Refreshing Your B2B Brand: If Not Now, When?

Positioning yourself as a trailblazer in your industry isn’t as easy as it once was. With the rise of social media in the past decade partnered with the sprout of new start-up companies launching off the back of the recent pandemic, your biggest advantage of stealing the show may actually be… a refresh. 

Now, a refresh doesn’t sound like much. But if you consider all elements of the re-branding process, you’ll soon realise that it’s not as easy as re-designing a logo. It’s the font, the colour palettes, the shapes, icons, website, name, social media, marketing strategy, values; the list goes on. In short, you may need expert advice and skillset to execute your company re-brand. That’s where we come in!

Repositioning Your Brand

Considering what customers associate with your brand along with in-depth target audience research­ is key. If you’re changing your status in the marketplace, you need to ensure that repositioning is done correctly in order to keep up with the wants and needs of your customers. With repositioning comes relevancy, so consider the following: 

• Are there new segments to your business/offering where your existing positioning doesn’t resonate?
• The changing attitudes of your audience and the overall market
• Competitor Research – where do you sit in your competitor matrix?
• Target audience – owning your sector. Breaking down your industry by looking at personas and pain points of decision makers will effectively create a resonating marketing strategy

Identity Development

A logo is the symbol of the business, not the entirety of the brand. Long after you’ve made a sale, your product and/or service leaves a standing impression with your consumers.

Hearing ‘Coca-Cola’ usually creates a visual image in your head of their well-known logo.

• Coca-Cola’s brand identity begins with a red logo with central script text. The red is supposed to elicit confidence in the person who drinks the beverage, while the white script typeface is related to enjoyment.
• They print their logo on a unique shaped bottle, telling customers that what they get is ‘The Real Thing’. This is how the brand developed credibility and trust.

If It Isn’t Broken, Don’t Fix It

Back in 2010, GAP presented the world with their new logo, their first redesign in 24 years.  As marketers, this was, to be blunt, devastating to watch, as the re-branded logo was scrapped after just 6 days (9th October – 11th October 2010).

However drastic it may have looked for the company, an understandable scenario is often the idea of the re-brand being solely PR stunt material. If the reason for the new logo was because their brand strength wasn’t where they had planned for it to be, this release will have generated monstrous amounts of feedback while also successfully creating a buzz for the love of the old logo. This was simply a clear example of an unplanned re-branding process, but furthermore, a perfect learning opportunity for marketers.

It’s Not All About Being Online

When considering your company re-brand, you want to ensure that you stand out from the crowd at industry events where you’re attending, presenting or exhibiting. Basically, your brand needs to translate to print and look good in real life.

And example of our experience in this is the design of our client Hark’s exhibition stand, created and installed by Imageco. It consisted of two wall structures, branded front and back with a clean, simple shapes in the brand colour palette. Exhibition delegates were taken by surprise with the moving 6-foot wind turbines and holographic fan that presents a constant moving image of the logo and strap lines.

It was paramount that the Hark team were able to discuss and illustrate the power of their IoT platform in real-time. So we designed and built a bespoke component podium that housed both sensor equipment and IoT edge gateways. We finished this with a 52” flat screen mounted on the side wall so the Hark team could surprise and delight new business prospects.

If you’re looking for expert advice and skillset to execute your company re-brand, get in touch with our strategic team of creatives and innovators – we’re happy to help.