Subscribe to Our Newsletter
Have you ever put on a favorite sweater or jacket, looked in the mirror and thought, with a sinking feeling, It’s just not working for me anymore? The garment’s the same. It’s you that’s changed. And so it is with a brand. The brand that got your company to its current level of success may not be the brand you need to achieve the next level of growth.
Perhaps you’ve outgrown it. Or the market has moved on. Perhaps your firm’s growth strategy requires connecting with entirely new audiences and the current brand just doesn’t resonate. Or your firm has expanded its offerings (organically or through mergers and acquisitions), and your story just isn’t the same anymore.
The decision to modify or replace a brand can be a tough one. If a company is growing at an acceptable rate, the temptation to “leave well enough alone” can be powerful. There may be a sentimental attachment to a legacy brand, particularly to the more visible elements, such as the logo. But it’s important to keep in mind that virtually every industry today is in a constant state of flux.
Your market is constantly marked by new entrants, innovative disruptors, breakthrough technologies and evolving customer preferences. Your brand can’t drive value creation by standing still in a world that’s forever moving.
Why Change Now?
In some cases, the need to alter or replace a brand is obvious: the strategy reflects old assumptions and market dynamics, or the visual identity is dated or tired. But in many cases, the need to change isn’t so clear.
We partnered with the CEO of a publicly-traded consulting firm who had grown his company from a start-up to a billion-dollar global leader in just 10 years with the same brand. His question when he began his engagement with us was a perfectly reasonable one: Why change now?
We pointed out that the company he’d started wasn’t the company he was running anymore. And that the world he’d founded his company in was no longer the world in which it operated. What had begun as a highly focused, specialized boutique with a handful of competitors was now a diversified global powerhouse competing with some of the world’s largest and most admired companies. Technology had transformed virtually everything the company did. So while the legacy brand was great, it no longer fit.
In such situations, a brand equity study can be a useful tool for deciding whether or not to evolve. After all, your brand isn’t what you say about your business; it’s what your most important audiences believe (and say) about you. So the first step must be determining how your clients, prospects, employees and investors (as relevant) perceive you. It’s common to discover that perceptions of your business leave value on the table.
Closing the Brand Gap
If you discover daylight between how you want your business to be perceived and how it’s currently viewed and understood, you’ve got a brand gap … which means it’s time to rebrand.
Beware of complacency! You may well find that your clients’ perceptions are well-aligned with your own. But will these perceptions take your business to the next level of success? The brand may fit today, but will it continue to work for you in a year’s time? In three years’? The time to plan and build the most relevant, resonant brand you can is now.
Employees’ invaluable input
Often, company management warns us in advance of a rebranding initiative that employees are very attached to the brand, particularly the legacy identity, and will be loath to change. In virtually every case, however, our research reveals not only a willingness to change on the part of the workforce but a strong desire to evolve.
Why? Employees are often closer to the market than senior management, and are therefore in a better position to know whether a brand continues to support the company’s mission. In fact, it’s generally the people closest to the ground—especially the salesforce—that feel the pain of an ill-fitting brand the most.
In a world of constant change, putting your brand in front of an unforgiving mirror isn’t easy. But it’s something every company must do to get from where it is today to where it wants to be in the future.
Want to discuss building the brand that takes you further? Let’s talk.
Originally published February 16, 2018.
