Your brand’s look can be updated or reworked to maintain a modern, fresh brand identity. However, it can be difficult to decide what to rework so that your brand looks consistent over time.

Refreshing your brand is not the same thing as starting over. You have undoubtedly built a loyal following for your company, and you will want to keep going with the brand refresh. Follow the 6 steps below to ensure your brand’s effectiveness.       

• Learn why you need to redesign your brand
• Assess the competitive landscape
• Highlight brand attributes
• Create brand materials that reflect your business
• Your materials can be integrated into your current operations
• Get feedback about your materials

Why not re-evaluate your brand?

Before you get into the details of your brand revamp, it is a good idea for you to first define your reasons. This will guide you in making the right strategic decisions during the entire process.

Common reasons why companies update their brand are:

• Your brand’s look and feel are out of date

• Your brand is no longer representative of your services

• Your company has acquired other businesses, and you want to integrate them into your brand.

• Your branding materials should appeal to a diverse audience.

A company might need new branding components for a variety of reasons. You can brainstorm the reasons you want to update your brand and help your company find the right branding solutions.

Assess the Competitive Landscape

After you have decided what you want from a company branding update, it is time to assess where your brand stands about the competition. You can get a sense of the current branding trends by examining the competitive landscape.

To help you make informed decisions about your branding journey, it is important to review the branding materials of your competitors. However, this doesn’t mean you have to conform your brand to the most popular trends. This is a great opportunity to consider what could make your brand stand out from the rest.

Highlight Specific Attributes

Having seen the branding assets of competitors, you might have an idea about how your brand can be differentiated.

Your company may have already created unique brand characteristics. These can be complemented by your mission statement, values, and vision. Your brand personality and identity will be based on brand characteristics.

Take into account your industry and current company. You may highlight the following characteristics depending on your target market in your branding materials.

• Show compassion
• Fairness
• Confidence
• Honesty
• Humor
• Passion
• Progressiveness
• Nonconformity
• Strength
• Purity

These attributes are crucial because they establish the tone for your company and set expectations for customers before they even meet your staff. Your branding should reflect a desired brand characteristic that will help potential customers feel comfortable in their first interactions with your company.

Through the brand update and development process, your company will be able to identify its unique brand characteristics.

Design identifying brand materials

This is the point where you have laid the foundation for brand-new materials. You have analyzed the positioning of your competitors and gotten a sense of how you can stand out in this market. Once you have this plan in place, it’s time to partner with a design company to create brand materials.

Logo

Your company’s logo is a key part of its brand identity. Logos are a key part of a company’s brand identity. Many people can identify popular companies by their logos.

It can be difficult to update your company logo. It is important to create a modern, clean product that will still be recognizable by loyal customers.

This balance is achieved by large companies by retaining core shapes, lines, and colors in logo updates.

Domino’s Pizza, for example, may have altered its logo’s shape, but it made sure that the colors and general patterns remained consistent.

Font

Another way consumers can identify brands is through the use of brand-branded fonts and typography.

You can make your brand stand out by keeping the fonts consistent if you are looking to update other aspects of your business’ brand.

Large companies often use imaginative typography in their logos.

You can make subtle changes to fonts to keep your style current and appealing. You might reduce the boldness or severity of italics to give your text a lighter feel.

Color Palette

Your brand colors can make a big impact on the perception of your company’s values and attributes. Your brand’s reputation could be improved by choosing effective colors for a rebranding campaign.

Blue, for example, is associated with trust and stability. Large-scale technology companies tend to use a variety of colors in their branding. PayPal, Facebook, and Twitter use blue color palettes, for example.

The power of color is in its ability to communicate. Be aware that customers who are already loyal to your brand may be confused by a drastic change in their color palette. Before changing your primary colors, talk with trusted branding partners about possible color shifts. 

Brand Guidelines 

After you have determined the visual elements of your brand, it is time to put your brand standards in one central place. This file is often called the brand guidelines by most companies.

The brand guidelines include selected colors, logos, fonts, and other visual elements in one space. This serves as a guideline for employees who use your brand to build relationships with customers.

Uber’s brand guidelines make it easy to locate key brand colors and app icon designs, as well as several graphic design elements the company uses in day-to-day operations.

Your brand guidelines make it easy to access all your brand materials and keep your branding consistent. 

Rebrand Apps and Websites with a New Brand Identity 

Once you have created new branding elements, it is time to adjust your existing products to reflect the updated look.

To communicate and display updates, companies should first look at their digital presence. To get the word out about new and updated products, they can use their apps or social media pages.

With the assistance of a development partner or an in-house team, your company can quickly implement changes. 

Get Brand Feedback 

Feedback is vital in any project. To improve the quality of your brand updates, you should solicit both quantitative and qualitative feedback from customers as well as people outside your company.

It is easy to lose yourself in brand building and have biased opinions about the results. Your feedback will allow you to determine if your brand materials solve the problem that you have set out.

Use Branding Checklists to Keep Your Strategy In Focus

A branding checklist will allow you to keep your operations consistent. While you may want to modify your checklist to meet your specific needs, the following elements can be used as a starting point.

• Learn why you need to redesign your brand
• Assess the competitive landscape
• Highlight brand attributes
• Create brand materials that reflect your business
• Your materials can be integrated into your current operations
• Get feedback about your materials

This branding checklist will help you keep your strategy aligned with your branding vision.