Rebranding
Business and culture are changing faster than ever, and maintaining a relevant and compelling brand is essential for long-term success in today’s competitive market landscape. Brands are not static or immune to outside influences. Market trends, shifting consumer behaviors, and evolving industry landscapes are only a few factors that impact public perception of your brand.
Your brand serves as the cornerstone of your company’s identity, and there comes a time in every company’s journey when it becomes necessary to reassess brand strategy and brand identity—and thus, the marketing and communications that build on that foundation.
We have rebranded companies and products that have been in the market for three years and for one hundred and eighty-three years. Each rebranding strategy is unique, and clients’ reasons for rebranding vary from company to company. While myriad factors drive the need to update a brand, certain considerations are universal across rebranding examples.
Your Brand is Bigger Than Your Logo or Visuals.
Your brand is the summation of how people think and feel about your business—the sum total of all the impressions a customer has based on every experience they have had with you, your company, and your products or services. Brands are organic and evolving; they’re active promises about what your company will do for your customers. Your creative visuals, marketing services, web, and social media—each item tells your audience a story about your brand.
Rebranding is more profound than just a new logo design—it can mean changing everything from your brand’s identity, strategy, name, and tagline to your website, marketing materials, and more. Rebranding services should be implemented thoughtfully, comprehensively, and consistently across every consumer experience.
Successful Rebranding is Built on a Foundation of Business Evolution.
Brands are strategic assets—growth platforms for future success that create ongoing value for an organization. The best branding honors who you are today but also charts a course for who you will become. Brand design is an agent of change. It is a catalyst for growth and the bridge that takes you from where you are to where you want to be in your market. A rebranding strategy crafts a plan for success and builds assets to make it real.
Shifting your positioning and identity can alter perceptions, boost recognition, reach new audiences, and attract different consumers. What is now different about your company? How will rebranding share it with target customers in mind? Your creative visuals, messaging, and marketing are the tools to communicate this updated direction or product offering. A rebranding announcement should inform the world how your company has changed and guide consumers to understand how you differ from your competitors. You want your brand to stand for something and stand out in the marketplace.
There is a Spectrum of Rebranding, from Refresh to Complete Rebrand.
A complete rebrand is a total overhaul of a company’s strategy and identity, typically implemented when the current strategy fails or becomes ineffective over time. This is a ground-up rebuild, starting practically from scratch. As a result of the exercise, the full suite of the brand’s visual and verbal identity assets will change, and sometimes even the brand name is replaced.
A complete rebranding aims to breathe new life into a stagnant business, better connect with customers, old and new, and reinforce what makes the company unique, valuable, and desirable. The difference in the new identity and positioning is substantial.
A brand refresh, or as we often call it, an evolution, is less dramatic. Brand strategies and the brand name remain untouched while care is taken to optimize and strengthen key elements of a company’s existing brand equity. Those elements might be the symbolism of a longstanding logo, an ownable signature color palette, a brand story, iconic packaging design, marketing taglines, or branding jingles. A new brand identity is built by preserving, evolving, and adding to these equity assets. Each element is refined to make them stronger, clearer, and more compelling to contemporary consumers.
During a brand refresh, a savvy rebranding agency will coach clients on how to build a bridge for fans to recognize the brand they love in the market upon relaunch. Market research, focus groups, or even insight from longstanding team members can be valuable in identifying the aspects of your brand that resonate most deeply with consumers. Consult stakeholders who have years of experience with customers—they are often a team of experts when it comes to the aspects of your brand that foster public affinity. The goal is for longtime customers to love the brand even more than before now that it has been distilled down to the most potent essence of what is valuable and unique.
In addition to better engaging fans, a refresh works to introduce the brand to new customers as well. Digital marketing, social media engagement, and traditional marketing and public relations should all be onboarded and coordinated to broaden the reach of a company’s rebranding efforts. Consistency in voice and message are key to ensure a refresh reaches its full potential.
One of the benefits of a brand evolution approach is cost and resource efficiency. Though the creative costs of refreshing a brand are similar to a complete rebrand, implementation can be more cost-effective. Changing packaging, signage, web design, and other assets in an iterative fashion over a longer timeline can help manage implementation expenses for brands on a budget.
In many ways, the goals of a brand refresh can be similar to those of a rebrand. Branding and rebranding both aim to position a company or product for success and growth. What is different is the number of steps, the breadth of assets, and the amount of time required to achieve those goals.
Insight from your creative agency can help determine the best rebranding process for your team. Our journal articles provide more information about which approach is suitable for your brand, a rebranding checklist, and more information to guide your rebranding journey.
Rebranding is a Strategic and Creative Plan Targeting Business Goals and Growth.
Our team solves business problems through design. With this edict as a primary lens, our team crafts strategies for solutions that target goals, address challenges, and leverage opportunities for businesses. Our designers, strategists, and writers coach clients through aligning positioning, branding, and marketing communication with business execution and evolution. That handshake between a brand’s promise and the value the company delivers is the key to a successful rebrand.
In short, creating a new brand manifests a vision of an organization’s future. Branding and rebranding are not about communicating value; they are about creating value.
Rebranding FAQ
How do we know when it’s time to rebrand?
It’s time to consider rebranding when your brand no longer accurately reflects your business reality or strategic direction. Key indicators include significant shifts in your product offerings or service model, expanding into new markets with different consumer expectations, mergers or acquisitions that have altered your company’s scope, consistently declining market share despite offering solid products, a visual identity that appears dated compared to competitors, or negative brand associations stemming from past issues. A comprehensive brand audit can help identify disconnects between your current brand and business objectives. The most successful rebrands are proactive strategic decisions rather than reactive responses to immediate problems.
What’s the difference between a brand refresh and a complete rebrand?
As you can see in the case studies below, a brand refresh updates elements of your existing brand while maintaining core equity and recognition, typically involving modernizing your visual identity, refreshing your messaging, or elevating your photography style—all while keeping your brand name and fundamental positioning. In contrast, a complete rebrand represents a more substantial transformation, often including a new name, entirely new positioning, comprehensive visual identity overhaul, and sometimes a shift in business model or target audience. The decision between refresh and rebrand requires strategic thinking—the decision depends on how much brand equity you currently possess, how dramatically your business has evolved, and whether your foundational brand strategy still aligns with your business objectives.
How do we navigate the risks involved in rebranding?
Successful rebranding requires striking a balance between innovation and continuity. The primary risks include alienating existing customers, losing brand recognition, internal resistance, losing control of brand management, and implementation challenges across touchpoints. Mitigate these risks through comprehensive stakeholder research to understand which elements carry equity, a phased implementation that bridges the old and new, clear internal communication about the rebranding rationale, thorough planning for all brand applications, and strategic timing that leverages business cycles. Bring stakeholders along in the process of changing your brand. Remember that the greatest risk often comes not from bold changes but from incremental updates that neither retain existing equity nor create meaningful new differentiation, leaving your brand in an undefined middle ground.
How do we measure the success of our rebranding efforts?
Effective rebranding measurement combines quantitative metrics with qualitative insights across multiple timeframes. Short-term indicators include press coverage, social media sentiment, website traffic spikes, and initial sales impact. Medium-term measures focus on brand awareness tracking, perception shifts among target audiences, customer acquisition costs, and conversion rate changes. Long-term success metrics include customer retention improvements, pricing power increases, employee satisfaction and retention, and ultimately market share growth and profitability impact. Establish clear baseline measurements before launch and track consistently afterward, recognizing that different metrics become relevant at different stages of your rebranding journey.
How much should we budget for a rebranding project?
Rebranding investments vary dramatically based on company size, industry, geographical reach, and implementation scope. For mid-sized companies, comprehensive rebranding typically represents 10-20% of your annual marketing budget. This investment covers strategic development, design creation, and initial implementation across primary touchpoints. Additional variables affecting cost include: research requirements, trademark complexities, physical asset updates (signage, vehicle fleets, retail environments), digital ecosystem complexity, and whether your rebrand involves regulatory submissions. Remember that implementation costs often exceed initial strategic and creative development expenses, and budgeting should account for phased rollout over 1-2 years. When evaluating return on investment, consider both the cost of rebranding and the potential cost of not rebranding as your business evolves.
