When to know it's time for a re-brand.
Does your branding feel like its no longer aligning with who you are or what you do? Perhaps it's not attracting your target audience or isn’t moving in the direction you had envisioned?
A key part of our work at The Binding is collaborating with our clients on their brand refreshes. For this post, we thought we’d share what we’ve learnt from our experiences and the journeys of those we’ve worked with to provide some helpful indicators when it’s time to update your business’ visual identity.
01
Your Business Model has changed
Throughout your business’s history, your goals and strategy may pivot as a response to any number of local, national or global factors. Perhaps you’re expanding from a small at home business to commercial storefront or maybe you’re strategically downsizing to focus on a niche market.
Whatever evolution your business is undergoing, your branding and identity should reflect this, in order to stay relevant to your target audience. Building upon, testing and adjusting your brand identity is as important as updating your products or services.
Think of companies such as Apple, Pepsi or Instagram - they rebrand and streamline their visual identity as they refine their purpose, visions and company culture. Being aware of how your visual identity connects to your business model is an important part of building a strong and cohesive brand.
02
You’re not attracting your target audience
Do you find that you are getting traffic but not traction? Or perhaps you continue to get enquiries for products or services that are outside your offering or scope.
Your branding should be aligned to your businesses core values and your logo and any supporting branding materials should reflect what you stand for and what you offer.
If you’re an early stage business, establishing your values and core target market is an important step in the development of your business. This also provides a reference point for a designer to connect connect to your values and ethics with a strong branding visuals.
If you’re an established business who is not attracting your target audience, try a market research group to determine if your present branding is having its desired effect. This process of assessment and reflection may mean your branding and visuals need to be adapted to further enhance your brand perception.
03
Your branding reflects a design trend that has come and gone
Perhaps your initial branding didn’t capture the true you or your branding reflects a design trend that doesn’t reflect your business’ values and/or target market.
Businesses evolve over time and we often hear that our clients have moved on from what they initially believed embodied their business.
So how do you know when it's time to make the necessary changes to your brand identity? Well if that bottle neck can be resolved by refining how the business is portrayed in the public eye then it's time to sit down and figure out who the business really is and where it's heading.
And remember being relevant doesn't mean jumping on trends, it means leading the way and making your business stand strong both within and outside of your industry.
If you found yourself resonating with the above points then it might be time to consider a new direction for your branding to better attract what you reflect.
The Binding is a branding studio that specialises in designing web, print and logo designs that are refined yet memorable visual identities for people pioneering the lifestyle and tech industries.