Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu last month rolled out the second phase of its “Green Dot” campaign, a global brand effort designed to communicate the company's leadership position in the professional services market.

“This year marked a significant milestone in Deloitte's history—our formal recognition as the largest private professional services practice worldwide,” said Luis Gallardo, global director-brand and marketing at Deloitte, pointing to the firm's ranking based on revenue and headcount. For the fiscal year ended May 31, Deloitte had aggregate member firm revenue of $26.6 billion and employed approximately 170,000 people worldwide.

“We faced the marketing challenge of leveraging that unique moment to address and build momentum about our new market-leading position,” Gallardo said.

The first phase of Deloitte's “Green Dot” campaign debuted last year and was created by brand strategy firm The Partners and creative agency muirhoward, both based in London. It has been rolled out to more than 50 countries, including the U.S., Brazil, China, France, Germany, India and the U.K.

The campaign is designed to communicate a consistent image in the marketplace and is based on Deloitte's “Green Dot” logo that was introduced in 2003 as a period following its name.

“Phase Two of the "Green Dot' advertising campaign needed to reflect our leadership position and future growth plans to widen our competitive lead in each area of our business over the next five years,” Gallardo said.

Deloitte last month announced plans to invest more than $1 billion in growth initiatives over that period, including expansion in emerging markets and educational initiatives for its global staff. The company said it plans to hire more than 250,000 employees as part of its expansion.

“The bold and striking visual style of the campaign, with the Deloitte green dot as the hero set against a black or white background, perfectly captures the clarity, leadership and direction of Deloitte's point of view in a way that is unique and unforgettable, akin to our brand promise,” Gallardo said. “Ultimately, the green dot represents our unique point of view—our people's voice to clients.”

The “Green Dot” campaign includes online, out-of-home and print ads, and is running in publications such as The Wall Street Journal, Fortune, Globe and Mail and Washington Business Journal.

All of the ads use images of a green dot to represent moving ahead and new opportunities. One shows the dot emerging from the clouds, with copy reading, “Global recession or big opportunity?” Another uses the dot to represent a doorknob on an open door, with the headline, “Step ahead.”

“The world of professional services firm advertising is generally characterized by a homogenous palette of people-focused imagery, long copy and a somewhat sombre, unimaginative tone,” said Jim Prior, CEO of The Partners, which created the brand strategy for the campaign. “We wanted to create something that broke that mold and that did for the sector what Apple iPod advertising or Nike advertising did for theirs.

“Green is a positive, energetic color, symbolic of moving forward, progress and action, especially when used in circular form—all of which are attributes that are particularly true of Deloitte.”

As part of the campaign, Deloitte last week introduced the Green Dot Challenge, an internal contest that lets employees create their own “Green Dot” visual and headline using an online sketchbook application on the website. Deloitte is now working on an interactive iPad app for the Green Dot Challenge.

“When we think about mass media, we are not thinking about print or TV—we are thinking about our 170,000 people,” Gallardo said. “We wanted to make this campaign truly unique and get all of our people engaging with it. We want to make them brand managers.”

Deloitte is also using social media as part of the “Green Dot” campaign, including social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. In addition, the company is using RSS feeds and podcasts to keep employees and clients informed.

“We are increasingly putting emphasis on the development of several mobile apps for devices such as iPhones and iPads to increase accessibility of our online resources and appeal to our growing talent pool,” Gallardo said.