Our brand looks dated. Do we need a rebrand or a refresh?

A dated brand needs a refresh, unless the business itself has changed. If you now sell something different, or to different people, you need a rebrand, and it starts with positioning, not a logo. If the brand looks dated only because it’s used five different ways, you need rules, not a redesign.

Start with what changed

Has your business changed, or only the way its brand looks to you? You see the brand on every invoice and email you send. Your customers see it in passing, so you’ll tire of it long before they do. Tired isn’t the same as dated.

If your business hasn’t changed, the most you need is a refresh. But if you used to sell to homeowners and now sell mainly to builders, a new logo won’t win builders while your website and proposals are still written for homeowners. Positioning is deciding who you’re for, what you offer them and why they’d choose you. The look comes after.

Check how the brand is used

Lay a year of your web pages, social posts, proposals and emails side by side. If the logo, colours and typefaces still hold up, but your proposals use one blue, your website another, and every social post a different font, a new design would soon look just as mixed. The fix is rules for using them, with a worked example of each rule. Then give one person the job of approving every piece before it goes out.

Decide what to keep

Test each part of your brand with two questions from brand researcher Jenni Romaniuk’s book Building Distinctive Brand Assets (opens in a new tab). Do buyers link it to you? Do they link it to you alone? Anything they link to you and a competitor works for both of you. Put the questions to people who buy what you sell, from you or anyone else. Your own team is too close to answer. Keep what passes both questions, replace what passes neither, and refresh the rest.

Tropicana’s cartons showed an orange with a straw in it, the image shoppers knew the brand by. In January 2009, a glass of juice replaced it. Some customers complained they couldn’t find Tropicana on the shelf, and within two months the company went back to the old carton. A 2010 study of its supermarket sales (opens in a new tab) estimated the new carton cost about US$27 million in lost sales.

Roll out changes in this order

1. Tell your staff first, and explain why. They use the brand every day, and customers will ask them about it.
2. Switch over what people see most, such as your website, social profiles and proposals.
3. Reprint business cards and brochures as the old stock runs out.

Whatever you change, your customers have to learn again.