How To: Rebrand Your Business

Giving the current climate lots of businesses are feeling the crunch and it may seem like rebranding is the ideal way of revitalising and energising your company and your customers perception.  Ultimately the goal is to stir interest, engage customers and encourage them to rethink their perception enough to boost sales and maximise your customer base.  Aside from a decline in sales you might consider a rebrand because of a merger, acquisition, formation of an umbrella group, to reposition within a market or to hit the international marketplace.  Regardless of the reason(s), chances are you haven’t come to call upon a rebrand easily.  Usually from the outset you’ve helped grow and drive your existing brand, establish its personality and position it within your market so it can be really difficult to step back and consider rebranding.

Are you clinging to history?

A rebrand doesn’t mean you have to lose sight of your brand values and identity – if anything it’s the perfect way for you to enhance what already exists and evolve in line with your market.  It’s fundamental to never lose sight of exactly where your brand needs to be in order to compete effectively.  It may seem harsh but unnecessarily clinging to history is an all too common mistake that you need to avoid.  Rebranding (if carried out correctly) will drive growth and help you reinvent your company in line with current market conditions and trends ensuring you remain at the forefront of your industry.

There’s only one way to go and that’s FULL throttle!

The best rebrands are those that go the whole hog and encourage change across the board – internally, externally and across all platforms and channels.  To really rebrand your business correctly you need to look at changing everything, not just your logo.  A firm strategy must be in place for how you envision your new brand to look and feel, the tone of all communication – corporate and consumer, perception, mood, desired customer experience, voice and message.  There’s lots you can do to help make this process as smooth as possible starting with your staff.  Getting everyone on board and ensuring they fully understand is vital and if done right your staff will be highly excited, clear about the company’s future direction and determined to be a part of it.

You’ll also need to look at finding out what isn’t working so that you avoid carrying these practices into the future.  A good focused research session will lead to invaluable information that will help give you clear direction for a rebrand.
Getting your customers on board is essential so if you’ve got a story then tell it!  An honest approach will help your customers believe in the change enough to become receptive to it.  Telling a story is also a great way of hiking media interest and getting exposure on the evolution of your brand.

Seriously consider your budget – throwing lots of money at an expensive rebrand will not guarantee that you yield the desired business results.  Planning your spend from the start will help you to be clever with your budget.  A rebrand doesn’t have to carry a massive price tag and this is where calling in the experts can really help you maximise your budget ensuring your money is spent wisely.  The 10thstep team have managed lots of rebrands and we’ve loved every second of it.  Using our insight we can help you with the future strategic direction needed to evolve your brand.  Chat to us today about how we can help.