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Note: Each month, The Rosy Blog highlights a different theme in our weekly posts. In March, our theme is Branding 101. What do people mean when they talk about brand? As a business owner, when is it the right time to invest? How do you know? What should you get?
Remember the time you found that beautiful and perfect house? The one that everyone loved visiting and telling all their friends about. The one that you were so proud of because it was so much more than a house; it was a home where people felt safe and understood. And remember how it stayed like that forever without any updates or maintenance ever? No…?
We all know that it takes work to make a house a home—and to keep it that way. We make the effort to protect and maximize our investment in one of the most critical financial assets we’ll ever own. And we do it to make our lives and the people in it more comfortable and safe. It’s really no different with a brand. As time passes, things change and impact the relevance, aesthetics, and utility of a brand. It’s as inevitable as cleaning out the gutters every fall. Or getting rid of that shag carpet (which was totally cool at the time).
Here are some common situations that a brand is likely to encounter over time that should trigger a brand refresh or perhaps a complete rebrand.
Your core business has changed.
Are you launching a new product line? Expanding from the freezer case to the cereal aisle? Adding software products to your hardware lineup? In these situations, you may need to update your brand to bring your fans along with you, connect with new ones, or support new sales functions.
Or, is a merger or acquisition on the horizon? Either scenario can be especially challenging for employees and customers. Your brand must answer the question: so who are WE now? If the brand promise of each company is at odds with the other (or with the customer’s expectations), brand work will be needed to help people connect with the new entity. And in some cases, that brand work can become the foundation for a cultural shift based on shared values.
Example: A particularly amusing example of how two merging airlines handled their brand is United and Continental. They kept it pretty simple; they just mashed everything up and kept the name United and the Continental logo. Opinions about this are mixed. Some thought it was smart, others–not so much. Personally, I’m not sure how successful it has been–I’m still confused after ten years–but no doubt there were some cost efficiencies.
A new competitor is getting a lot of attention.
New competitors are like death and taxes–inevitable. When it comes to your competition, differentiation is the name of the game. If you’re already well-established, upstarts and disruptors will look to innovate and differentiate relative to your position. When that happens—and it will—it’s time to take a look at your own brand to make sure it’s still relevant.
Example: Chobani started a yogurt revolution when they introduced Greek-style yogurt in 2007. Huge success also brought a veritable army of competition. By 2017, even as they became the #1 brand in the category, Chobani knew they were getting lost in a sea of white cups. Late last year they announced a brand refresh which was most dramatically demonstrated by their packaging redesign. They also adjusted their positioning. Once just a yogurt company, they are now a “food-focused wellness company.” That paves the way for product expansion (though no plans have been announced).
What your customers care about has changed.
Changes in your competitive landscape can alter the way customers perceive you. But cultural and generational shifts can have a big impact, too. For example, if you make baby products, your audience changes with each generation. You can’t control these external forces, but you can work to understand them. How will you know that your customers’ expectations have started to shift? There may not be one event that indicates this situation is impacting your business, but loss of market share to a competitor might be a flag that it’s time to do some message testing and make adjustments.
Example: Gerber has helped raise five generations of of children. That’s pretty incredible, right? But the innovations and shifting culture of the past couple decades have brought serious challenges. Driven by trends, the competitive space has changed significantly. And today’s parents demand more for their loyalty. Late last year, Gerber expanded their positioning through their new tagline: Anything for Baby. A new logo, a packaging refresh, non-traditional recipes, and a text-based advice line are all geared toward Millennial parents and that sixth generation soon to come–Gen Z.
Your employees don’t know what your mission is.
Early on, maybe you had a small team of folks working really hard to get this business off the ground. You had a shared set of values and you knew what you were aiming for and why. And it worked! So you grew! Over time, people left and new people came in. And while your values may be found in the new hire handbook, your employees aren’t connecting it to their jobs or success. When employees don’t know why what they do matters on a larger scale, expensive business problems can arise: turnover, poor performance, and an inability to attract top talent. If your culture has grown stale, that’s an indicator that your core values and mission need to be examined, agreed upon, and put into action.
Example: Starbucks hit a rough patch in 2007-2008 when sales and share value dropped significantly. In response, CEO Howard Schultz, took aim at restoring the “distinctive Starbucks experience” which he felt had been eroded by rapid expansion. The result is Leadership Labs, an immersive brand experience for baristas and store managers that mobilizes a huge employee base into brand evangelists.
These scenarios don’t all feel the same. A merger or acquisition is a seismic shift; you know it when you feel it. But other outside factors can be harder to notice in real time because they often unfold slowly. The rule in branding has long been that you should consider a refresh every five years—but with the pace of business and competition accelerating, we recommend that it be examined even more often. Where you fall on the refresh/rebrand spectrum will depend almost entirely on the underlying business situation and what the market requires for you to be relevant. But keeping up on your maintenance list can help you avoid an expensive remodel.
This wraps up our Branding 101 series on the “when” and “why” of branding. Over the next several months we’ll be sharing our insights into “how.” Next month, we’ll discuss the possible power of your business’s mission, vision, and values. Follow along here, or sign up for our monthly newsletter, a wrap-up of our posts along with a few additional pieces of insight.
Photo by Julián Gentilezza on Unsplash
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