What You Need to Know About Auditing Your Brand

“Failure isn’t fatal, but failure to change might be.” – John Wooden

Are you having internal issues that are causing your business to fail? Don’t have the reputation you’d hoped for when you started your business? Have you considered auditing your brand? You should.

Sometimes, even the most well-intended business owners lose their way. If your company needs to get back on track, you’ll need to take an honest and objective look at your business to determine what the problems are and how you’re going to solve the problem. Review every detail from your internal documents to your social media. Leave no stone unturned. Make sure your company is living up to the values and promises you’ve made and your brand is consistent.

After you’ve done your work, you might decide it’s time to rebrand.

Values are the Foundation of your Business

When you started your business, you knew what you wanted to do and how you were going to get there. But in all your planning, did you establish your values? What your company stood for? If so, did your company stay true to them or did it veer off path?

Believe it or not, establishing values for your company is very important. It’s why you do what you do. It sets expectations for both your employees and your customers. It’s your foundation. And the strength of your brand relies heavily on the integrity of your foundation.

Here are a few things to consider when building your brand foundation.

• Why Statement – why do you do what you do?
• Core Values – what values set the culture and tone of your business?
• Unique Value Proposition (UVP) – what promise are you making to your customers to set expectations and loyalty?
• Messaging – what tone and voice are you going to use to translate your information to your employees and customers?
• Positioning – who are you selling your products/services to and how are you going to present your products/services to your demographic?

Take time to re-familiarize yourself with your initial goals and messaging. Make sure your brand is consistent. Decide whether your company just isn’t meeting the expectations you’ve established or if you just got it wrong.

Either way, you’ll need to decide how you can make it right if you’ve gotten it wrong. That’s where rebranding comes in.

Research First. Rebrand Later.

It’s easy to say, “Let’s just rebrand the business to fix the problem”. However, that can cause more problems. All too often, we have businesses contact us stating they want to rebrand their logo and website, but they can’t really give an answer as to why. They don’t know what’s causing their problems, they just know there is one because they’re not seeing a return on investment (ROI).

However, not seeing the ROI you expected doesn’t necessarily mean you need to rebrand. You may just need to take a look at your internal processes and make a few changes. Before considering a rebrand, you’ll need to do your work to determine what the problems are and if they can be fixed without rebranding. Keep in mind, if your company is making any big changes to your brand foundation, that’s a sign rebranding is necessary.

What’s Involved In Rebranding

Rebranding is more than just changing a logo. It’s making sure your brand is consistent both internally and externally. It’s reviewing your internal and external processes and making sure you don’t deviate from your foundation. It’s making sure the messaging, design, logo, everything is consistent across the board.

Brand consistency is what makes your company recognizable and sets you apart from your competitors.

Here are some items you’ll need to focus on during the rebranding process:

• Brand Foundation (Why Statement, UVP, Messaging, etc.)
• Brand Identity (Logo, style guide & other brand elements)
• Website
• Collateral (Brochures, Letterhead, Envelopes, etc.)
• Social Media
• SEO (Website and blog content)
• Business Systems (Documents, emails, etc.)

Making sure your business is successful isn’t easy. It takes hard work and dedication. It also takes passion. If you love what you do, believe in your company and do your work, you can’t fail. So take the time to audit your brand and make sure you’re staying the course.