A startup brand is like a shark, if it stays still too long it dies. The startup business strategy of 'pivoting often' actually works great for startup branding as well, as long as it's done right.
At Condensed we are always trying to push our clients brands forward and helping them re-invent themselves, with this said, there are some core components of your branding that should never change.
Startups are sometimes 'required' to rename because of law suits
It seems obvious that a startup's name should never change. When creating a new brand, many times naming is rushed or done by the founders without doing enough dilligence. Some great names have been created by founders, but naming is an artform, and when you name companies a lot, often you can get better at it, and even gain a sixth sense of what will and will not work in the market, or cause trademark disputes. We've helped re-name several startups and it has mostly been done because of trademark issues, so it's important to get this right from the beginning. The extra time and money it takes to do it correctly is very small in comparison to the amount of time, effort, and money it takes to re-name a company after doing business for a while.
Great logo marks don't ever need to change - EVER
Whether it be a word mark, a brand icon or a combination of both, this can be considered the 'cornerstone' of the visual brand, the rock that never changes! Look at the type based logo Coke or the symbol of the Nike swoosh. Can you imagine some top C-level execs at Coke sitting around a boardroom table discussing how to improve their wordmark? Or changing the curves on the Nike Swoosh to make them 10% better? These logo marks are timeless and iconic and they should never be messed with. So many re-brands lately have thrown the baby out with the bathwater by loosing their history and all the things about their logos that made them recognizable in the first place. I'm looking at you Johnson & Johnson.
Core Brand Values are forever <3
If the logo mark is the cornerstone of the visuals, the core values are the cornerstone of the messaging.
Core values are like the soul of a brand. They should be well defined and understood or else a lot of other things that come later, like the tone of voice you choose to communicate, or the message you try to convey, won't make any sense or feel cohesive.
Build your long-term vision
When coming up with the vision for the company make sure it's something lofty and looking to your ideal version of the future where you accomplish that amazing far off dream goal. This vision should not be changing, it's there to guide you for the life of your brand.
Limiting vision statements are ones that can be acheived and moved on from, like say for instance my startup made a website builder for fitness coaches (an actual project we are currently working on). If the vision was to 'Make a platform that can transform the lives of fitness coaches' that's better than 'Making a platform to give a fitness coach the best website'.
Examples of 'unlimited' visions (these will never need to change):
- Ben & Jerry’s: “Making the best ice cream in the nicest possible way”
- Lego: "A global force for Learning-through-Play"
- Linkedin: "To connect the world's professionals to make them more productive and successful"
When to re-invent a brand
Literally everything else about the brand can (and should) be in constant flux. Pivoting and evolving the company's messaging and visuals over time keeps the brand looking and feeling young and relevant. Rewrite your mission, re-think your tone, re-work your supporting graphics, type, photo direction... Just be sure to start with the correct foundation; without core values and a visual 'north-star' (the logo), things will quickly fall apart.
One trend is for some brand agencies to say that the 'logo' is over-hyped and not as important as the entire system. They aremissing the point, a strong mark is needed to anchor that amazing system. We named our agency Condensed because we like to simplify things, condense them to their simplest version and make sure they still are expressive. The logo-mark is the simplest expression of the brand and we think it's incredibly important.
Need to create or evolve your branding, tell us about your brand.
