There are many reasons why a brand may need urgent rebranding. Among the most common are brands that have become obsolete, due to a change in the audience, loss of differentiation, reputational problems or because the brand has inconsistencies in its visual language. Not forgetting the most common in these times, which is a lack of versatility, especially in adapting to new online platforms.
But there are three reasons that I believe are the most serious and therefore the most urgent:
- Your business is growing and evolving;
- Weak, confused and incoherent message;
- Literal and/or complex logo.
I mention them because companies often wait too long before deciding to change or redesign their brand. They think that it is not the most important thing for the business, that it continues to sell the same and they do not realize that they are losing valuable time and, worst of all, is that this time is used by the competition to move forward and displace them.
I have seen companies with products that have been number one in their market for years and they think that they do not need to renew their brand precisely because they already have it consolidated. One day, an agile; modern; new; well-designed brand comes along, with a powerful marketing strategy, and in a few months it displays that product that had been the leader for years. This is due to the power of innovation.
The market needs to see changes because it means evolution, and it shows that there is a company behind working for today’s world, which adapts to the new times quickly and confidently.
But I am already entering what will be the first of the three reasons for urgent rebranding!
1. Your business is growing and evolving
I was already anticipating this situation, but at this point we are going to focus more on the company that is evolving. Is your company growing? Do you have new products or services? Have you made important changes in different aspects and do you need to tell your audience about it? If so, you need to show your audience that your business is growing, that it has evolved, that it has modernized and this evolution should be reflected in the branding, if you don’t, communicate this growth or this change will be very difficult.
Don’t think that a press release or a marketing campaign is enough. Unfortunately, that campaign will only have a short-lived impact, lasting only a few days or weeks at best. The text on the website, social media or a press release that may appear in many published media, too. All this will be momentary and possibly not read by all your audience, because that is clearly impossible; but what your audience will see constantly is your brand, and what is more, those who read your press release carefully, if they do not see the change reflected in the brand, it will be difficult for them to really visualize this change. However, if they see that you have worked on a good rebranding, they will immediately see that there is an evolution, a growth. They will know that they are in front of a brand that is working in today’s world, connected with its customers, with their daily lives, that is present today and tomorrow. Because there is nothing worse than brands that represent yesterday with no intention of adapting to the new times.
Time passes quickly, that’s why you have to make the decision today. The redesign of a brand generates impulses, and these impulses must be given from time to time.
2. Weak, confused and incoherent message
This situation is serious, simply because we are faced with a trademark that does not serve the purpose for which it was conceived, even worse, generates confusion in its message. What I call “weak message trademarks” are those that are not trademarks, that are only visual representations of a name. This is no good, plain and simple.
Then there are the “confusing” ones, which are very dangerous and need to be urgently reviewed. I knew a private aviation brand that had this serious problem, its logo was a triangle with an airplane across it and some clouds behind it. Yes! I know what you are thinking, that this is a case of a literal logo, which is explained below, but the problem was actually worse than that. That logo used red for the triangle and a greyish blue for the rest. The problem is that this greyish blue made the clouds look like smoke and this added to the red triangle that globally means danger, so the message was an airplane in danger, with smoke, that is to say, on fire. A very different message to the one that a private aviation company should send, where the first message should be one of safety and for no reason can you doubt that.
I know this may sound strange, but it happens much more often than you think, and companies don’t realize it because they don’t think that concerns about its brand.
I am going to tell you a second real case, this one is a bit more abstract but the situation was the same. A brand of a real estate company had a logo with two half-arrows to the left and then the name. They were like two gestures but they meant to the past, i.e. backwards, when a company that sells houses is selling the future to those families who come to buy their new home. A real estate company does not sell the past, it sells the future, which is why this error in its identifying signs is so important.
Errors at a semantic level, meaning, perception, generated by shapes, colours, styles, etc., are frequent in brands that have been used for many years. They are very common in brands that have been designed by inexperienced, by those “logo designers” who for a very low amount of money spend a couple of hours to make a visual representation of a name, without stopping to analyze the multitude of variants that exist in the creation of a brand.
3. Literal and/or complex logo
This is another common and serious problem in branding.
The literal logo is the one that does not contribute anything, it is that company that sells strawberries and the logo is a strawberry. The problem is when that company starts to grow and its products start to diversify. Now this company not only sells strawberries but also all kinds of berries and they are thinking of expanding into tropical fruits. And in the future they plan to continue to expand their product range.
Many times I have seen that even though they have considerably expanded their product catalogue, they still continue with the strawberry logo, because the owner says that it honours the first product he started with. An absurd and egocentric thought, totally disconnected from its public, but which unfortunately I have to see on many occasions. Business owners resist change because of their own emotional issues, clinging to the past, often out of fear of change.
Complex logos are another big problem. The power of synthesis is key to Brand Recall (this is how people remember a brand), and this is the number one quality of a good logo should have. A logo should be simple, in its structure and in its message. It is also the best way to avoid confusion and this is so clear that there is not much more to say. A logo is not a decoration, and I say this because there are still people who want to decorate their products with a “nice” logo.
And so we come to the end of this post, which I hope has helped you to identify if your current brand has any of these serious problems for which it might need an urgent rebranding. If so, don’t worry, I’m here to help you redesign your brand, to provide it with those essential aspects capable of transforming an ordinary logo into a successful brand.