Anna Navolokova, Marketing Manager in Multi-Programming Solutions • 11 min read
If you are searching for an efficient, time-tested way to renovate an existing company’s identity without extreme changes, consider providing a brand update. It’s a unique chance to engage loyal clients and open gates for additional consumer flows. You can upgrade a logo, fonts, messaging and develop a new narrative that caters to potential users.
Each top company launches brand modernization from time to time to stay competitive in the chosen niche and showcase its growth and commitment to clients. In this article, you’ll find the most efficient examples of how redesign helped corporations translate their values better and become closer to the public. But first, let’s explore what a brand refresh is and how to organize it in 7 steps.
2. Conduct a Competitive Analysis
3. Uncover Brand Positioning and Key Messages
4. Update the Visual Identity System
Usually, managing a brand is the responsibility of a corporate marketing department. When talking about a small organization, like a POD dropshipping store with a solo owner, this task is often outsourced to third-party specialists. This may help entrepreneurs refresh old approaches and renew a look starting from the research stage. It includes interviewing all stakeholders and clients interacting with the firm.
The main goal of surveys is to determine whether users, workers, and the business leadership have the same brand perception. It's excellent if the answer is “Yes.” However, clients’ responses often differ from those the company’s owner is waiting to receive. It’s crucial for the business to ensure that messages delivered with a brand are identical to what consumers perceive firsthand.
Start by evaluating who you are and how you differ from other rivals. Then, discover how the market currently understands your propositions. The research should help find an overlap between various perspectives and draw possible ways to make the views identical.
Although the two terms sound similar, they vary. The main difference between brand refresh and rebrand is that the first process updates the business identity while the second one transforms it. In the first case, you can improve visual perception, build a stronger connection with users, and announce new features to already existing products. During rebranding, your firm literally receives a new birth. You can completely redefine primary purposes and change markets, investors, and even the customer base. But in this post, we talk about less radical methods of optimization.
A well-thought-out brand refresh campaign considers an industry landscape. To deliver exceptional quality, it’s worth learning how to do it better than others. You probably already know the key players in the market that offer the same assortment or service as your firm to local buyers. Now, you need to thoroughly analyze how to increase your share and attract clients. To look, speak, and feel different, you should explore offerings your competitors don’t have.
Analyzing rival’s product assortment, online stores, social media, and even the way they talk with followers may help you improve performance, including:
Gift from Podza: Free Business Plan Template
As soon as you determine how your firm is identified on the market, it's time to compile a key brand message emphasizing the main differentiators. They should reach a tailored consumer’s mind and soul.
What is a brand positioning statement? It’s a description that addresses fundamental questions about what your firm is and what it does. It also highlights why you decided to launch this entrepreneurship (to solve an exact problem, make the world better, improve the environment, etc.). While creating key messages about the firm, you may mention why your company has no analogs (if it really does) and how your exceptional offerings benefit clients.
The main goal of the positioning is to go beyond material values and evoke deep users’ feelings other competitors can’t discover. Your messages should provide emotional triggers that make clients buy a product and build lasting relationships with the organization.
It’s already good if you sound unique on the market due to efficient key messages. Still, you can improve the performance even more if you look memorizable. That’s why developing a unique visual identity is crucial for business progress. You should include the spirit of a brand in various elements like styles, logos, textures, and colors.
An update doesn’t always mean you should entirely change your visual representation. Depending on the company’s needs, you can simply add some details to labels or change the palette. Everything depends on your fresh treats and novelty in positioning. For example, businesses that are moving to a more sustainable production often emphasize their new route by adding green colors to their style.
A successful brand refresh may not include changing logos at all. Firms can apply new photography styles or replace messaging. In fact, you can leverage old representation while adding a unique touch and expanding the view.
Applying the latest web design trends to print on demand business
When you clearly determine how the logo should look and which colors will be associated with the organization, it’s worth creating a strict guideline for using key brand elements. All thriving businesses are consistent in their visual representation. Such an approach helps them build strong recognition in the industry and gain a trustworthy reputation among clients.
Develop your own brand standards where you’ll specify logo size, positioning, colors, and different variations or restrictions depending on the place and case. For instance, you should define how a logo will adjust to business cards, packages, documents, e-mails, etc. The guideline will describe acceptable fonts, photo styles, graphics, etc. You may also mention how the logo will change in the black-and-white version, in the horizontal or vertical position, and much more.
After you renew a brand's uniqueness and conduct basic standards, check the entire communication chain to apply updates consistently through every contact point. Write a list of all the ways the firm interacts with the audience, including invoices, e-mails, websites, social media profiles, etc. A corporate brand refresh requires attentiveness and passion to run a process smoothly. So, take some time to adjust your business templates according to the provided innovations.
The final stage that shapes the entire venture's success is its advertisement. You spend a lot of time and resources renovating your company, so it’s worth creating buzz around the announcement, reviving interest in new and existing clients, and building a further development path.
Ideally, you should create a roadmap to guide you in introducing updates to managers, corporate workers, and customers. Follow these steps while conducting a brand refresh announcement to get the maximum efficiency from updates:
To sum up, a brand refresh strategy should include an announcement plan to incorporate innovations efficiently.
We can observe how famous companies update their identity every day. New logos and labels are watching us from store shelves and online listings. Some of them are optimized pretty well, showcasing that when a business already has a solid reputation, it doesn’t need any visual noise in style.
A few of the most successful brand refresh case studies can inspire entrepreneurs for their own companies’ upgrades. Let’s have a closer look at the impactful examples.
A well-known payment system for local and international financial transactions made a refresh twice. In 2016, it changed its logo into a 2D illustration, which allowed it to enhance its perception via small mobile devices, including watches, which people often use to pay for products or services. The corporation used a friendly color palette to connect two circles representing the brand since its launch. In 2019, they made another optimization. Now, the logo represented only two iconic figures with a text removed. When your brand is already recognizable worldwide, you can simplify the representation because customers already identify you in the crowd.
In 2021, a fast-food giant changed its logo, leaning toward the original illustration designed in 1969. The company revolutionized the colors (orange for a burger and ketchup-red for the brand name), symbolizing the warmth and fun that the product evokes in customers. But the main emphasis was made on the company’s roots. In their upgrade, Burger King showed how they embraced the firm's long history of delivering perfect customer experience and emphasized their competitiveness in the market through decades.
Initially, the company sounded like Dunkin’ Donuts. Still, over the years, the brand has increased its assortment. It became not only a place where customers could buy coffee and doughnuts but also a generator of good vibes, friendliness, and warmth. They changed the two-word name, leaving only “Dunkin,” as this was the short form of how clients remembered the brand. The company removed an illustration of a coffee cup but kept the apostrophe and made it pink. Thus, they showcased an extended menu of the store.
Dunkin also developed a diversity of logo variations. Thus, vertical text can be found on large disposable cups, and the abbreviation “DNKN” can be printed on smaller containers.
The major US airline collaborated with a brand refresh agency to update its logo in 2016. The modernization was caused by the main campaign goals: to connect with more millennial passengers and business travelers. While the company maintained the same color palette, it changed the visually “heavy” plane into a heart showcasing the commitment to clients. The sharp black font revolutionized into a rounded blue one, symbolizing an easy and hassle-free voyage.
One of the largest social media apps currently features a warm gradient logo. Still, not everyone knows that initially, it had a more retro look. In 2016, the company decided to refresh its logo by moving to a more minimalistic and visually appealing view. Such a decision was driven by the desire to attract more iOS users and provide a simple design highly appreciated by younger generations. Moreover, brand upgrading allowed the company to attract even more attention to the new app feature — uploading personal stories.
Where to Get Funding for Your Print on Demand Clothing Brand
Providing an update is vital for almost all organizations that want to connect with their customers and remain competitive in the niche. For those who doubt the necessity of the process, here’s an overview of its main benefits:
Suppose your firm works as usual, retaining customers, increasing the assortment, and discovering new marketing strategies. But how do you know whether it’s time to make some adjustments? Here are several signs to do a brand refresh:
Keeping a strong and consistent identity is crucial for every business that wants to thrive in a rapidly changing marketplace and constantly appearing rivals. By refreshing a visual look and positioning, you can ensure that clients will remember the company and precisely identify you with the key messages it delivers. Creative design and emotional messages will allow you to develop a powerful connection with potential consumers, increasing your chances of success and long-term development. Follow this brand refresh checklist to conduct your own modernization plan.
REQUEST A FREE DEMO