rebranding Archives - Amy DeLouise

ReBrand Lessons from Cadillac

boards, brand, communications, governance, Leadership, marketing, nonprofits, social media, video

You could have knocked me over with a feather when my teenager said “Cadillac’s are cool” as we passed a dealership. I realized this was the rebrand success story of the century. When I was his age, Cadillac stood for “old people’s car.” Granted, it was a car for old people with money. But it was definitely not cool. The fact that a young demographic is showing interest in this brand is a testament to the success of the Cadillac rebrand strategy. Fallon’s remake of the Cadillac brand, with help from a company-wide post-bailout GM makeover, is a journey that other organizations—even nonprofits interested in rebranding—can look to for lessons.

Lesson #1: Build on core strengths. Cadillac built its new campaigns around its (original) competencies in engineering and bravado, taking on BMW, Audi and Mercedes by a commitment to out-engineering those brands and appealing to those “making it,” not just resting on their laurels or playing it safe. Figure out your brand essence, and build on it. Avoid getting sidetracked with those features or programs that aren’t your core competencies. Get input on a tag cloud from your various stakeholder groups. You might try the “what our brand is now” versus “what we want our brand to be” and see where there’s overlap. Often this is the core mission or competency.

Lesson #2: You don’t have to toss the old logo; just reimagine it. Cadillac’s shield was in many ways a relic of its age as a brand. The shield would seem like a negative in a world of sleek and simple car logos. Instead of tossing the image, the graphics team built a whole new, razor’s edge focus on technology using the lines and negative space of the shield.

Lesson #3: Commit to a talented rebrand team. Cadillac had pitches from many firms, and landed top talents in motion graphics, sound design, research, and creative direction. While your company or nonprofit may not be hiring a top agency like Fallon Minneapolis to shepherd your project, you can still assign a rebrand team made up of internal and external talent whose goal is to think big.

Lesson #4: Show your customers and products in action…with video. Even if you can’t produce a slick spot like this Cadillac aspirational ad you can do what the ad does: show your “target consumer” using your product. If you are a nonprofit, that could mean showing an African village using the new well you just dug. If you’re a hospital, show a happy child and their family after a life-saving surgery. In the corporate world, let users champion your product or service by creating their own videos of themselves using your brand. Set up a Pinterest page and let your “users” pin their favorite images of the brand in action.

Lesson #5: Bean-counters shouldn’t win over “car guys.” (See Bob Lutz’s book on this topic.) Don’t get me wrong, bean counters are often the ones who let us know we’re in trouble. They are the ones who say the business model isn’t sustainable, that some aspect of the brand isn’t selling well. But the visionaries and key stakeholders—the ones who really Get the core mission and values—are the ones who must ultimately re-invent the brand. If your rebrand team only assesses bottom line, you may end up cutting the very programs, products or services that make your brand distinct.

March 11, 2013/0 Comments/by Amy DeLouise Producer/Director/Author

Making an Old Brand New(ton)

brand, communications, fundraising, marketing

I’m a fan of the Fig Newton. Sorry, I mean the Newton–its new moniker in a rebrand campaign rolled out by Nabisco this week. Other old brands needing renewal could take note of their strategy.

Born in 1891, the Fig Newton was billed as a “cake” rather than a cookie. These tasty morsels featured heavily in my after-school snack repertoire as a kid. Something to do with the texture–soft on the outside, chewy on the inside, with a touch of crunch from the fig seeds. But now Nabisco has decided figs aren’t sexy. They’re too much like prunes. But the Newton still has healthy ingredients that can be touted. So Nabsico took away the modifier, added new flavors like raspberry and blueberry, threw in some whole grains, and rolled out a new ad campaign. Plus they launched Newtons Fruit Thins, which target boomers like me, rather than our kids. (And hey I have to admit, they’re pretty tasty. Though my advice to Nabisco would be to go easy on the Rock-Hard Pieces of dried lemon in that variety—we oldsters have fragile teeth!)

Declines in sales were reversed, largely thanks to the Fruit Thins. Other aging brands could take a page from this campaign by McGarryBowen, part of Dentsu—launched this week.

Understand Your Unique Brand Promise. Newtons were always about containing real fruit. That hasn’t changed. The packaging of the message has.
Be Relevant. Don’t stick with a name that doesn’t help you sell who you are. Consider your core values and those of your customers/donors/prospects.
Be Different. If you want to stand out from the other “cookies”—don’t try to blend in. Dare to be different and flaunt it. The Newtons campaign avoids animation and other kid-targeted elements common in cookie ads.
Your Market May Be Aging. Change with them. Give them new offerings that meet their needs, while still putting out a core product that can attract new, younger fans.
Invest in Your Change. If you’re going to roll out a rebrand, you can’t just change your name and logo and hope the customers will follow. Of course you don’t have as much money as Nabisco, but every department involved in communicating to customers or donors or volunteers (which is pretty much everyone) needs to be briefed, vested, and ready to engage as a new brand.

May 3, 2012/0 Comments/by Amy DeLouise Producer/Director/Author

Tips for Rebranding a Nonprofit

advocacy, boards, brand, communications, governance, volunteers

Solid branding is just as critical for nonprofits as it is in the corporate world. A brand that is not aligned with organizational goals, principles, and donor investments, is in serious trouble. And because a re-brand can take time and dollars away from key mission, it scares people . Nonprofits can also find re-branding daunting because it can be a deeply emotional process for donors, long-time volunteers and staff. Here are some reasons to do a re-brand and ways to make it a productive, even exciting process.

Why Re-Brand?

1. Your name/logo/tagline no longer reflect your true mission.

2. No one knows what your mission is when they hear your name.

3. You are expanding your mission and want to ensure all your external materials reflect this.

4. You have gone from being a collection of local or regional organizations to being a national one and need a new, unified identity.

Reasons NOT to Re-Brand a Nonprofit

1. You have multiple and divergent missions that not everyone can agree on (not a re-brand issue, but a good reason to embark on a strategic planning process).

2. You’ve really messed something up (you need crisis PR and brand attention, but not necessarily a re-brand).

3. Your logo style and color is dated (this may be true, but may not be reason enough to give up the brand capital associated with it).

Okay, let’s assume you’ve gone through all the due diligence and decided it’s really time for a change. What’s involved?

A Strategic Plan for Your Brand

Branding is always an act of imagination. The question to ask if you want to re-brand is “will this help propel our mission to where we envision ourselves 10-15 years from now?” Or, in the lingo of corporate brands, “does it help us deliver on our brand promise?” And just as you have a multi-year road map for your organizational work, you need a strategy for your re-brand. Here are three things to focus on in a re-brand and questions for your board and staff to consider.

1. Programs and Services. Are they consistent with our mission/vision?

2. Governance Structure. Do our bylaws, board governance, and staff-board and staff-volunteer relationships effectively support our programs and services? Do we offer a consistency of vision and goal-setting across all parts of the organization?

3. External Signifiers. Do our name/logo/tag line/communications channels help people understand our mission, vision and value to our community?

So many organizations start a re-branding with the externals and then fail at the re-brand because the internals are still not quite in sync.

Brand Identity Touchstones

Another element to success is checking in with key constituencies. I’m not recommending crowd-sourcing your new logo. But when considering changing any key aspect of your branding—colors, logo and/or tag line—consider these useful perspectives:

1. Current customers/clients/donors. Organizations that already have deep roots into social networks can use them for feedback. But it’s also good to use old-fashioned focus groups, with a trained professional to run them. However realize that all of these sources are subjective and subject to change from a variety of external pressures you can’t necessarily control.

2. Prospective customers/clients/donors. This one is always a bit harder to pinpoint, but a firm specializing in both quantitative and qualitative survey data can help you hone in on key sub-markets and assess the resonance of your new branding with them.

3. Vendors. I know, on first blush this seems odd. But as one of the people who often has to deal with people’s new logos (for multimedia/video production), I’m often struck by how they don’t work across multiple mediums. Check in with your essential communications vendors–from printers to video producers to webmasters–and be sure that you are considering the fonts and colors that work best in their media.

As you craft your new brand vision, always come back to mission. Consider how your donors, volunteers, policymakers and the public will remain confident that you will provide the value they expect and deserve.

July 18, 2011/0 Comments/by Amy DeLouise Producer/Director/Author

Pay Attention to Your Employment Brand

brand, communications, marketing

It’s easy to forget that your Employment Brand matters. But it affects your overall brand perception significantly. How people perceive your organization as an employer affects staff morale, customer service, and your ability to achieve results. Companies like Walmart learned quickly back in 2005, when their poor healthcare coverage was revealed, that they ignored employee needs at the peril of their brand. In addition to health coverage, your employment brand includes policies like flex-time and maternity/paternity/parental care leave.

And the impact of the choices you make towards employees extends beyond them to their family members–your company’s extended family. I worked with a 50-year-old corporation on a branding and marketing project, and as part of the process polled and interviewed many of the staff. One of the founders shared his concern that the company was losing its reputation as family-friendly. He recalled how they used to invite families to an annual picnic, go to ballgames together, and invite the wives (back then!) to special company dinners and recognition events. He acknowledged the firm needed to find new ways to involve families. I pointed out the firm could become more family-friendly by also acknowledging its people needed time away from the company.

With a Blackberry in every pocket, setting boundaries that allow employees to have “off limits” time is difficult, but in my view essential to creating a positive employment brand. But let’s face it: when you burn people out, they don’t perform at their best for you or your customers. Calvert Investments has repeatedly won awards as a great place to work largely because it supports work-life balance and good health for its team. Some of their non-traditional benefits include paying 100% towards health club membership, paying 100% towards public transportation, helping employees pay for a bike or walking shoes if they use them to get to work, paid parental leave—to see school plays, chaperone a field trip, etc.

So what can you do to ensure that you create a culture of a great employer?

Focus on your mission and let staff do the same. Empl0yees get very frustrated when they are side-tracked from job goals by things like excessive meetings or unproductive reviews.
Offer routes to advancement and professional development. People need to feel they can improve and learn.
Offer feedback loops. If staff get additional training or educational experiences, give them the opportunity to share back to the group.
Consider non-traditional benefits that don’t cost a lot but encourage good behaviors–time to work out, time to volunteer in the community.
Consider how much time “on” you are really expecting from employees and assess staffing. If you’re expecting one person to respond to customers 16 hours a day, that job probably needs to be split up among more people.
Assess what flex-time and telecommuting options you can offer that reduce employee stress and time on crowded roads.
Look at the companies that repeatedly win top employer awards and see how they have developed a positive employment culture

An often overlooked component of employment brand is the perception of your company from the outside–from those applying for jobs. A job applicant today could be a staff leader tomorrow. Or a customer. Or a donor or volunteer. Except when that person is completely turned off by your job application process. Today, job applicants are faced with a “buyer’s market.” So employers may think it’s acceptable to not be responsive to applicants. I have a friend who’s an executive and has been in the job market for many months and it’s shocking how many corporations have had high level managers interview her face to face as a finalist for a job, but then not made the effort to even send an email if she is not selected. Don’t think that I’m not influenced by this treatment when I consider doing business with these entities.

What should you consider about your job application process as it relates to your brand?

Who is receiving applications and responding to applicants? This person is now the “face” of your organization. Make it clear they should be courteous and prompt in their responses.
What is the process by which you notify applicants you have received their application? At a minimum, send applicants a brief, polite email acknowledging the application. This will save time and frustration handling phone calls.
What is the timeline for your process? Let applicants know what to expect.
If an applicant doesn’t succeed, you should notify them–again a brief email will do.

These aren’t difficult steps, but they can make a difference in how well your company competes in the marketplace–both for excellent employees and for satisfied customers.

June 21, 2011/0 Comments/by Amy DeLouise Producer/Director/Author

Is It Time to Change Your Name or Tag Line?

brand, marketing

The simplest way to tell the story of who you are to everyone you contact is through your organization’s name. A second opportunity to communicate your mission is through your tag line. It is amazing how many groups have names and/or taglines that, at best, don’t tell people what they do, and at worst, confuse them about the organization’s mission.

What’s in a Name?

If you are just starting an organization or are very new, it’s critical that you take a look at your name and see if it conveys your story, or at least some critical parts of your mission. Miriam’s Kitchen is one such nonprofit, a soup kitchen and social services organization in Washington, D.C. that addresses the root causes of homelessness (watch Michelle Obama’s visit there earlier this year on You Tube ).

The word kitchen of course conveys that Miriam’s serves food. Using the possessive of the name connotes a homey and welcoming place. People from a Judeo-Christian background may also recognize Miriam as a biblical name. Since the nonprofit was created by a church (Western Presbyterian) as part of its urban ministry, that is an important connection. Miriam was the older sister of Moses, a woman of faith who helped to serve her people and supported their release from bondage and, in effect, homelessness. So the name Miriam’s Kitchen conveys a message about why the group does the work it does (because it feels God calls it to do so) and how it operates (by helping people be fed and find a home). All of these elements make Miriam’s Kitchen a great name for a nonprofit that feeds and supports the homeless.

We’re Too Old to Change Our Name

If you’re an older organization, you may think a name change is too difficult and expensive. You may be right. Both goodwill and community connections are associated with your name. But there also may be missed opportunities for immediate brand connections during email and direct mail campaigns. And with the increase in on-demand printing and online communications, the cost of reprinting costly brochures is less of a consideration. Take the Sitar Arts Center in Washington, D.C. Originally named the Patricia M. Sitar Center for the Arts in honor of an arts education advocate for the children of the Adams Morgan neighborhood where the Center is located, the name also evokes the historical Indian instrument. But the Sitar Arts Center is a vibrant urban arts center providing visual, literary and performing arts experiences for economically disadvantaged children in the District of Columbia. To ensure it communicated its mission more clearly, a recent re-branding campaign shortened the center name to Sitar Arts Center with the tag line “celebrating kids, arts and community.” This is a good compromise for an organization wanting to keep its original name but better convey mission.

Given the importance of electronic communications today, your name and tag line will appear literally hundreds if not thousands of times every day as members of your staff and volunteers are emailing people about your work. And that goes a long way towards detracting from or supporting your brand. Every institution should re-examine its name and tag line at least every 5 years, or when you are conducting your regular strategic planning. A good match can help with donor and marketing campaigns. And a mismatch is not something you can afford.

Are you considering a name or tag line change? What are your biggest obstacles? What are the opportunities? Please share…

August 25, 2009/0 Comments/by Amy DeLouise Producer/Director/Author

Choosing the Wrong Communications Tool Can Really Screw Up Your Brand

marketing, social media

I was recently reminded of how important it is to choose the right communications medium when I opened my office email after the July 4^th holiday weekend. To my surprise, my in-box was chock full of emails—more than 200 of them. This seemed odd. Could there have been some massive event I wasn’t aware of? Then the culprit emerged. The university orchestra of my alma mater had sent out an email encouraging people to “chat” about their experiences in the group. Hmmm. A group chat through email? Not an invitation to join a list-serve or a fan group on Facebook?

I trolled through the first handful of emails and realized that not only had the organization chosen a poor format for this lovely outreach idea, but that almost everyone contacted had responded “reply all” when asking to be removed from the list. Voila! 200 increasingly nasty emails were created, and were still replicating as I watched. And one of the last ones I read reminded me of how badly your brand can be damaged by such a seemingly innocent mistake. An alumn said they couldn’t believe the university had sent such a missive and they wanted to be removed from all future lists and never hear from the place again. Ouch!

I quickly sent off an email to the VP of Public Affairs saying, essentially, “your brand is on fire.”

Brand wound self-infliction isn’t as uncommon as you would think. The Washington Post recently produced marketing fliers promoting a series of private, sponsored off-the-record dinners between policymakers and journalists that set off a firestorm of controversy about whether or not the Post could maintain its brand of journalistic impartiality.

So, how to choose the correct medium for your message?

1. Know Your Audience. It’s important to know how your audience prefers to be communicated with. I recently sat on a marketing panel at an independent schools conference and one audience member asked whether they should be sending out emails or Facebook invitations to their alumns. I responded with another question “have you ever asked them?” It’s really important to periodically query your target audience(s) about how they like to be reached. A quick email survey using a tool such as Survey Monkey can suffice.

2. Know Your Options. Trying to jump-start a conversation that goes on beyond your initial contact? A Facebook page or Linked In group might work best. Trying to get customers to respond to something new? Offer a clickable coupon link that also takes them to other content you want viewed. Want to reach potential donors? Send them a link to a You-Tube video that tells a short but compelling story about real people benefiting from your organization’s work. And be wary of e-newsletters. If you must send them, make sure they have easy navigation and clickable links to full articles (one group I support still sends a PDF–yuck!).

3. Know Your Limitations. Donors and customers don’t want to hear from you every day. Prospective donors and customers want to hear from you even less. So be thoughtful about your communications tool, and then the content you deliver with it. Offer information and connectivity that is truly useful to them.

4. Know Your Internal Content Generators. Yes you have standards and best practices. Surely my alma mater does. But clearly not everyone knows them. That’s because users/content generators are everywhere, not just in the PR office. Educate early and often. Rinse and repeat.

5. Know Your Power. Electronic and social media, when used correctly, can greatly magnify and support your brand. Use them well…or else.

COMING THIS MONTH (Wed, July 29th, 1PM EDT): Free Teleconference on Helping Your Board Support Your Auction Success. For more information/to register, click here.

July 7, 2009/0 Comments/by Amy DeLouise Producer/Director/Author