Many companies reach a point in their lives where it is time to reposition their brand identity. Sometimes a certain brand identity just isn't achieving the desired results. All brands needs to adapt to the market around them and evolve according to the market. Repositioning mean anything from tweaking a brand's image to fit with the changing times to dramatically changing the current personality of a brand.
There are many different types of reasons for dramatically repositioning a brand. Perhaps the brand's target market simply doesn't have high brand awareness, the target market of consumers may be diminishing, the brand may not appeal to future consumers, or the brand may simply need to incorporate a new brand image into their new marketing strategy. No matter what the reasons may be, there are certain "do's" and "don'ts" of brand repositioning that any company should be paying attention to during the repositioning process.
Do's
- Do Have a Clear Goal in Mind. You need to be clear on what you want to achieve with your new brand repositioning effort. Make sure that you are focusing on becoming more specialized with your repositioning, rather than more general.
- Do Think About Your Target Market. Repositioning your brand image does not necessarily mean changing your target market of consumers. You may very well still have the same target audience, so as you reposition, you need to cater to their individual needs.
- Do Pay Attention to Emerging Trends. One of the most common reasons companies decide to reposition their brand is because they feel as though their brand is not keeping up with younger generations of consumers. You need to utilize modern tactics to attract attention and create a strong web presence, so don't forget about this as you conceptualize your brand's altered identity.
- Do Look at the Competition. Review the competition, look at the number of competitors in your field, look at what they are doing right and doing wrong and attempt to position your brand accordingly using this insight.
Don'ts
- Don't Disregard the Current Status of Your Brand. Before you can reposition your brand, you need to be able to thoroughly review and assess the current status of your brand image. You need to understand where you brand stands today, the original concepts in brand development and current issues and challenges before you can make necessary changes.
- Don't Try to Change Perceptions Completely. When you are repositioning a brand in the market, you should focus on building upon current perceptions, rather than changing them entirely.
- Don't Confuse Repositioning with Rebranding. Repositioning and rebranding are two important yet very different things. You are not trying to completely reinvent yourself as a brand (this means taking a complete overhaul of your brand, your image and who you are targeting as consumers). This is a much bigger undertaking than a simple repositioning. Remember you are tweaking your brand, not changing it entirely.
- Don't Expect The Public To Catch On Right Away. Once you have decided to reposition your brand, it may take a while for the public to notice. Don't be tempted to try to educate the public and tell them that you have made all of these changes. Instead, continue branding your newly positioned image and let them catch on at their own pace.
Keep these "do's" and "don'ts" of brand repositioning in mind as you start on your new branding effort, and you will have a successful and seamless transition to your newly altered brand identity.