So you’ve decided the scope of your rebrand.
Now what?
Studies suggest your brand accounts for nearly 20% of your overall organizational value, so keeping your new platform top of mind—and top of eye—is central to continued success. To help guide your planning, our EVP of Operations Erinn Steffen has mapped out the six steps you’ll need to take.
1. Ensure you have a mission, vision and values in place.
And ensure they’re ones that your company lives by, not just a tile on the intranet or a poster in your break room. Refer to them before any major decisions, and incorporate them into your new brand strategy. Confirming alignment with your company’s values helps keep what you say and what you do in lockstep. Your logo can change; your vision shouldn’t.
2. Audit your brand (and its place in the larger landscape).
Start with your competition. They’ll likely fall into a few discrete boxes—rule-makers staying traditional, rule-breakers pushing boundaries. Look for the white spaces when you’ve determined where the competition lies in the larger scheme. Those gaps are prime real estate for your brand to fill. Don’t try to compete where overcrowding already exists. Reference that competitive audit to determine where you are today, and where you’re striving to be with you new brand.
3. Test within your target audiences.
A crucial step in any rebranding effort is confirming potential new brand directions with your core target audiences before finalizing anything. This typically involves testing a few creative options and concepts via qualitative methods (like focus groups or interviews) or more robust significant testing via a quantitative study. Bring customers and prospects directly into the rebranding process by gathering their candid feedback on everything from your proposed logos and colors to overall brand tonality. Their input will be invaluable when helping to understand how your target audience will interpret and react to your rebrand. With their feedback in mind, finalize your brand strategy and brand use plan—and ensure that you’ve covered how your name, logo and colors will work across everything from roadside billboards to an Instagram handle.
4. Align with internal and external parties.
Employee and stakeholder communication is critical for managing expectations. Build a comprehensive roll-out strategy that starts with an internal launch to educate and energize your employees. When discussing your rebranding with employees, make sure they’re aware of what assets to use and any new brand guidelines to follow. If there are operational or cultural changes in play, prioritize internal training so they can fully embody the rebrand. Then execute the external launch, leveraging marketing channels like organic social media or paid placements to build on excitement and visibility.
5. Clearly define what your performance tracking entails.
Knowing the metrics of your rebrand is one of the most surefire ways to track its success. Once you’ve established your KPIs (which is an important pre-rebrand step) you’ll want to track everything that links back to your original objectives. That can range from brand awareness and perception to customer sentiment. Use proxy metrics like branded search and web traffic, and think about both leading and lagging indicators.
6. You’ve done the hard work. Now, how are you celebrating?
Recognize and celebrate milestones after the rebranding, whether it’s improved word of mouth and website traffic, increased demand gen, better NPS scores or a shift in market share. This helps reinforce the value of the rebranding effort, and it can give your team a much-needed morale boost when you’re able to point to what, exactly, is working.
Having a well-thought-out plan in place during and after rebranding is essential for ensuring a smooth transition and achieving long-term success. Rebranding can be a disruptive process that impacts multiple aspects of a business, including customer perception, employee morale, and market positioning. A clear strategy helps manage these changes by providing a roadmap for consistent messaging, minimizing confusion, and aligning the organization’s goals with its new identity.