How can you minimize the risks of rebranding your business?

There’s a difference between a “rebrand” and a “refresh”. In the latter, you’ll likely keep your same color scheme, core messaging, etc. but maybe refresh your logo, try out some new imagery, or give your website a facelift. These are nice updates, but not entirely drastic for your overall brand identity. A rebrand is the more nuclear option which strips your brand down to the studs and rebuilds it from the ground up. This includes overhauling your visual identity, your messaging, and in some cases even your value proposition. Make sure you take the time to truly assess what your brand really needs. Like a haircut, sometimes you can get by with just a trim, but other times you may need to make the big chop to really feel a difference.

A few things could mitigate the risk like, For a successful rebrand, plan ahead, communicate, preserve equity, test, align culture, transition smoothly, and monitor. Research market, set goals, involve stakeholders, retain assets. Test rebrand, align employees, update materials. Monitor impact on perception and performance for a successful transition.

To minimize the risks, the purpose of rebranding should be absolutely clear. Furthermore, three important elements are required - continuity, clarity and consistency. There needs to be a thread that ties the pre-rebranding and post-rebranding brand for all stakeholders to make a connection and to ensure you don't burn down every bit of brand awareness. The rebranding should clarify all that was "left-to-imagination" and establish a clearer brand voice/product positioning. Otherwise rebranding is just a vanity exercise. Rebranding needs a cohesive consistent marketing effort to ensure the new brand is clearly re-established in the minds of the stakeholders, and they are able to differentiate the pre & post brand.

Rebranding is a big decision that should not be taken lightly. It is important to have a clear and compelling reason for rebranding, as this will help you to communicate your goals to your stakeholders and justify the investment. The Natural History Museum of New York is a good example of a business that rebranded for a clear and compelling reason. The museum wanted to rebrand to reflect its new mission as an "active catalyst" for change. The new brand identity, which features a circular logo and a vibrant color palette, is meant to represent the museum's commitment to exploring the natural world and using its knowledge to create a better future.

User research is one of the most important steps in rebranding - helping to mitigate risk, preventing backlash, and getting feedback. There have been several instances where target audiences were not heavily consulted and resulting in negative backlash including Gap 2010, Tropicana 2009, Uber 2016, New Coke 2021, and Twitter 2023.

From experience leading a couple of re-brands for enterprise companies, I've found you need to get your employee base excited about the re-brand as they can be your biggest ambassadors. If budget allows, have fun internal parties to celebrate the re-brand and give out swag with the new brand identity. Then craft employee advocacy social posts (with gamification) to get employees to share with their networks the new brand identity.

The impact of this change should be identified through research - both internally and externally. Any rebrand should focus on their staff because without them embodying the new brand, it will never be successful.

Remember to create a re-brand package/site with all the required assets for press, partners, and third-parties so that they aren't using the prior brand identity (logo, colours, fonts, tagline, images, etc).

Request Removal via Google Search Console: If the logo or image has been removed from your site but is still showing up in search results, you can use Google Search Console to request its removal. Go to the "Removals" section and submit a removal request.