Traditional navigation apps get you from A to B, but for adventure motorcyclists the journey is the whole point. Scenic was the first app to realise that bikers needed their own tool to get around, giving people the control they needed, before they knew they needed it. Taking the scenic route meant letting people avoid motorways in favour of curvy roads, unpaved roads, remote roads — roads they would have never been able to find alone.

Today, Scenic is the iOS store’s number one motorcycle navigation app, helping riders to plan, discover, explore, track and share their adventures on the world’s most beautiful roads. Outfly’s journey with Scenic started with a shared personal passion for adventure. The motorcyclists in our team had been using the app for years, so when we got the opportunity to help them re-envision the brand, we jumped at it.

The strategists decided early on to differentiate Scenic from its competitors by repositioning the brand specifically for the off road and adventure bike market which, more than being a lot of fun, is resilient and growing fast, with a CAGR of 10% over the last few years, vs a sector growth of 2%.

Every brand contains a tension: this one was about unifying reliability with rebellion. Motorcyclists are counter-cultural by nature, but needed Scenic to be a tool they could rely on in extreme situations. So the brand had to be sleek and reliable, without sacrificing the sense of adventure and rebellion that inspired its target audience. To symbolise clarity and simplicity of form in a world of uncharted adventure, Outfly envisaged the metaphor of a pristine swiss army knife found in a far flung desert, and used it to guide the design of everything that followed.

The messaging and visual direction needed to be aspirational and empowering, and so was crafted to help people take the leap, giving them the confidence they need to start an adventure and see it through to the end. The visuals show paved curvy roads transforming through Scenic into paths off the beaten track. The language — of anti-efficiency, enjoying the journey, riding the road less ridden — spoke to the explorer in all of us. A to B is boring, so take the Scenic route.

This all came together in the logo design, a cleanly sliced location pin, reflecting the focus on the journey, not the destination.

Against this exciting, aspirational backdrop, the app itself needed to be clean, clear and controllable. Outfly worked closely with Scenic’s founder, Guido van Eijsden, to upgrade the app design to match the revamped brand. The designers innovated new features and streamlined the overall user experience, all while keeping Guido’s core usability principle in place: the app had to be ‘glove-friendly’ so users could do everything on the move, without removing their gloves.

Outfly’s growth team then built this into a new website and a series of seasonal marketing campaigns, to help Scenic retake the market share that had begun to be eaten up over the years by heavily-financed competitors. Built around digital app install adverts on Facebook, Instagram, Google and Twitter, the marketing strategy was continuously optimised in a live environment, iterating targeting and creative to deliver better results faster. The impact has doubled the rate of Scenic’s growth, driving 70,000 app downloads, reducing cost per download by 74% and significantly increasing profitability through in-app purchases. In a highly seasonal market, the campaigns have delivered consistent revenue growth. When compared year on year, weekly revenue now averages 49% higher.

Outfly’s senior team has continued to work closely with Guido since, helping him leverage the increased brand equity to negotiate exclusive brand partnerships and make Scenic what it should always have been: the #1 app for adventure motorcyclists.