Talent Acquisition Branding Case Study: TD Bank Blueprint Employer Sub-brand
Helping a banking leader build a future-forward tech talent brand.
Case Study Snapshot
Project Blueprint was a critical transformation initiative within TD’s U.S. Cards and Partnerships business, created to modernize credit card infrastructure and the digital customer experience.
But to build something this ambitious, TD needed more than open roles. It needed a talent story that could compete for specialized tech talent in a fintech-heavy market, while leveraging the reputation, scale, and credibility of TD Bank.
Ingenuity helped define the Blueprint employer sub-brand and year-one LinkedIn activation strategy, giving employees and leaders a clearer way to share the opportunity, attract niche talent, and build momentum as the team scaled from 12 to 240 hires over six years.
About the Client
A major U.S. bank with scale, reach, and everyday relevance
TD Bank is one of the 10 largest banks in the United States, serving millions of retail, small business, and commercial customers from Maine to Florida. With a broad consumer banking presence, TD brings the scale, stability, and recognition of a major financial institution.
Our Take
“An employer brand shouldn’t compete with the master brand. It should show how a specific team fits within it. High-impact talent acquisition branding gives these niche teams the autonomy to express their unique culture, while staying grounded in the parent organization’s core values.”
The Challenge
Competing for fintech talent from within an enterprise brand
Project Blueprint had big goals and a short runway. The original 12-person team was building new capabilities across TD’s U.S. Cards business, with a focus on transforming the customer experience.
To deliver on that ambition, the team needed to grow quickly. But the employer branding challenges had two sides.
Externally, Project Blueprint needed to stand out to specialized tech talent who may not immediately associate a major bank with startup-minded transformation work. The opportunity was strong, but it needed to become more visible, specific, and believable in a highly competitive talent market.
Internally, employees and leaders needed a clear, shared way to explain what Blueprint was, why it mattered, and why their peers should pay attention. The people already inside the work had the most credible perspective, but they needed the language, confidence, and tools to carry the story forward.
The story could not live only in job descriptions or formal recruiting channels. It had to travel through people.
Our Approach
Aligning TD’s talent acquisition branding with the candidate and employee journey
Ingenuity helped TD build Blueprint’s employer brand around the people already inside it.
Rather than creating a traditional recruiting campaign, we helped define an employer brand foundation rooted in the real team experience: what the work felt like, why it mattered, and what made the opportunity different from a typical role inside a large financial institution.
That people-centered approach gave the Blueprint story its credibility. The original team was not just the audience for the brand. They were the best proof of it.
Their ambition, pace, and proximity to the work showed candidates what Project Blueprint was building and why it was worth joining. This gave the talent acquisition branding strategy a more human foundation—one built on real voices, momentum, and work already underway.
Ingenuity translated those insights into a focused employer sub-brand.
What We Delivered
A departmental branding system for attracting niche tech talent
To help Blueprint move from positioning to activation, Ingenuity built a practical, highly visual system designed for the channels where talent conversations were already happening.
- A clearer Blueprint story: Positioning and messaging that defined what Blueprint was, why it mattered, and why specialized tech talent should pay attention.
- A LinkedIn activation system: A year-one content strategy built around the work, team, and opportunity to make an immediate impact.
- Employee and leader advocacy tools: Day One LinkedIn posts, leader messaging, employee social assets, and onboarding materials that helped the people closest to the work, carry the story forward.
- A connected candidate-to-employee narrative: Messaging that made the opportunity feel consistent across recruiting, onboarding, and employee advocacy moments — because a talent brand should not disappear the moment someone accepts the offer.
The Activation
Helping Blueprint activate the workforce across the employee journey
Ingenuity helped TD create a grassroots talent acquisition approach that employees and leaders could actually use. Project Blueprint’s first year LinkedIn strategy, Day One new hire posts, and social messaging gave the team repeatable habits for sharing the work, introducing the opportunity, and extending the team’s reach through their own networks.
Each new hire became another credible voice for the transformation work underway. That helped the team expand its talent network in a way that felt personal, practical, and true to the culture of the initiative itself: ambitious, hands-on, and built by people willing to roll up their sleeves.
Ingenuity gave the team the framework. The U.S. Cards Transformation team took it and ran with it, using the foundation to build momentum, attract quality talent, and grow the team needed to realize its ambition.
Ingenuity Design helped TD Bank transform Project Blueprint’s team identity into a scalable departmental branding system — one that gave employees and leaders the language, confidence, and tools to execute a successful talent acquisition branding strategy while staying grounded in the TD masterbrand.
The Result
A stronger talent story for a fast-growing transformation team
The Blueprint employer sub-brand gave TD an effective way to tell a more nuanced talent story: ambitious transformation work, startup-minded energy, with the credibility of being within a major financial institution.
In year one, Ingenuity defined the employer sub-brand and LinkedIn activation framework. From there, the team could continue to use, adapt, and carry it forward as it grew.
Hiring momentum
The employer sub-brand foundation supported Project Blueprint’s growth from a 12-person team to 240 employees over time by making the opportunity easier for specialized talent to see, understand, and believe.
Stronger candidate connection
Candidates could better understand the work, the culture, and the immediate impact they could have inside TD’s U.S. Cards business.
A team-powered talent story
Employees and new hires had messaging, assets, and repeatable habits to help introduce the Blueprint employer brand through their own networks, extending the reach of the recruiting story in a more credible way.
Blueprint employer sub-brand helped TD meet a fast-moving talent moment without creating distance from the masterbrand. It gave a specialized team inside a large organization its own energy, voice, and momentum, while still benefiting from the trust and scale of TD Bank.
Ready to build a culture that attracts niche talent?
See how our bespoke employer branding services help organizations connect with specialized talent and build resilient cultures. Explore our HR & People Programs.
