Whether you’ve just started or you’ve been around for while and have recently considered rebranding your small business, it’s likely that you’ve had experience with logo design at one point or another.
Hey, you might have designed the original logo yourself – giving little strategy to its creation, whipping it together in Word, and printing it out for the world to see.
Now, years later, your business might be doing great! But your logo has remained the same…as has that stack of business cards collecting dust in the corner of your office.
You may or may not be embarrassed to give the cards to clients. Needless to say, it’s probably time to consider your next strategic move: rebranding a small business.
But before you dive in, you will need to ask yourself if you ever truly “branded” your small business in the first place. Best practice is to solidify the details of your branding and design strategies before your move forward.
First question: What is branding, exactly?
Well, it’s not a logo, and it’s not even a color palette on your website. Branding is what others say about you (and your company) when you’re not in the room. It’s the opinion your customer have formed. It’s how your company is perceived.
Here’s how to identify the best time for rebranding a small business:
You no longer consider your small business a start-up.
You’ve grown, your company has grown, and the world around you has changed.
If your brand isn’t meant to speak to the 22-year-old college student customers you once served, then it’s time for a rebrand.
Your logo is outdated, making the decision to rebrand a necessity.
The decision for rebranding a small business can be rooted in multiple factors, but one of the most common? Your brand is old & dated, unintentionally turning away new clientele.
While there are some brands that have withstood the test of time, they’ve also spent millions of dollars to do so. With a budget like that, they’ve been able to focus on market research and sound strategy, in addition to consistent relevancy upkeep.
For the rest of the world, however, that price point (and approach) is a bit less feasible – both for big and small businesses.
Maybe you didn’t have the time or money to make that kind of investment at the start, but now you’re ready to pay special attention to your branding and make the decision to change an outdated logo or design.
You have the money to invest in a quality redesign that matches your brand.
You’re now starting to realize that your good-intentioned nephew’s best attempt at a company logo design just isn’t cutting it anymore.
Sure, it was fine at the beginning when you were getting your dream off the ground, but now it’s hard to compete with the other businesses in town. Rebranding your small business is worth the money if it communicates to your audience the quality of your work!
But what about brand recognition?
Many businesses don’t want a brand-new logo. Instead, they might be more interested in some updates to their existing brand.
This form of small business rebranding could be as simple as updating the font or colors in your logo and website or changing the tone of voice in your social media posts. It certainly does not always mean changing your business to look completely different.
Of course, a new logo isn’t the solution to a branding problem. Like we mentioned before, the brand is how your audience perceives your company. Ask yourself the following questions to determine if a rebranding is right for you and your small business:
- Does your brand reflect your current values and offerings? If not, how have they changed?
- How do people respond to your current branding?
- What are some problems that people encounter with our company?
The answers to these questions will help you decide whether or not rebranding a small business is right for you. Whether you’re looking for some help answering those questions or you’d simply like to pass off the rebranding responsibilities to a professional, Brindle Digital Marketing is at your service! Small business website design and branding are our specialty. Get in touch today!