Need rebranding? Don’t just change your logo, think brand strategy16 Nov
I am often asked to explain what brand strategy stands for. In my experience, many people still associate branding, and brand strategy, with graphic design — logos, web sites and other elements of visual identity.
Whereas visual identity is absolutely essential in branding (and SCHMOOZY FOX works with a great team of designers to take care of it!), it’s just one step in a broader activity which is brand strategy.
Brand strategy is your overall business strategy that has an objective of building a S T R O N G B R A N D.
This may sound rather simple, but in reality, a good brand strategy is a very complex exercise. A good brand strategy can determine your success, and no brand strategy is often a recipe for a failure (see my previous blog post Brands do not take care of themselves).
Rebranding is a good chance to sort out your overall brand strategy. Often, companies feel like getting away from a tired image, and creating something more consistent with market needs. This “something” is often, in their view, a change of look and feel. Often, their rebranding efforts are only about changing a logo.
But the reality is, even after improving their logos, many companies don’t sort out their bad customer service, or improve product functionality. It’s astonishing that many companies simply do not think that these strategic elements have anything to do with their brand!
Today, I want to share with you a story published on Inc.com, How to rebrand your business successfully. It summarizes a rebranding project that was done by Seattle’s Coffee Company (part of the Starbucks group). See how the company measured the size of their market, did competitor research, re-thought their customer base, and improved distribution channels.
All of these activities are characteristic of brand strategy and should be considered within any rebranding project.
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6 Responses to “Need rebranding? Don’t just change your logo, think brand strategy”
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What are the implications of a corporate rebranding on brand intergrity given that in most cases it involves the erosion of the old brand and its culture, associations etc? This given that brand intergrity contributes to the building of a strong brand. Is corporate rebranding & brand intergrity complimentary or they are opposing exercises?
A rebranding exercise can be directed on the logo or name change. However this does not solve matters especially for companies emerging from scandals or with negative perceptions of the brand. Personally i feel the rebranding should address every element of the organisation be it name, policies, internal processes, admin & everthing. Like in one study, one can not successfully rebrand a hyena by changing its skin colour & expect it to be accepted by the society unless it changes its behaviour.
How important is a logo today?…
A logo is one of the attributes of any brand, and its role is important. I think an important point to remember here is that 65% of the Earth’s population are the so called “visual learners” — people who perceive information through their eyes (as …
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What description or name can we give a rebranding not focusing on visual identity elements but rather on such issues as internal branding, change of policy, strategy, administration etc.
It’s usually referred to as re-positioning, but both “rebranding” and “repositioning” are often used interchangeably