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Should We Rebrand?
Posted By: jdcordray on 2/10/2007 3:47 PM (CST)	500 Points
I am the owner of a company that I have had for 35 years. When the company started the main focus was commercial relocation. As the years have evolved and the needs of the industry have changed, we have as well. In doing so, I created several smaller companies that were their own division (i.e. diff. company name). The idea was for the companies to work together as a team. However, at this point, the divisions are very separate. For example, the design part of the company may have a lead for planning, design ,etc. It would naturally lead to them involing the moving division as well as office furniture, etc. Additionally, we have created a lot fo confusion for the customer. Due to the different company names, they are often not aware the company offers extensive services. I blame myself, as I did not create one brand message when developng these other companies. So, at this point, after talking with a branding consultant, I decided to bring the company under one name - it holds the logo of the original company, with a little differentiation in color (more modern). The new name also contains part of the old company name, as it has a lot of equity. My question is, "Am I doing the right thing?" There is going to be tremendous cost involved in rebranding. I feel though that we can not stategic place ourselves in the market without having one message. I realize there are going to be a lot of internal issues. We are currently working on a plan to make each person a champion of the new brand. So, do I move ahead? Or leave the companies separate and hope for more harmonious dealings with each company. I am a firm believer that once we move in a direction, I will commit myself fully to that plan. Thank you for any help!

Posted by: CarolBlaha	Accepted Answer
2/10/2007 3:59 PM (CST)
If the issue is communication -- just putting everyone under one umbrella might not solve it. You will have to build a system for the communication. In working with a nonprofit I helped found in Colorado, they decided on dynamic governance as a way to communicate with nationwide, autonomous chapters. Their way of organizing by circles is a very effective way to build communication. The feedback loops provide a fair process and keeps open communication flowing This is a link to one of my blog entries on it. http://salesqueen.typepad.com/sales_talk/2006/07/dynamic_governa.html#more. Other sources are to google Sociocracy, Dynamic Governance and Holacracy. The creator of Holacracy gives a good case study of how it works in the private sector. Good Luck Carol Sell Well and Prosper tm

Posted by: wnelson	Accepted Answer
2/10/2007 4:47 PM (CST)
Jennifer, The reason you state for rebranding is a sound one. If you believe having one brand umbrella will net you increased sales and profits because people value a "one-stop shop" for your service/product range, then that's a good reason. However, the right way to go about making this decision is through survey of your customers to make sure you the extent of the brand confusion and the amount of business you are missing with the confusion. If you validate the assumption - that you are indeed losing revenue with the multiple autonomous divisions, then this gives you your answer. The second part of the decision is to evaluate the return on your investment of the branding investment. You know the cost and from the surveying you ascertain the benefits. If the ROI is acceptable - go full steam ahead. If not, scrap the idea and all you've wasted is the cost of the branding consultant. I would be surprised if the elimination of brand confusion couldn't be remedied through other means. For instance, co-branding might fix this as well at perhaps a lower cost. Having alternatives is always good because you can evaluate the best option. I hope this helps. Wayde

Posted by: jdcordray	Author Response
2/10/2007 4:53 PM (CST)
Thank you for the responses. I had not thought of co-branding. To be honest, this has not been mentioned by anyone. Can you provide me with more details on the benefits of this process. How is it different from rebranding. We are planning to have two focus groups in the next week or so. One will involve customers and one with employees. Given that we want to keep the group under 10, how would you go about picking the customers for the focus group? Also, any advice on the "right" questions to ask each froup so that the results are accurate and measurable? Again, thank you to everyone. This is such an amazing site!

Posted by: wnelson	Member Response
2/10/2007 5:13 PM (CST)
Jennifer, Co-branding is where two companies enter into a partnership for joint products/services and advertising. For instance, if Swanson's entered into an agreement with Kentucky Fried Chicken, you'd have Hungry Man Kentucky Fried Chicken dinners. The Swanson's Hungry Man logo and the KFC logo would appear on the box together. Ads and TV commercials would have both brands featured together. Without more information, I can't give you relevant specifics. With respect to your focus groups, how you pick the customers is dependent on how many divisions you have. Advice on the right questions - well, it would depend on which options you want to include: Keeping the same brand, rebranding, co-branding, etc. I would advise you to hold off on doing this until you have this sorted out. Do you have a marketing research person helping you with this? I am an expert in many aspects of marketing and in particular, the rebranding process and market research. If you would like to give me a call, in my profile is my website. Email and phone contact info is on my website. Feel free to contact me. Wayde

Posted by: W.M.M.A.	Accepted Answer
2/10/2007 8:31 PM (CST)
I'd just like to jump in (not for points), and highly recommend that you retain Mr. Nelson to assist you with moving forward with this project. We found his company and personal guidance to be a vital asset in developing a survey/focus-group program for one of our start-up clients. His assistance helped us to move the client forward in their launch by 4-6 months. He has a unique methodology in uncovering crucial information, that engaged the audience, resulting in more informative responses than we believed possible. We have since worked with him on several successful projects. One conversation with him should be all you need to make the right decision to hire him. Randall WMMA

Posted by: jdcordray	Author Response
2/10/2007 9:27 PM (CST)
Thank you - I think that a phone call to Mr. Nelson sounds like an appropriate step at this time.. We do have a marketing person, although I must admit this is a new position in our company. I have to be honest and say that for years it was enough to give value and outwork your competition. This is still critical, but more components are involved in creating a long term co with strong AR'S. The person who is heading up the marketing used to work with RJ Reynolds in marketing. He has a very comprehensive understanding of marketing, as well as our comapny. However, I feel like it may be too much to ask him to lead and create the entire process. One last thing, as a company owner, with approx. 6 branch offices (small but profitable on razor thin margins. another thing that has changed over 35 years - margins! ) and 75 employees on an associates level, not including service people, can anyone give me a ball park of the cost of rebranding? What is the reasonable cost of a consultant to consider in budgeting? Again, thank you for all of the help.

Posted by: wnelson	Member Response
2/10/2007 10:04 PM (CST)
Jennifer, Typically the costs of rebranding include printing of new letterhead and envelops change-out of all business cards, change of signage, reprinting of all collateral material (brochures, white papers, etc.), replacement of any uniforms and company shirts, replacement of labels on trucks and company cars, replacement of any billboards in play, and anything else that has the old names and logos on it. I'd recommend strongly that the consultant work with your new marketing person. Given he is new, you would be a great boss to bring help in for him/her. Cutting him/her out of the "fun" would undercut him/her. You want his/her buyin with the implementation of whatever comes from the focus groups/surveying/analysis. And with the marketing person in the project, this should reduce the consulting cost as well. Wayde

Posted by: telemoxie	Accepted Answer
2/11/2007 12:21 PM (CST)
There may (or may not) be a significant dangers involved in combining the companies. Before making a final decision, I would look very, very closely at where you are getting your business currently. For example, since your customers are unaware of these multiple divisions, maybe your competitors are as well. I don't know, but it is possible that, for example, your furniture sales representative is in a "lead swap meet" or networking club where he or she gets leads from, say, a competitive relocation company. If such "networking" results in 2% of your business, then it is not a big deal.. but if it results in 20% of your business, you risk losing significant referrals by creating a single brand. (I know a very successful company which positions itself as two companies: one is a print shop, which does not do design work and sells to design companies... and one is a full service design and printing company under one roof, who sells direct to "end users".) Also, you risk losing the "focus" of doing just one thing. If I personally had to pick between 1) a company who only did corporate relocations, and 2) a company who did relocations, and sold furniture, and did space planning, and designed offices, and provided staffing, and sold refrigerators, and did weddings, and walked dogs - I would pick the first company. There are many, many folks on this forum who know much more than me about branding. But, if it were my company, since I don't understand branding very well, I would begin by creating a new and separate brand which did everything, while retaining my existing other businesses, and I would try to assess the results based on actual experience, rather than gambling my 35 year established business on one roll of the dice.

Posted by: Alireza Mojahedi	Accepted Answer
2/11/2007 1:06 PM (CST)
Jenifer, I think one brand will be usefull if all of your brands are in good position. If one of your brands in its market have a good position and is famousa and have a big market share but other one is very unknown brand in its market, if you make a brand as a holding company or group or joint venture (or what you call it) you will damage to your famous brand without helping to your powerless brands. I think because of you have some oldest brands, you make a group name that its logo comes tith other brands, as the brands are a members of big family Regards, Alireza

Posted by: mbarber	Accepted Answer
2/11/2007 3:55 PM (CST)
Hi Jennifer - all good advice thus far I think Carol's focus on the internal communications issues is a very important one. Even if you got the singlular barnd, that doesn't mean that it alone would improve the cross fertilisation of leads. That would need something for more specific. The other issue as Wayde and Dave have pointed out revolves around the idea of where your focus lies. Yes by all means an internal focus might lead you to see the need for beter internal communications (and Branding is likely to be but one of those steps) and then with an external focus you become alert to the needs of your existing customers (and potential ones), the issue over your competitors and so on. I note your question over cost for the change over. I suspect that if it is a case that your business units are not sharing data at the moment (which can be as simple as a once a week board meeting with all concerned regarding a KPI around 'sharing leads') then you are probably missing out on far more each month than what an amortised re-Branding investment may require.

Posted by: jdcordray	Author Response
2/11/2007 6:44 PM (CST)
Wow! So much to think about and discuss. I appreciate all of the feedback. I do understand the point about "offering too many services." I guess I should clarify and say that we have found that as the industry has changed, people want to be able to deal with one vendor to complete several small projects within the larger project. It allows the customer to have one person they deal with and to execute their ideas. It reduces the level of miscommunication for the client, as they can tell one person the scope of their project. It also has the downfall that if you have errors internally, on our side, the clients needs can be misevaluated. Having been in this business for 35 years, we would never survive with just doing the corporate relocation. The margins are so small now. We have tried to grow the company in response to the clients demands and overall industry change. For the most part, our competitors are offering this cafeteria of services too. Believe me, it would be great to do just one thing, but the competition would eat us alive.

Posted by: Alireza Mojahedi	Member Response
2/13/2007 8:22 AM (CST)
Dear Jenifer, Did you think to merge your brands? I think your business is in defferent roots like a tree and need to become small and fast and lean by merging the units and their costs in one central unit that serve the other companies (Your brands). I think the problems is not more brands. the main problem is become more lean to have more core competency and in this situation you think about merging or not. If it is right leaving out any thing that it is not useful for your customers Regards, Alireza

Posted by: jdcordray	Author Response
2/22/2007 8:00 PM (CST)
I think that these have all been very helpful answers. At present we are exploring all of the options. I think it is very important to anyone who is considering to rebrand to remember that it is not about throwing a new name on an old toy! It is so helpful to gain the insight/expertise from these forums! I applaud each of you for taking the time and enery to respond! I will try to keep you updated!

Posted by: carrie77	Moderator Response
3/3/2007 6:35 AM (CST)
Hi Everyone, I am closing this question since it's more than 2 weeks old. We do this to reward the contributions of participants in a timely manner + to give increased visibility to the newer questions. Thanks for participating! Carrie (Production Editor)

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