Rebranding is considered one of the most powerful marketing tools. This is the name of the next stage in the development of the company's brand, which is closely associated with changes in the ideology of business, with the evolution of its main idea. Rebranding helps create a new image of the company and its product in the minds of customers.
Rebranding: concept, goals and objectives
Rebranding is understood as a set of measures aimed at changing the brand and its constituent elements (ideology, name, logo, slogan, visual design, etc.). In the most general sense, rebranding is aimed at changing the image that is already in the mind of the consumer.
Rebranding allows you to bring the brand in line with the current state and plans of the company. Changes can affect a variety of issues, including updating the packaging and drafting new promotional materials. At the same time, as a rule, we are not talking about a complete replacement of the old brand. He continues his evolution, becomes more fresh and emotional. New qualities give the brand the opportunity to become more attractive to old customers and win new customers.
Minor changes in brand visuals or marketing should not be considered a rebranding. This method reflects serious, qualitative changes in the company's strategy and its positioning in the market. Almost all aspects of the brand are undergoing revision.
Rebranding tasks:
- increasing the uniqueness of the brand;
- strengthening the brand;
- Attraction of new clients.
When conducting rebranding, they strive to preserve those aspects of it that the consumer perceives as advantages, and to abandon those qualities that reduce popularity and recognition.
The need for rebranding
Rebranding is necessary if one or more factors are present:
- misplaced brand positioning at the start of a business;
- changes in market conditions;
- low level of brand popularity;
- losing the competition;
- setting more ambitious business objectives.
Marketers highlight many of the factors that force companies to resort to rebranding. One of them is the erosion of the actual needs of the target audience, which are in constant motion. Competition is intensifying on the market day after day, new players appear, more modern means of promotion are used, distribution channels are expanding. All these moments force the management of companies to return to the starting point, and often even start building their image from scratch.
It often happens that all the efforts of marketers aimed at forming a new brand do not pay off, do not lead to an increase in the target audience and an increase in profits. At any stage of rebranding, it must be remembered that the main purpose of using such a tool is to bring the company closer to the target consumer group, to increase the overall competitiveness of the product, product or service with which the company enters the market.
Unsuccessful rebranding is often associated with the inability of specialists to concentrate on those positions that are actually achievable, with the pursuit of imaginary success for which there is no sufficient reason. Overly ambitious goals cannot promote realistic and effective positioning of the firm and its product.
Rebranding stages
At the first stage of rebranding, an audit of the existing brand is carried out, including the study of its condition, an assessment of the attitude of customers towards it, and the determination of its features. The analysis of the company's financial capabilities is also underway. The purpose of the audit is to assess the awareness of an existing brand. Marketers strive to understand whether the consumer is loyal to the brand, whether there are serious obstacles to its perception. An audit allows you to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the brand, its advantages over competitors. A complete analysis enables you to make an informed decision about whether a brand needs a positioning change. If a marketing audit indicates a low level of brand awareness, rebranding is intended to boost that characteristic.
At the second stage, a rebranding strategy and tactics for its implementation are being developed. The main content of the stage is the definition of those brand elements that need to be changed.
The third stage involves changing the selected brand elements. New positioning is being used, identification systems (verbal and visual) are being updated, and a different brand communication strategy is being introduced.
The final step is to communicate the meaning of the rebranding to the target audience.
Rebranding elements
The following concepts are closely related to the “rebranding” category:
- restyling;
- redesign;
- repositioning.
Restyling is a change in some of the visual characteristics of the company logo, including its color schemes. Such changes should be consistent with the new positioning.
Redesign is a complete change of the corporate identity of the company, including its logo.
Repositioning is understood as a change in the essential characteristics of a brand with their subsequent consolidation in the minds of consumers.
The described changes can be implemented individually or in combination. In domestic practice, companies are often limited to light forms of rebranding: they change the style of external attributes, design of points of sale and packaging.
Rebranding: subtleties of technology
Rebranding is not a simple change of a company name or sign. The wrong choice of rebranding strategy can negatively affect the company's image. Customers can be disoriented. Some part of the target audience may even have a perception of the updated brand as a fake. The decline in product prices only reinforces this opinion. The result is the collapse of the entire project.
A large-scale rebranding, which includes a change of corporate identity and company name, can be relatively safe only for less well-known companies. Every change to a stable brand that has market weight turns into a risky undertaking. Even minor miscalculations can damage the company's image with difficulty.
If the predecessor brand was successful, serious marketing work must be carried out before its large-scale replacement, including in-depth interviews with representatives of the target audience and working out the consequences of the proposed changes with focus groups.
Features of rebranding
Consumers have their own idea of brands, which is formed as a result of the experience of using specific products. Therefore, when rebranding, marketers should consider the functional needs and emotional preferences that motivate people to buy. If a new brand appeals to the right needs of the market, but goes against the expectations of the representatives of the target group, such positioning is doomed to failure.
Rebranding in most cases means changing some of the attributes of the product. When changing positioning, it is important to build a "bridge" between the two ideas about the brand, that is, between what it appears to the consumer at the moment and what it will become as a result of rebranding. The strength of the built "bridge" can be assessed only by the behavior of representatives of the target audience.
Such links between actual and target brand perception can be built both on emotional benefits and on those features of the product that are most appreciated by the consumer. It was noticed that the emotional benefits of a new brand, which enable the company to transfer its positioning to adjacent markets, form the best consumer loyalty.
After developing a new brand position, you need to make sure that the company is able to deliver on new promises and does not fail the target group's expectations. To build a successful brand, companies should follow a simple rule: "Do what you say." Accurate fulfillment of the assumed obligations is of particular importance in the service market.
It happens that the updated brand of the company is not able to immediately correspond to the new positioning in all its characteristics. It sometimes takes a lot of time to update a product or service, to form service support programs. In this case, rebranding specialists use the so-called intermediate positioning. It is built solely on those parameters that the company is able to achieve at the moment.
Competent rebranding allows you to build a more attractive value system for customers, provides simplicity, accessibility and ease of perception of the company's policy towards the consumer. Correct changes in the image of the company usually result in increased customer brand loyalty and improved market status of the company.
