external brand. They were created exclusively for The Bridge to give the internal workplace its own visual personality. When an icon appears in a Slack notification or newsletter, employees immediately connect it to the corresponding intranet site. The visual trail is consistent from first touch to final destination.

To sustain brand integrity across their global offices, the team developed a standardized site template system. Site managers work within a shared framework but have enough flexibility to reflect their region or function. Stock photos are categorically off the table. Instead, real employee photography is used throughout the site.

“By aligning The Bridge so closely with our visual identity and company mission, we have turned a tool into a tangible daily experience. The branding doesn’t just look slick; it reinforces the idea that every internal interaction is part of the broader Third Bridge story. The result is a platform that feels professional, unified, and unmistakably human.” — Nicole Wayment, Senior Communications Manager

Choose a name that resonates

Beyond clever wordplay, meaningful names create lasting digital identities. The winners of Best Intranet Name developed names that reflect company culture and showcase the kind of clever, intentional thinking that makes a name stick.

Arden Logistics Parks

Arden Logistics Parks is a vertically integrated industrial real estate operating platform specializing in the acquisition, improvement, and management of light industrial business parks across more than 15 U.S. markets.

When Arden Logistics Parks needed a name for their new Simpplr intranet, they invited employees to submit ideas for the platform rather than assigning one from the top down. What emerged was ARDIE, a name that felt immediately personal, approachable, and tied to the company’s identity.

Over the past five years, as Arden Logistics Parks has expanded its portfolio and geographic footprint, ARDIE has grown alongside it. The name has remained a consistent point of familiarity through organizational change. More recently, ARDIE evolved from a name into a mascot — a visual character that shows up across intranet communications, milestone celebrations, and employee recognition moments. Employees don’t just log in to an intranet. They “go to ARDIE.”

The mascot appears for birthdays and anniversaries, highlights wins, and promotes events, giving the platform a personality that mirrors how the team works together day-to-day. The combination of name and character has turned a functional tool into something employees genuinely identify with.

“ARDIE is more than a platform. It’s a trusted voice and recognizable presence within our organization. It’s a reflection of where we’ve been, how far we’ve come, and the people-centric culture we continue to build.” — Allan Polier, SHRM-CP, HR Manager

Ascentek

Ascentek is a fluid and lubricant technology company serving global OEMs in automotive, powersports, marine, and industrial sectors. The company’s offerings span private-label fluid manufacturing, battery management, vehicle wash equipment, and maintenance solutions designed to maximize equipment performance and longevity.

Their Simpplr intranet started as an internal demo environment, named the Garage by a team member who felt it captured Ascentek’s personality. When the company later held an organizationwide contest to officially name the platform, they received 152 submissions. The Garage won decisively. Teammates and leadership alike chose the name that had felt right from the start.

From there, the team built a mini brand around it. The theme extends naturally across the platform. Tutorials and training resources are housed in the Toolbox, giving the intranet a cohesive identity that feels distinctly Ascentek.

“The Garage felt like us from day one. When more than 150 names came in and it still won, that told us everything. It’s more than a name. It’s a reflection of who we are.” — Zac Zaffke, Enterprise Comms Manager

Think beyond standard features

The best intranets do more than inform — they surprise and delight. The winners of Most Unique Use of an Intranet turned their platforms into cultural hubs. They used creative content and unexpected features to spark genuine engagement across distributed teams and break down the barriers between employees and leadership.

Agero

Agero is a leader in vehicle lifecycle services, including roadside assistance and accident management. They partner with insurers and automakers to deliver fast, reliable support to drivers.

Most intranets serve as information repositories. Agero’s intranet, the HUB, goes further by functioning as an active learning environment. The centerpiece is the Get to Know series — two distinct content tracks designed to dissolve the distance between employees and the business. The leadership track features videos that showcase the personal side of executives alongside their strategic roles. This makes leadership accessible to employees at any stage of their tenure.

The product and solutions track takes a different approach. Subject matter experts lead video deep-dives explaining Agero’s capabilities in plain language. AI-generated podcasts synthesize complex product data into audio for employees who prefer to listen. A custom NotebookLM-powered assistant lives on the home dashboard, trained exclusively on Agero’s internal knowledge base, giving any employee instant answers to specific product questions.

Together, these programs give every employee a clearer picture of how their work fits into a complex product suite and a fast-moving business.

“Through the HUB, we’ve created an evergreen library that empowers employees to visualize their place in the broader company strategy, humanize leadership, and master our product suite through tools that turn curiosity into expertise.” — Katie Doherty, Internal Communications Content Creator

Liliʻuokalani Trust

Founded by Hawaii’s last reigning monarch, Liliʻuokalani Trust supports the well-being of Native Hawaiian children and families through culturally grounded programs and services.

When Liliʻuokalani Trust launched Ipukukui, their Simpplr intranet, the team needed a creative way to get employees to actually use it. The timing was good. They were opening a new youth center that teammates were eager to see. Rather than a standard announcement, the IC team produced an interactive skit video and built engagement mechanics directly into the post.

Employees were invited to “like” the video to receive an exclusive sticker. Hidden throughout the footage were butterflies, and anyone who left a comment with their count could win ultra-rare versions. The butterfly tallies sparked hallway conversations and friendly debate. No one could agree on the number.

The post became Ipukukui’s most engaged piece of content to date, with 96 reactions and 46 comments. More importantly, it accomplished something harder to manufacture. It gave employees a genuinely fun reason to explore a new platform and interact with it for the first time.

“We were able to draw people into our intranet, got them to interact with a post, and it was done in a fun and interactive way.” — David Onoue, Director, Brand and Marketing

Samet Corp

Samet Corporation is a commercial construction and real estate development company serving clients across the Southeast. The company’s work spans industrial, healthcare, municipal, education, multifamily, and technology sectors across six regional offices.

When Samet’s Women at Work ERG planned a financial health session, the team skipped the standard email announcement. Instead, employees from Payroll, HR, Marketing, Accounting, and Business Development came together to produce a short commercial — something that reflected the spirit of the event and the people behind it. The video ran on Samet’s intranet. More than 100 employees signed up. Comments rolled in: “This video made me sign up,” and “This is hilarious, I’ll be there!”

The approach became a template. Video content on Samet’s intranet now serves both practical and cultural purposes. Community impact stories remind employees that the company’s reach extends well beyond the buildings it constructs. These pieces give dispersed teams across six offices a shared sense of what the organization stands for.

“Video content on our intranet transforms communication from transactional to relational. Whether we’re driving event attendance or celebrating community partnerships, video gives us another powerful way to engage employees and bring our culture to life.” — McKenzie Feldman, Communications Manager

Design your own intranet experience

These featured award winners demonstrate how intentional design elevates the employee experience beyond basic functionality. Through Simpplr’s modern intranet, these organizations have created digital environments that reflect who they are and what they value.

Their success stories prove that when your intranet reflects your organization’s identity, it fosters deeper connection, strengthens cultural alignment, and creates a more engaging employee experience.

Ready to make your intranet exceptional? Learn how Simpplr can help you express your brand identity. Request a demo today.