Branding For Dummies®

Chapter 17. Revitalizing Your Brand

In This Chapter

• Evaluating your need for a brand update

• Aligning your brand to current times and market conditions

• Launching your revitalized brand

As you open to this chapter, the word “rebranding” is probably on your mind, but chances are good that “revitalizing” better explains the brand revision you're looking for.

Rebranding is a catchall term that marketers use when they talk about updating their brand identities and reputations. Especially when business is down or competition is up, the idea of rebranding arises along with hope that a new logo, a new slogan, and maybe even a new name will be the magic pill for an image turnaround.

In fact, few brand owners really need or want a total brand overhaul. Complete rebranding involves basically erasing your current brand identity (along with much of the considerable value that goes with it) and starting the brand development process all over again, following all the steps explained in this book.

Sometimes rebranding is in order (like following a major acquisition, a merger, or a major change in business direction). More often, though, instead of rebranding, marketers need to revitalize their brands by updating their identities to make them more contemporary, more competitive, and a clearer reflection of the businesses they represent.

This chapter helps you to determine what kind of a brand revision you need and how far you want your identity update to go. Then it helps you plan the steps involved to make ...