Seven benefits of rebranding your business

Nothing lasts forever

There are lots of reasons why someone chooses to rebrand a business. Some of the better reasons include changes to your business model, your audience, your value proposition, and/or your marketplace. Or perhaps you're updating a neglected or obsolete brand system. No matter the reason, rebranding is always a better investment when it provides some real benefit to the business.

The big benefits

Whether it’s a full complete do-over or a lighter-touch update, these are some of the most cited benefits of rebranding. Is this a definitive list? No. This is how we group and categorize the benefits we talk about.

1. Full support of business strategy

Sometimes, a business with a poorly defined business strategy will under-invest in a dangerously quick solution to their logo problem. They then stick this non-strategic solution on their equally quick solutions for the website problem and brochure problem. This approach short-changes any consideration of brand perception.

Or sometimes a business with a well-defined business strategy will lean on an old brand system that no longer fits, but they can’t see it. Their familiarity prevents them from realizing that their brand no longer matches their strategy.

Your brand system is most effective when it supports your business growth strategy. It needs to reflect your value proposition and distinct position. It needs to align with your audience’s needs and expectations. It needs to provide the right suite of tools for going to market. Really, this is the primary benefit and goal of our work. And it encompasses everything we list below.

2. Appeal to new customers

Suppose you have a completely accurate picture of your ideal client. And that hasn’t changed in 15 years. The characteristics you’re looking for are the same. But as the world turns, people move into that state and out of that state. Their tastes will be different. Their expectations will differ. The way they search and think about purchases will be different.

We once worked with a business whose best customers had aged out. The business needed to reach a new, younger audience for the same product, and a rebrand helped them look and speak like the younger audience needed them to.

Another well-known example of this is Old Spice. It has transformed from my grandfather’s brand to a young men’s brand, and has even made inroads to the female market.

Alternatively, you may determine that your ideal client profile doesn’t work anymore; you have to redefine the ideal. Rebranding can help you look and speak for your new ideal client profile. And it can help those less-than-ideal clients self-select out.

*The buyer audience

One nuance here is that there’s a different kind of customer for some businesses: potential buyers of the business. Buyers are always going to look at the health of the business and unrealized potential. And a brand that presents well is always going to make them feel better about the decision.

3. Distinction in the marketplace

Most of us have competition in the market. And many of them are very similar—easy substitutes for hiring us. This makes standing out from competitors difficult. Rebranding for distinction—to reflect your meaningful difference from your competitors—can help you appear uniquely suited instead of easily substituted. Branding and rebranding efforts should ALWAYS press for distinction.

How does that distinction show up? It shows up in your company’s visual identity, messaging, and behavior—all those ways that your business shows up in the marketplace.

We once worked with a business who was about to make the leap into a different, much larger pool of competitors. The way they were showing up was not ready for that—they wouldn’t be taken seriously. By the end of our work, they were ready to show up with distinction.

4. Reestablished relevance

If you inherit a brand system that is obviously outdated and out of touch with today’s customers tastes and expectations, the business will suffer real consequences. Unfortunately, the consequences are often invisible. People won’t call to tell you that your brand is a mess.

Your brand is not a place to set it and forget it. But we see a lot of that. A business will get its logo, website, and other components in place, and they leave it there. The brand system may not be high on their list of things to watch (or on the list at all), and the years slip by. Here and there they add a new piece with a new designer that doesn’t quite match.

When a client comes to us with two decades of mismatched odds and ends in use, we get to help them bring everything into alignment, and up to current standards in the market.

5. Reflecting evolution and expansion

Businesses always age, but some will evolve more significantly over time. Purposeful expansion or narrowing of services, productions, geography, or audience can all prompt a significant rebrand effort. Why? Because the business will be, or will want to be, perceived differently after that evolution. That’s a change to the brand.

We worked with a non-profit during a significant repositioning of the organization. They were expanding their audience strategically, after which the name and brand system would be obsolete. We created a new brand system around their new name and mission that would align with the needs and expectations of their expanded audience.

This kind of work can also be done in advance—anchoring the new brand in the future. Be ready when you get there.

6. Effective marketing

This one is pretty self-explanatory. A strong brand system facilitates all the best ways to increase brand awareness, visual, verbal, digital, and offline. Making those communications land with the right audiences consistently is important. When a brand system is old and inconsistent, rebranding can provide the strategic clarity and quality tools to support effective marketing efforts.

Most of our clients come to us with this benefit in mind: up-leveling their brand system to support more effective marketing. If you’re calling attention to your brand, it will serve you better if it’s in good shape.

7. Talent magnet

Everything listed above has been about the external benefits of rebranding. But there’s another, internal benefit to be realized: the recruiting and retention of employees.

Just like most things in life, we choose what feels most right. People want to work for a company that feels right: it looks healthy, it communicates well, and behaves in accordance with a value system. Recruiting is easier with a brand system in place that does all this. Retention is stronger when employee experiences of the brand match what’s happening externally.

Getting into the work

Rebranding can be a big change for a business. Not everyone will be eager to take this on. And not everyone will recognize when it’s necessary.

On top of that, it needs to be done right. If not, it can cause real problems: disoriented customers, broken legacy, confused staff, bad PR, and backpedaling (not a good look).

We suggest finding the right outside advisors to examine what you’re trying to do with the business, and how your brand system is (or isn’t) supporting that strategy. If you don’t have someone like that who is impartial, we’re happy to step in. We love helping clients reap the benefits of their brand, whether we’re working with what they already have, or redesigning for the future they want to build.