Extreme Makeover: Brand Edition
By: Mark Winter
The Top 10 Signs Your Company Is in Need of a
Major Brand Overhaul
How do you know when it’s time to take a good long look at your company’s brand identity and brand voice, to truly discover your company’s essence, and to re-engineer how you are communicating your company’s strengths against those of your competition?
1.| You’re constantly apologizing for your website. “We’re at company.com. You can check us out but the site is hideous and the content is out-dated.”
2.| No one in your company, not even the founder, can tell you what your logo represents.
3.| The overriding message in your marketing collateral is different from that on your website…and far different from what your public-facing team members are communicating in face-to-face meetings.
4.| What you thought was your key differentiator is the exact same value proposition being claimed by each of your top-five competitors. (Go check your competitors and weigh their messages against yours. I’m willing to bet you’re all hanging your hats on some combination/variation of “unparallelled service,” “unmatched expertise,” or “outstanding solutions.”
5.| You can’t communicate your company’s essence in 20 words or less.
6.| All of your marketing messages are centered around what you do, and not why you do it. (Hint: All of your competitors do the same things as you. Why you do it [and how] is what sets you apart.)
7.| Take a closer look. In the last five years, your market has changed, your product or service has changed, and your value proposition has changed. But you haven’t changed a thing about your outward-facing messaging.
8.| Nothing matches. You’ve added various marketing tools to your toolbox over the years (trade show booth, new logo shirts, a sales pamphlet, an e-newsletter, redesigned business cards…), but when you place them all side-by-side, none of them look even remotely alike.
9.| As you’ve grown, your business development needs have become more ambitious, but you’re still acting like a small company selling small contracts to small clients. What you never needed before but do now: a unique brand position.
10.| You haven’t thought about any of this stuff, until now.
