What are the most common challenges when retailers rebrand and how can you overcome them?

To make any rebranding exercise successful, one needs to strike at the centre of the problem. An amalgamation of Interviews with stakeholders, employees, customers, branch/outlet visits, competition scanning, brand audit etc is must to arrive at the genesis of the issue. Once that is identified, without alienating current set of customers and keeping brand values intact, how to effectively resolve the challenges and make the brand more in tune with the TG, forms the crux of brand rebranding or refresh strategy. As in every aspect of marketing, there can never be personal bias for any brand or campaign activity to be successful. Final decision has to be supported with logic and data.

The Personal brand comes to fore especially in the business where the differentiation is hard on products and services. It matters most when contingency happens how you stand up to trust reposed and generate good will personified.

One of the important things is to first communicate the refresh to internal teams and make them own it. Unless the business and brand are in sync to the refresh and the new identity/positioning, customers cannot be. A sustained effort at all levels is important to ensure brand refresh is successful and achieves the objective it was intended for. Depending on the nature of the refresh whether it's cosmetic or a complete overhaul of the brand, the launch needs to be planned. In both cases the challenges will be different and so will be the strategy.

La modification d'une stratégie de marque est souvent engagée dès qu'une marque change d'identité. Le principal défi consiste à construire une nouvelle relation, de renforcer les incitations à converser avec les clients et de créer une effet de surprise. Ce dernier élément est régulièrement oublié : surprendre le client est un atout pour une marque qui change d'identité. La marque doit réveiller le désir chez le client et se faire reconna?tre d'une nouvelle fa?on (positive) pour gommer son histoire précédente.

'Nothing has changed' - we have 'Only improved for you' needs to be takeaway mantra for your current customers. Methodical and Seamless execution is critical to ensure customers get quickly accustomed and comfortable with the brand refresh. And not confused.

“Somebody that I use to know.” Tell a story. The WHY? The connection can be maintained when they CARE about your reason for changing something they love. The advantage here is that, for those who decide to stay, a new level of LOYALTY, will be reached. And you may find yourself holding the opportunity to offer greater value.

The customer base often gets confused with re-branding as "change of ownership" or even change in "Modus Operandi" both of which can be a very tricky situation to be in. A business seldom has witnessed this situation before so rarely it has use cases to learn and strategize from, therefore one should think through the repercussions and effects of such an endeavour. perhaps a strong communication campaign highlighting how the re-branding will help customer connect with business

Any Rebranding exercise always has to be a long term decision and never a stop-gap arrangement. Stop gap is detrimental not just for the brand and consumers but also to the business considering the costs involved esp Capex.