Seven Common Mistakes to Avoid When Rebranding for Success

1. Hanging onto history
Rebranding well means staying relevant. Assumptions made when the brand was first established may no longer hold true. Take the time to analyse the changes in your target market and your position in the market when exploring the opportunities for brand expansion and repositioning.

2. Thinking the brand is just a logo, stationery or corporate colours
The value of your brand and your customers experience is made up of things you cannot see or touch, but are real. If you are looking to rebrand, ensure you know what the value of your brand is before your start.
A brand spends time, money and energy developing these intangible values and communicating these to the customer. The end result is a business that builds assets to sell, brands that demand a higher price and customers who are will to pay more for the branded product.

3. Design by committee
We all know the old saying about too many cooks in the kitchen. The same holds true for the rebranding process. Too many opinions delay the rebranding process and can at times diffuse the focus needed to achieve success. Keep those with critical approval level to an efficient shortlist, and assemble to smallest, most essential team possible.

4. Navigating without a Plan
Effective rebrands rely on a strong creative brief and plan to keep everyone focused on the project and milestones. The creative brief and overall plan should include market analysis, objectives, target markets, budgets, timeline and any KPIs to measure success.

5. Limiting the scope for your creative team
Good branding agencies and consultants are more than graphic designers. The best ones can help develop new products, expand target markets and help streamline your business operations. Give your creative team a good brief to why the rebrand and what it means to make it successful, but don’t limit their areas on influence.

6. Basing rebranding on an advertising campaign
An ad campaign or a slogan does not equal brand positioning. Brand strategy should lead advertising – not the other way around. Sometimes the most effective rebrands don’t include traditional advertising.

7. Believing you’re too small to rebrand
Every brand needs a refresh to stay relevant as markets evolve. Smaller companies are not immune. Like larger brands, they too have brand positions