Eight Common Rebranding Mistakes to Avoid

by Reid Neubert

Companies undertake rebranding in an effort to improve their image, increase their appeal, modernize, or sometimes to try to move upscale. A merger or acquisition may also be the catalyst.

The process of rebranding involves some combination of changing the name, the logo, the tagline, and developing new marketing and advertising look and messages.

Often, however, companies do this without consulting me and so make mistakes,
;-) mistakes that could have been avoided. Look at the recent debacle over the Gap's so-called rebranding, which really seems to have involved only changing their logo. (Actually, they got so much publicity out of the negative reaction to their new logo that it makes me wonder if they did it on purpose!)

Common Rebranding Mistakes

So, what are the mistakes to avoid?

1) Thinking you own your brand image.
Especially with consumer brands, as the Gap found, companies forget that their brand image really resides in the minds of consumers. Brands are about perception. So, legal perspectives aside, the public owns your brand, you don't.

Because of this, you can't willy-nilly impose a different brand image … or even, in the Gap's case, a logo … on your loyal public. Any changes have to be consistent with the public's perception of your brand.

2) Thinking that changing the logo constitutes rebranding.
The logo is not the brand; it is only the visual representation of the brand. (For more definitions see http://www.neubertweb.com/definitions.html). Companies often couch a logo redesign as a "rebranding" because it sounds more significant. But it's still just a facelift.

If it is part of a strategic rebranding effort, that is another matter. But just positioning a new logo as rebranding does not make it so.

3) Thinking you can reposition your brand by saying so.
Every brand occupies a position in the marketplace, whether as the "Cadillac of something," the economy brand, the coolest, the best service provider, whatever it is for the particular company and brand. We marketers work with clients to help them identify a beneficial positioning for their brand, but it has to be one that aligns with the public's perception. Remember, they own the brand.

It is a grave mistake to think you can reposition your brand however you want if that is at odds with the public's perception. It is also virtually impossible to usurp a competitor's position. Many have spent millions trying and have failed.

4) Thinking you can just make it up.
A brand cannot be hung on a product or company like curtains on a window. It has to come from the company's core values, its culture, and how it does business. I used to work for a company whose president wanted a slogan that said, in effect, "top quality software at low prices." Yet that is not how the company was run. QA was not given the authority it needed to ensure that products weren't shipped until they were thoroughly debugged. Instead, ready or not, products were pushed out the door to make the monthly and quarterly numbers.

In a case like that, no matter what the slogan says, the brand image will be one of buggy software and long waits for customer support because so many people experience problems.

5) Thinking that people know what you are thinking.
A name or marketing message can't require people to have inside knowledge in order to "get it." An example is the Accenture name – people don't know what it means, so when the new name was announced they couldn't associate it with anything. It just had to be drummed into our memory banks through repeated advertising exposures.

We don't know from seeing the name that is stands for "accent on the future," which is what the company had in mind. Once you hear that, the name is more memorable. Otherwise it's just a made-up name the company had to spend millions to familiarize people with.

6) Thinking that having "a logo" will do.
A rose may be a rose, but a logo is not a logo, is not a logo. Just having "a logo" does not constitute a good brand identity. Another company identity with a swoosh or a swirl by the name, for example, does not differentiate the company or make the brand memorable. There are swirls and swooshes galore. Neither does sticking a piece of clip art next to the name make for an engaging, memorable identity.

7) Not thinking through your whole strategy.
After Fedex bought Kinkos, they rebranded the copy shops "Fedex Kinkos."

For me, it always brought to mind an episode of "Taxi" in which Jim Ignatowski bought the cabbies' favorite restaurant, Mario's, and renamed it Jim's Mario's. I always felt that Fedex Kinkos was almost as silly.

They have since again renamed the stores "Fedex Office," which works much better. I don't know if that was planned from the start, but the new name is certainly a great improvement.

8) Thinking you can change a brand's perception just by dressing it up.
While you can't change perception with window dressing, that's not to say dressing it up doesn't help. A salesman in a suit makes a very different impression than the same person in jeans.

There is a difference between window dressing and a well dressed brand, however. The latter is one for which everything, from the business cards to the website, are well and appropriately designed and written based on a sound branding strategy.

Of course, the brand has to then live up to the impression its "suit" makes, just as the salesman does. People's experience of the products, services, or company have to match the expectation that is set by it being well dressed.

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