Setting Out to Launch a New Brand

So you wanna launch a new brand, eh?

Well, buckle up, and get ready to roll. We’re about to take off. There’s a lot of moving parts to successfully launching a brand. It’s important to stay organized and on top of all the details to make it a success. Project management is just as important as creativity in the process, and you should start with your calendar.

What is a brand exactly?

Let’s take a moment to define BRAND. Many new business owners miss a vital piece of their brand when creating a new company. Your brand is NOT your logo, colors, fonts, tagline, etc. These are brand elements that support your overall brand. Your Brand is the EMOTIONAL CONNECTION and message you are putting out to the world. It should be simple yet powerful and consistent.

The best way to establish and define your brand is with our unique Brand Archetypes process. First, you pick an archetype and then you build your brand around one single emotional idea.

Find out more here: Brand Archetypes

Take our questionnaire and see what your brand archetype is.

Pick a Date to Launch Your New Brand

This is the date that everything else hinges on. From the launch date, the team works backward to schedule the rest of the process. Think carefully about when you’re launching to avoid holidays or other events that would distract your target market from noticing what’s going on. If you can, time it to line up with a conference, festival, or another large social event. You can use it to help get eyes on your new brand!

Once you’ve picked the all-important launch date, stick to it. Depending on your branding needs you could need anywhere from six weeks to months to create and launch your brand. Plan for the work after the launch too. If this is a rebrand, you’ll need at least a couple of weeks of transition branding referencing the old brand after the launch. If your brand is new or you’re just updating the logo you won’t need transition branding at all. If you’re making a big shift to an established brand it will take more than a couple of weeks.

Make Your Plan

Who are the key audiences you’ll be communicating with? Take into account your stakeholders, clients, workforce, and community. You should launch your new brand internally first, and then roll it out externally. That way everyone on your team will be ready to go on the public launch date.

What’s the story surrounding your launch? How are you sharing the “why” of your rebrand? You gotta have this in place to make a successful launch. Creating the story humanizes the process. It connects your target market to your brand. Make it personal and your customer will connect with the transformation.

Assess your marketing materials and make a full audit of everything that will need to be updated. Create checklists and due dates to keep things organized.

Here’s a list of some of the materials you may need to create or update:

• Website
• Social media pages
• Google Business page
• E-books
• Landing pages
• Social media templates
• Collateral materials like brochures and business cards
• Signage

Create New Branding Materials

Now it’s time to get creative! Work with your copywriters and designers to build your businesses’ new look and feel. Don’t forget your brand archetype in the process.

• Logo
• Business Name
• Colors
• Fonts
• Hashtags
• Taglines
• Photos
• Graphics

Your graphic designer should be able to give you a brand guide that includes this information. Use your list of branded materials and create new graphics and copy to match the brand for each item. Don’t roll them out as you create them. Save everything until the launch date. Roll out your brand internally to employees, and then on the launch date, to everyone else.

Roll Out Your New Brand

Get excited! Share your enthusiasm for this brand your team has put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into organizing and building it. Update your social media platforms, your website, and your print materials. Before the launch date check the rules for business name changes on the social media platforms you use. The rules change frequently enough that it’s important to get the latest information on the process. It’s worth it to build a paid social media advertising campaign to get the word out about your new brand, if you’re not sure which platform is right for your brand, we can help.

Following your launch look at your analytics to see how your customer base responded. You’ll want to look at website views, as well as social media interactions. If you’ve decided to do paid ads, look at those analytics too. Are you reaching your target demographic?

Don’t forget to congratulate yourself and your team for a job well done. Updating or creating a brand is a wild ride, combining details, organization, and creativity. If your business could use a little help getting everything done, let us help with your lift-off!