Author: Jamie Schwartzman

How can you be sure the LA branding agency you choose is safe to trust your brand with?

Your brand is your company’s lifeblood. It sets you apart from the competition, endears you to loyal customers, and wins over new ones. Before you dive into a relationship with a branding agency, you want to be absolutely certain your brand will be in good hands.

Hiring a branding agency is a unique, personal process – and it’s important to screen your branding agency carefully. Here are just some of the qualities you should look for before making the leap.

 

20 qualities your LA branding agency should bring to the table

Make sure your branding agency excels in all these areas before choosing to partner with them:

1. Strategy

Branding isn’t just beautiful typography and carefully-designed logos. For a brand to be successful, you need to uncover the reason behind every choice and map a clear path to the future. The LA branding agency you use needs a strong sense of strategy in everything they do.

2. Metrics for results 

How do you know whether your branding project was a success? Before you start a project, your agency should be able to help you set metrics for your results. This should include the impact of the new brand on your staff, customers, and bottom line.

3. Insight into your target audience

You know and love your customers. And your target audience expands beyond your current customers. An excellent LA branding agency will be able to gather and interpret data that gives powerful insight into your target audience, whether they’ve bought from you yet or not.

4. Understanding of internal branding

When you embark on a branding project, it should always be done with an eye towards executing brand-driven strategies in the future. Your agency will need a strong sense of how to successfully create and implement internal branding, as well as external branding.

5. Brand identity definition

ARBORA Brand Identity

You may already have a sense of your brand identity, but chances are good that it’s still a bit blurry. A talented branding agency will be able to bring even more power and definition to your brand identity, no matter how confident you feel right now.

6. Attention to detail

Because the last thing you want is a brand lunch, when you need a brand launch.

7. Creativity and innovation

Strategy, metrics, and research need to be the foundation of your brand. And building on that foundation are creativity and innovation, powering the strongest, most impactful brands.

8. Adaptability

No matter who you work with, company rebranding doesn’t always go exactly according to plan. Adaptability allows your LA branding agency to use their expertise on the fly, adjusting to any unforeseen circumstances that get in the way of your brand launch.

9. Transparency

Branding is a specialized field, and it’s easy to get lost in jargon, especially when it comes to results. Your agency will be completely transparent about every step of your project.

10. Strong communication skills – for you and your audience

Your LA branding agency will need to clearly communicate your message through your brand, but that’s not all. They’ll also need to communicate well with you about expectations, changes, deadlines, and creative work.

11. Responsiveness and availability

Hand in hand with communication comes responsiveness. Your agency doesn’t need to be available 24/7, but you should know when and how you can get a hold of them. You’ll also want to make sure that their availability lines up with yours.

12. Clearly laid out contracts and billing

A professional, trustworthy branding agency will have contracts that clearly define deliverables, timelines, and other key factors of your branding projects – including prices and invoicing.

13. Frameworks and processes

Great agencies don’t fly by the seat of their pants. They use frameworks like the IDEA Method to produce excellent results every single time.

14. Experience in your industry

An LA branding agency that has experience in your industry brings an extra layer of expertise to your project. They don’t just know branding, they know branding and the unique quirks of your industry inside and out.

15. Ability to monitor and respond to trends

A Los Angeles branding agency might be situated near Hollywood, but that doesn’t mean they should jump on every sexy new trend. Talented agencies know exactly what’s trending and how today’s trends might (or might not) impact your brand’s future.

16. Positive reviews and case studies

Flax Coffee Branding Case Study

Reviews and case studies offer a detailed look at what working with a particular agency is like. You can see what their strongest qualities are, how they tend to come at projects, and what others have enjoyed about partnering with them.

17. Strong team players

Your LA branding agency isn’t just one person, it’s many different professionals, all working together to create your brand. Besides working together with each other, your agency will also need to work with you and your team to create a brand that’s uniquely you.

18. Drive for excellence

Branding can literally make or break a company, so mediocre just won’t cut it. The best branding agencies are always improving and innovating to provide the best possible outcome for you.

As you’re researching, keep note of which agencies go above and beyond. Who impresses you, inspires you, and empowers you to create your brand?

19. Potential for a long-term relationship

Ideally, you want to update your brand every 3-5 years. So before you hire an agency, ask if you could see yourself working with them for not only the months it takes to finish this project, but for future projects, too.

20. Passion and pride

Finally, the best LA branding agency will have immense passion and pride in their work. It should shine through every touchpoint you have with them, from their blog to their website and from your first exploration call to the launch of your brand.

 

Creating memorable brands

As a branding agency in Los Angeles for more than two decades, Flux strives to better embody every one of these qualities, every day. When you’re ready to get started, get in touch. We can’t wait to create a memorable brand with you.

Internal branding is the unsung hero of some of the world’s most successful brands. When we talk about branding as a whole, it’s easy to reduce it to just a logo. And even once you cross the threshold and see branding in a more holistic light, internal branding is often forgotten.

It shouldn’t be.

Branding or rebranding is a massive project, so missing something during the process is not uncommon. However, with all the focus on your customers, it’s easy to forget the people that determine the success of your business in the first place: your employees.

Internal branding allows you to be a strong positive force for your employees, not just your customers. Employees at companies with strong internal brands are powerfully productive, creative, intentional advocates for your brand in ways your customers can’t be.

Like external branding, internal branding is a project you must take seriously. Unfortunately, even companies that understand the benefits of branding don’t see the value of internal branding. They end up half-heartedly putting something together.

They make sure the logo is sprinkled throughout the building. Employees get branded e-signatures or business cards. The company values are on the wall somewhere. Maybe they host a yearly Christmas party or throw a ping-pong table in the break room and call it good.

But none of it is done intentionally or strategically. They end up with a lot of parts that don’t form a cohesive whole.

So how do you create a cohesive internal brand? Let’s discuss our top tips for successfully crafting your company brand.

 

Internal branding: 6 tips to set yourself up for success

When your internal brand is an afterthought, your employees won’t be engaged or passionate about your brand. They won’t go out of their way to talk about your company to their friends and family, won’t post about it on social media, and probably won’t be too thrilled to come to work.

The key to successful internal branding is understanding that your employees are every bit as important as your customers. (Maybe even more so.) They’re the engine of your car, and you need to fuel them. If you don’t, you won’t get far. If you do, you’ll be astonished at how far they’ll take you.

Here are the best ways to achieve successful internal branding:

1. Listen to your employees

Step one of internal branding perfectly matches step one of external branding: research. Instead of researching your customers, however, you need to research your employees.

What do your employees think about your brand?

Why did they come to work for you in the first place? Why did they stay?

Do they believe your company solves an important problem?

Do they feel their work is meaningful?

These questions are only the beginning. Before you can create a strong internal brand, you need to know how your employees currently see your brand.

Sometimes, your employees already have a good sense of the brand, but they don’t feel engaged by it day to day. They may like the idea of your brand but not see how it applies to them.

In other cases, your employees may not have a great sense of who you are as a company at all.

Understanding where your employees are coming from allows you to see where your internal branding is strongest and where it’s weakest. Most importantly, it allows you to look for branding agency services that can turn your weaknesses into strengths.

2. Build excitement

Once you know what your employees need, it’s time to build excitement. You need to know when to rebrand for the biggest impact, and you need to guide people through the change.

Internal branding is especially hands-on. You won’t be launching your brand out into the world. You’ll be creating a shift in the way your employees think about the people they spend so much time with.

No one likes massive change. So when you change your internal brand, tell your employees – in no uncertain terms – exactly why you’re making this change.

What problems are you trying to solve?

What benefits will they see in their everyday lives?

Why does this rebrand matter to them?

Building excitement for an internal rebrand isn’t just about getting people fired up. It also gets people ready to put in the effort required to change the entire flow of the workplace. Without this step, your internal rebrand can fizzle out before it really begins.

3. Take your values off the wall

Don’t worry; if you have a painting or poster with your values on it, that can stay. But it shouldn’t be the only way your employees experience those values. When your employees see a visual representation of your values, it should reinforce their experiences, not introduce new information.

If you value honesty, create space within the company for people to give their unfiltered thoughts. Build time into meetings for candid discussions around the pros and cons of decisions. Give people a chance to really be honest.

If you value sustainability, create a company-wide reward system for sustainable actions like recycling. Allow employees to volunteer with green initiatives on company time. Make sustainability show up front and center in the daily operations of your company.

These are just starting points for creating tangible values. In today’s increasingly aware culture, customers and employees are starting to demand that companies put their money where their mouth is. They don’t want to hear that you care about sustainability, diversity, or honesty. They want to see it.

4. Hire (and retain) in alignment with your brand

What does your application and hiring process look like right now to an outsider? Does your brand shine through every step?

For most companies, the answer is no. The job listings are perfect clones of listings for any other company. There’s no vivacity, no personality, no reason to work for that company other than a paycheck.

Don’t let your hiring process be like that!

Your hiring process should reflect what it’s like to work with you. What do you expect your employees to do day-to-day? How do you expect them to interact with their co-workers, team leads, and executives? What kind of person are you hoping to hire?

Internal branding allows you to reach candidates that don’t just have the right qualifications, but the right mindset.

And when you have a strong internal brand, retention does an interesting thing. At first, you might notice a sudden exodus of employees that are no longer a good fit. But once the people who don’t align with your brand are gone, hiring and retention get easier than ever.

5. Create culture

Creating company culture is a complex topic on its own. Cultures develop at a macro and micro level, from your overall company culture to the cultures of specific departments and teams. Internal branding should guide all of them.

Using your internal brand to create culture is similar to taking your values off the wall. It’s all about creating day-to-day experiences that allow your employees to experience your brand – and each other.

Is your brand bright and playful? Consider hosting a happy hour or mini-golf tournament to give your employees the chance to get to know each other off the clock.

Is your brand scientific and determined? Host workshops or guest speakers to foster a deeper understanding of the problem your company solves.

Is your brand out-of-the-box and innovative? Escape rooms can appeal to the problem-solvers your teams are made of and give them a chance to work together in a more relaxed environment.

Knowing and liking their co-workers colors your employees’ perspectives on your brand. They don’t see your company as a faceless monolith. They see it as a real community – something they’re excited to be a part of.

6. Make yourself memorable

In the age of social media, being “shareable” is more important than ever. Your packaging or social media presence might be shareable to your customers, but what about your employees? Are you doing and saying things they want to share?

Company newsletters rarely get read, but there are other ways you can share your brand identity with your employees.

A social intranet platform is a great place to post shareable graphics, quotes, and benefit announcements that your employees can’t wait to share with the world.

Branded merch, and other “swag” give your employees a way to bring up your brand in casual “off-the-clock” conversations.

Spotify Branding

 

Reaping the benefits of internal branding

Internal branding is a big project. Creating consistency within an organization is difficult, but the payoff is incredible.

Imagine what would happen if every one of your employees was as dedicated to your brand as your customers are. What would customer service look like? Would there be more innovation at your company? What would your turnover rates look like?

There’s a reason people love to work at start-ups, and it’s not money or status. Start-ups often have strong internal branding. They sell their employees on the brand hook, line, and sinker.

Here’s the thing: Any company can do that. All you need is a powerful internal brand. And working with a brand identity agency can help you create (and meaningfully launch) your brand to transform the way your employees see you.

If you’d like to discuss how to create a successful internal brand with our brand identity experts in Los Angeles, reach out to our team today.

At the time this article was written, a search for “Los Angeles branding agency” turned up about 56 million results. And that’s a real problem.

Branding is a serious project, whether you’re crafting your brand for the first time or undergoing a rebrand. You’re putting the future of your business in the hands of someone else.

Your brand influences how your customers see you. How your employees see you. Ultimately, an excellent brand should reflect how you see yourself.

Choosing a branding agency means you’re choosing a partner, a guide, and an expert. It shouldn’t be an easy choice. But it should be clear.

Which of those 56 million results can you discount immediately? Who should you schedule a call with? Who’s worthy of helping you shape or reshape your brand, and how do you know?

Flux has helped companies all over the world to craft their brand. Today, we’ll be helping you understand what made our Los Angeles branding agency the right fit for these companies – and whether we can help you, too.

 

How to choose a branding agency that’s a perfect fit

Company rebranding is a complex task. When you hire a branding agency, you’re starting a relationship with a partner that can help you handle that task down to the most minute details.

So, like any partnership, choosing your Los Angeles branding agency will require excellent communication.

You’ll need to communicate well internally, efficiently scope out potential agencies, and know how to choose someone once you’ve short-listed companies.

These three pillars of communication are the difference between a project that runs smoothly and one you’ll need to shell out the cash to do over within a year, so let’s go through them in a little more depth.

Review the project internally

Whether you’re looking for a Los Angeles branding agency or considering options from anywhere, you’re going to encounter variety.

Branding agency services can cover everything from customer and market research to creative work and brand launches. Depending on your unique position, not all of these will be a fit for your brand.

Reviewing your needs internally – before you even schedule a call with an agency – will help you determine which services you’re looking for.

You’ll also need to review your budget. Branding is an investment in the health and future of your business, and that’s how you should review your budget line for a branding project. You’re investing in something, and a wise investment will pay off.

It’s important to have a sense of your budget, and also to be realistic with your agency. If you need a light refresh or a full rebrand will change the amount of work required, and an exact quote will depend on your needs.

Prepare for interviews

If you’re looking at an experienced branding agency, getting that quote will be an involved process. Great branding agencies don’t pull numbers out of thin air. They take time to go over your wants and needs, where your brand is, and where it’s going to give you a unique quote.

Hiring a branding agency takes time and communication. Block off time in your calendar, make space in your research for meeting with agencies, and have questions ready to go.

The quote is just one of a series of questions you’ll want to ask a branding agency. You’ll also want to ask questions like:

• Do you think we can or should accomplish all this in one project?
• What’s your area of expertise? Does that mesh with the goals of this project?
• How can we contact you with questions or concerns if we decide to move forward?

And chances are that the agency will use this time to interview you, too. If they didn’t, you wouldn’t be setting yourselves up for success. They’ll probably ask about your current brand, the overall health of your company, and whether you’ve worked with agencies before.

Be honest with the agency you’re speaking with at the moment. Effective brands are built on effective communication, and that can’t happen without honesty and trust on both sides.

The better you can get to the heart of what you need from your agency, the better you’ll be able to determine whether it is the right fit.

Ask about their methods and successes

Flux Branding IDEA Method

Once you’ve established the trust that would land a Los Angeles branding agency on your shortlist, it’s time to dig a little deeper.

What gives that agency the unique ability to deliver a brand that’s just right for you?

First and foremost, you’ll need to understand their method. If an agency you’re looking at working with doesn’t have a method, proceed with extreme caution. Methods and frameworks allow agencies to deliver consistently great results.

Flux uses our unique, proven IDEA Method to craft brands from start to finish. “IDEA” stands for Ignite, Distill, Energize, and Activate – and each phase hones in on something specific that all great brands need.

The IDEA Method allows us to build the components of a brand step by step, creating authentic brands that stand out in the marketplace.

Once you know the Los Angeles branding agency you’re speaking with has a method, ask to see it in action. Great agencies will have plenty of successful rebranding examples to review.

This could also be a time to ask the agency what happens when things don’t go according to plan. This will give you insights into what a day in the life of working with them is like.

 

Find a Los Angeles branding agency you can trust

Your brand is the lifeblood of your company, and anyone you trust with it should understand the gravity of that.

At Flux, we are honored to guide brands on their journey of transformation. Change can be scary, but it’s the only way forward. We believe so much in the power of change, we named our company after it. While finding the right Los Angeles branding agency might feel like searching for a needle in a haystack, it’s all about finding the right fit. If you’re ready to take your brand from now to next, we’re ready to talk.

When you’re ready to start a project with us, just get in touch. We’re honored to be part of your brand’s journey.

Branding agency services aren’t one-size-fits-all, so what do they include? And what should you look for when you’re starting your branding or rebranding project? When you’re unfamiliar with the process, branding can feel so intangible that measuring sticks seem useless.

But branding isn’t intangible.

In fact, branding is the tangible representation of who you are as a company. It’s in the things people can see, hear, and even touch – like your packaging.

So is a graphic designer all you need?

Not at all.

The job of your brand is effectively communicating ideas, emotions, and values. Specifically, communicating with your ideal customer.

What tangible things will resonate with them and reflect you?

What colors, taglines, and ideas will ring true outside of the boardroom?

Branding agency services are complex because your brand is complex. That being said, there are a few key touchpoints to look for when working with an agency.

 

Which branding agency services do I need?

Every project is unique. Are you crafting your company’s brand for the very first time and still wondering, “What is branding?” Are you undergoing a light brand refresh or do you need a rebranding agency? Do you have a sense of the direction you want to go in or are you looking for more intense guidance?

These questions (and more) will determine which branding agency services you need. As a branding agency in Los Angeles with more than two decades of industry experience, we recommend booking a call with agencies to get an understanding of how they work.

This gives you a chance to feel each other out and start to understand which services and deliverables the agency can provide for you.

Unsure where to begin? After working with hundreds of brands, we find these 7 services are critical to a successful brand or rebrand.

 

1. Market research

Your brand doesn’t exist in a vacuum. While it would be wonderful if the only people who had to like your new brand were your board of directors, that would also mean they’d be the only people seeing your brand.

Your brand is a reflection of who you are, and it’s as much for your customers as it is for you. Here are some questions about your customers that get answered with thorough market research (the first step of our branding agency services):

• • What do they want, need, and expect from you?
  • What do they associate with your brand?
  • What do they love?
  • What do they hate?
  • How do they feel about your competitors?

Deeply researching your competitors’ brands and marketing is just as important as researching your customers. What are they doing? How can you differentiate yourself from them?

Before your agency begins crafting your own unique brand, they’ll stop, look, and listen to everything happening with your industry, customers, and competitors. Truly excellent branding agencies will also do an audit of your existing brand as part of their brand strategy process. This includes how your employees see the brand and a complete picture of your industry – not just your direct competitors.

At Flux, we call this the spirit of your business. And it’s not to be overlooked.

Branding agency services that don’t begin with research are missing a crucial part of making your brand successful. They might craft a brand that you like, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a brand that delivers your message to your customers well.

 

2. Strategy

The next piece of the puzzle is strategy, and this goes hand in hand with research. If you’re considering a firm that doesn’t offer strategic branding agency services and is just focused on design, re-consider.

Brand strategy services are helpful and relevant to every branding project. Without them, you’re inviting room for inconsistencies in your messaging and visuals. Consistency is key in branding. An inconsistent brand is an unrecognizable brand, and an unrecognizable brand will erode your relationship with your customers.

Without a strategy, how will you know your bases are all covered?

The simplest form of a brand strategy is a rebranding checklist. But while a rebranding checklist is fine for DIY-ing a rebrand or gathering information, it isn’t enough to guarantee a successful brand launch.

To set yourself up for success, make sure that the branding agency services you choose include deep strategy. There needs to be a clear “why” for everything that is being done – and your agency will be happy to make that reasoning crystal clear. They will also help guide the timing and comprehensiveness of your new brand’s launch so it goes off without a hitch.

 

3. Brand Position

This may not be one of the branding agency services you typically find on a rate card. But having a trusted person or team to turn to is important to starting and completing a branding effort.

But what will you do after your contract with your branding agency is up? While they’re working with you, they can help you learn all the ins and outs of how your new brand presents itself, but they won’t be around forever.

A great branding agency will not only create your brand today, but set you up for future success.

Here’s how we do that at Flux: All our branding agency services include an internal-facing document that you can use as a guiding light in the future. It’s called the Brand Position. It’s designed to be read and used by your own team as well as external collaborators, to ensure the brand is always aligned. We mindfully craft it to ensure clarity even after our branding campaign is over.

It includes things like your audience persona(s), creative concepts, and visual tone. You’ll carry these things with you through the life of your brand. This document is going to be totally unique to you, and at Flux, we consider it one of our most important deliverables.

When you’re exploring agencies, ask them about this document. When you’re asking, remember that it’s different from a style manual, which we’ll talk about next.

You should also ask any prospective agencies about how they measure the success of a branding campaign – and if they have any follow-up services. Our work as an agency doesn’t end when the new brand identity goes live. In many ways, the work is just beginning.

 

4. Logo, language, and visuals

Genicook Brand Positioning

This is where many people’s minds jump when they think of  “branding”. Sadly, there are some agencies out there that take advantage of this. They skip over the research, strategy, and guidance required to help companies craft truly great brands. Their core deliverables are tangible visuals, and not much else.

While there aren’t many agencies that do this (fortunately!), the ones that do can leave you with a brand that has little to no traction.

Branding agencies worth working with will understand that the logo, language, and visuals are always informed by careful research.

These branding agency services may seem simple, but they aren’t easy.

For example, the logo is the most recognizable visual part of your brand. People will connect a well-crafted logo with a brand even when the name is removed.

Meanwhile, language is a powerful cornerstone of your brand. It’s your “personality.” It can help your customers decide what kind of company you are.

• • Is your voice formal or casual?
  • Do you crack jokes or keep things serious?
  • What kinds of slang or abbreviations will you use?

All of these tell your customers something about who you are as a brand, humanizing your company.

These visual elements are arguably the most important part of your brand – a picture is worth a thousand words, after all. And your branding agency will help with photos and guidelines for future photos, as well as graphics, where needed.

It isn’t hard to find a branding agency that will help you with your logo, language, and visuals. But it is very hard to find an agency that does those things expertly and excellently.

 

5. Practical style manual

Shimahara Visual Brand Identity Guidelines

While the brand position document will help you answer big-picture questions about your brand, the style manual is more day-to-day. The practical style manual collects all the assets of your brand in one place. It answers questions like:

• • “Should we use “and”, +, or & here?”
  • “Which font is our subheader in, and should we use that elsewhere, too?”
  • “What are the hex code names of our brand’s colors?”

These questions will absolutely come up in the future, as you continue to use your brand across different mediums. Without an answer to them, you’ll be left guessing. Guessing often leads to the worst thing you can do to your brand – inconsistency.

Branding agency services that only create a logo and a tagline are in some sense leaving you in the dark. Small details are just as crucial as the big picture when it comes to creating a strong, consistent, memorable brand. Keeping all the assets in one place means you can easily bring your brand across platforms, as well as bring in external collaborators.

 

6. Collateral

Spotify Studios Merchandise Branding

Collateral is another example of fairly straightforward branding agency services.

This category can cover all kinds of things. Professional and internal collateral can include things like business cards, stationary, and branded templates. Customer-facing print collateral may include signage, packaging, and websites.

And, of course, there’s “swag”. T-shirts, hoodies, mugs, pens, pencils, bags… merchandising of every shape and size.

It’s an important method of bringing your brand to life. Customers want to be able to touch, feel, wear, and experience your brand. It helps forge a connection deeper than a transaction. Your agency can help you strategically determine which kinds of collateral will make an impression.

 

7. Launch campaigns

Last on our list of branding agency services is also the most important. Your brand wasn’t made to sit in folders – physical or digital. It was made to go out into the world, to make a difference.

Put simply, branding agencies that don’t help you launch are doing you a huge disservice.

Like a product launch, a brand launch requires a lot of time, effort, and care. Executing that carefully crafted strategy isn’t something you should be left to do on your own. Your brand needs to show up as a united front – both physically and digitally.

This might include trade shows or guerilla marketing campaigns. You’ll likely need traditional advertising and direct response, including digital ads. A great branding agency will be with you all the way through your successful launch. They’ll help reduce your workload and guide you through any sticky spots. While not all branding agencies do marketing in-house, they can work with your marketing team to ensure that all campaigns are on brand.

 

Choosing a branding agency

Branding is an intimate process. You’ll be communicating everything that makes your brand unique, its very heart and soul. The weight of choosing someone as your branding agency should always be evident to that agency.

Flux is a branding agency in Los Angeles who serves customers all over the US with care and pride. We don’t just “do branding”. We craft brands – intentionally, strategically, and beautifully. We help you tell your story to the world.

Reach out and see how we can help your business discover its new identity or refine its existing one.

Rebranding is an exciting time in a company’s life. And, like any exciting time, it has its challenges. Do you use a rebranding agency or go in-house? How many changes to your brand do you need to make? What should your budget look like?

Before we get into all those questions, let’s take a moment to talk about reasons to rebrand.

Why should I begin a rebrand?

Changing your brand isn’t something that you do “just because.” The more you change your brand, the more you risk confusing or alienating your customers. This leaves many companies wondering when to rebrand.

So let’s unpack this: What are good reasons to rebrand?

Great question.

As an experienced rebranding agency in Los Angeles, we’ve found that there are five main reasons a company may need a rebrand. 

• • You’re launching a new product or product line.

• • You’re handling the fallout from a company crisis.

• • You’re launching a competitive attack to reach the top of the market again.

• • You’re facing a merger or acquisition.

• • You’re looking to refresh an outdated brand to boost corporate spirit or your public image.

Rebranding is a big decision, no matter why you’re looking to do it. A great rebrand can help you win over new customers, grab a larger market share, and retain top talent.

A misaligned rebrand, on the other hand, will be a headache from start to finish. The time and money it takes to re-do a rebrand is only half the problem – the other half is the inconsistency your customers will see.

So how do you rebrand effectively, efficiently, and without the need to re-work your entire budget?

 

What is the difference between branding and rebranding?

First, let’s take a moment to distinguish branding from rebranding. Branding describes the first time you take your company’s core values, conceptual position, audiences, and personality and distill it into something tangible.

Branding takes what makes you special and communicates that to everyone else.

Poppy Rebrand

Rebranding is for companies who already have an established brand but realize that brand is slightly out of alignment with who they are now.

Companies aren’t static. They grow, they change leadership, they add or remove products or services. And when all that happens, your brand risks becoming outdated.

Rebranding takes your current brand and brings it forward, aligning it with who you are now. And a rebranding agency can help you determine what parts of your brand should remain the same, which parts need a change, and why.

 

Where do I start with rebranding?

There’s another thing branding and rebranding have in common – they can be very overwhelming for your in-house team to oversee. There are a lot of moving pieces. A rebranding checklist may help with some of the overwhelm, but taking the first step can still be difficult.

If you’re dealing with a product launch, merger, or company crisis, you have plenty to deal with already. Those extra tasks can change how you approach your rebrand – and not always for the better. And if you’re doing a brand refresh, chances are that it has been a good long while since you touched your brand at all.

This is why we recommend that the first step in your rebranding journey is bringing in a different perspective via a rebranding agency.

You don’t need to go it alone, and reaching out for help can make rebranding simpler, more efficient, and less stressful.

 

How much does it cost to rebrand an organization?

The cost of rebranding can vary wildly depending on the size of your organization, who you choose to work with, and the intensity of the change you’re looking for. There’s really only one way to get a good idea of how much your rebrand will cost – a custom quote for your project.

When receiving a quote from different rebranding agencies near you, you’ll want to look for a few things. The agency should have a great portfolio of existing work and they should have a demonstrated methodology or a brand strategy process.

 

What is a rebranding agency?

Essentially, there are three ways to find an outside perspective. You could hire a brand consultant, work with several solo designers, or hire a rebranding agency. Each option will require different amounts of time and energy, and usually have different budgetary requirements.

Consultants typically won’t produce any customer-facing deliverables. Instead, they’ll guide the overall direction of your rebrand. They are expert big-picture thinkers and strategists.

Solo designers are on the opposite end of the spectrum. They’ll produce your customer-facing deliverables but won’t be able to offer much insight into big-picture decisions. They are the doers.

A rebranding agency does both. Good rebranding agencies will gather information on your competitors, customers, and company history. Then, they’ll use that information to offer brand strategy services and provide data-based direction to your rebrand. Once you sign off on the direction, a rebranding agency will create customer-facing deliverables to help you send your new brand into the world.

An agency is the whole package, managing your branding efforts from idea to execution.

 

Is hiring a rebranding agency better than working in-house or hiring a freelancer?

Choosing what kind of help you should bring in is tough. You have to balance different factors and viewpoints. Chances are, every member of the leadership team has their own list of qualifications. In short, figuring out how to rebrand your business is based on your individual needs.

When it comes to a rebranding agency vs rebranding in-house, you have a personal decision to make. But answering one simple question might help: How confident is your team in handling a rebrand?

Rebranding happens so rarely that many teams aren’t well-equipped to handle it. The work of doing competitive analysis, evaluating the spirit of your brand, and crafting a future vision is extensive. For most marketing departments, it’s also unfamiliar.

As a rebranding agency in Los Angeles, we find that our clients’ teams thrive when they are left to do the great work they were hired to do and leave the branding efforts up to the branding experts.

Ok, so what about freelancers?

Freelancers can be less expensive than an agency, but they’re often less comprehensive.

There are always rare instances where this isn’t the case. However, most freelancers will look to you for direction and then focus on the deliverables and execution.

And if you hire a freelance consultant to handle the big picture for your rebrand… and a freelance designer to handle your brand’s new visuals… and a freelance copywriter to work up your brand’s new messaging… you may find that you’re spending more time and resources than if you had just hired an agency. (And your team may still need to pick up some slack, adding more work to their plate than if an agency had stepped in.)

 

How do I find the right rebranding agency for me?

And now for the ultimate question: How do you find that unicorn of a branding agency?

The one that aligns your vision with your goals and comes out of the process with a perfectly polished brand identity that feels unique and authentic to you. It can be challenging, but there are a few things you should evaluate before ever signing an agreement with them.

 

A branding portfolio

Rebranding agencies come in all shapes, sizes, and specialties. But as we mentioned above, one of the first things you want to check is their portfolio.

Make sure that the agency you’re exploring has projects in your:

• • General market, without any direct conflicts of interest
  • Company’s general size range
  • Ideal style

The portfolio is a great place to look at what kinds of companies a rebranding agency has already worked with and whether those align with the direction you were hoping to take your rebrand.

 

A clear methodology

Next, check on whether the rebranding agency has a brand strategy process.

A process allows an agency to put out consistently good, professional work and gives you a sense of what to expect at every stage of the process. This means that you’ll stay on the same page throughout the project without the need to check and double-check whether everything will get done constantly.

Here at Flux, we’ve crafted the IDEA Method, a proprietary process that helps us effectively transform brands into the brand they want to be. We use it to track project milestones and communicate with our clients about exactly what we are doing.

 

A location (if it’s important to your business)

Many companies consider location when choosing a rebranding agency.

Location isn’t necessarily a deal-breaking factor, but different time zones or the ability to have in-person meetings may impact your decision to move forward with a rebranding agency. For example, we are a branding agency in Los Angeles and, while we love working with our clients all around the world, many of our local clients have chosen us due to our physical proximity to them and their businesses.

Similarly, if you are trying to enter a particular market (like DTLA), a local branding agency may help you capture the spirit of the place and people you want to cater to.

 

An organized team

Last and perhaps least importantly, you may want to look at the agency’s size and team. This is two-fold.

Larger agencies can handle larger projects more easily, but you often get less one-to-one attention, and the final result may feel less personal.

Smaller agencies may take a little longer to deal with large projects, but the one-on-one time, top talent, and stunning results make it worth the wait.

We recommend focusing on the people who will be working on your rebrand and the process they’ll be using, rather than the size of the agency. This will have the most impact in your rebranding experience.

 

Start your rebrand with confidence

Why do companies rebrand? You can have all the reasons in the world, but they all boil down to one thing. Your brand is a reflection of who you are. If that reflection is inaccurate, it’s time for a change.

That change can set customers on fire with excitement about your brand. It can allow your company to scoop up a larger market share, even when you’re up against a fierce competitor. Top talent is more likely to stay with you because they identify more closely with your brand.

In short, a great rebrand can allow your company to experience explosive growth in every sense of the word. 

The only problem to solve is ensuring that your rebrand goes off without a hitch. For that, turn to someone who deals with branding and rebranding day in and day out. Someone who understands that branding is an art and a science and dedicates themselves to creating a beautiful brand based in data.

A rebranding agency can do all of these things and more. Flux is a branding agency in Los Angeles that has worked to create brands and launch rebrands that produce results. Get in touch today to get your custom quote and launch your brand into the world with confidence.

Your personal reputation is the sum of what people say about you. Whether they’ve known you for years or have only met you once or twice, every person you meet could impact your reputation. And how people form their opinion about you is based on a myriad of factors– how you look, how you speak, and your habits and beliefs. It’s a complex mix that’s not always valued the same way from person to person.

Your brand’s reputation is no different.

Your brand reputation is the sum of everything your customers and employees say about you. And just like your personal reputation relies on many different moments in which people encounter you, your brand reputation similarly reflects your customers’ experience across all touchpoints.

You can’t control what people say about you. But you can control how you show up.

That’s why if you want to build a strong brand reputation strategy, you need to know who you are and what you stand for. 

That’s where the power of branding comes in. The branding process helps you figure out who you are, what you offer, and what’s important to your customers. A professional branding agency will guide you through this process, and then give you a clear strategy for communicating it across touchpoints. When you have clarity and authenticity in your core concepts and messages, engineering and maintaining your brand reputation becomes much easier.

 

What are the parts of your brand reputation?

Brand reputation can feel overwhelming at first. Unhappy customers have access to all of your current and potential customers at the same time. They can reach hundreds of thousands of people with the click of a button. If your reputation is the sum of all the experiences each customer has with your brand, how can you even begin to get a handle on maintaining or improving it?

That’s where your brand reputation strategy comes in. Before we narrow in on concrete steps to building a strong reputation, let’s zoom out. There are three major parts of your brand reputation at the highest level: earned, owned, and paid content.

• Earned content is what people say about you without prompting. Whether their experience was good or bad, it moved them enough to talk about it without being asked and that’s a powerful thing.
• Owned content is what you create yourself to strengthen your brand reputation, including content marketing and using customer reviews in your marketing.
• Paid content is just what it sounds like – content that you pay for and then use in your brand reputation strategy. Think paid ads, influencer campaigns, etc.

A good brand reputation strategy will have to take into account how your brand shows up across all three of these content segments. Your brand reputation strategy should seamlessly manage your reputation across multiple channels, including paid advertising, word of mouth, reviews, and online presence. It’s not easy, but it’s well worth the effort in brand loyalty and trust.

Here are 10 things you can do to improve your brand reputation, even if you’re just getting started.

 

1. Determine your brand identity

Shimahara Visual

First and foremost, you can’t manage or improve brand reputation without knowing what kind of reputation you want to have. Brand positioning gives you an internal document that details who you are, what you believe, and who your customers are.

At Flux, we consider this so important that it’s a critical step in our IDEA Framework. We craft brand positions for every single one of our clients.

 

2. Make sure your workplace culture is consistent with your brand

Culture isn’t just for employee retention, it’s also a key part of your brand reputation strategy. Making your brand an integral part of your culture means that good reviews of your brand aren’t restricted to your customers – your employees will advocate for you, too.

On top of that, when your brand is a part of your culture, your employees will be able to easily create a seamless customer experience, since they’re upholding your brand, too. In fact, improving brand reputation has to start internally before it can be external.

 

3. Re-examine your customer service standards

Customer service is one of the first places people go when they have a problem. A customer service team’s response can make a customer loyal for life… or send them off to damage your reputation.

Whether you have a full team, a couple of people to handle complaints, or outsource your customer service, this is a good time to review the procedures and standards they follow. A brand strategy services company can help you translate the internal brand positioning document into something your entire team can use, including your customer service department.

 

4. Personalize your brand experience

One of the biggest mistakes customer service agents make can also be found in sales departments. The problem? Being too impersonal. No one likes to feel like a number, and without personalization, that’s exactly how your customers will feel.

Personalizing your customer’s experience as part of your brand reputation strategy means that your customers will feel more valued. When customers consistently see that you care, they’re more likely to be outspoken in their appreciation of your brand. An experienced branding agency can help you find ways to show your customers you care from your first interaction to your hundredth and beyond.

 

5. Be consistent 

Across each and every customer touchpoint, consistency is a crucial part of a good brand reputation strategy. As many as 74% of consumers will take their business somewhere else if they don’t have consistent interactions with a brand.

Inconsistency can make prospective customers wonder if they’re looking at the same brand. Current customers may have their trust damaged by inconsistent interactions – are they going to get the Dr. Jekyll version of your brand or the Mr. Hyde version?

This is why consistency isn’t just important in your brand reputation strategy, it’s important when executing brand-driven strategies across the company. Consistency is the difference between a brand that customers will happily recommend and one that they may not even stay with themselves.

 

6. Stay aware of your online presence

How do you know whether people are recommending your brand or disparaging it? While there’s no accounting for word-of-mouth, the internet is much easier to monitor.

Google Alerts will let you choose keywords such as your company name, products, and other things you may want to keep an eye on. Then, they’ll alert you when there’s new content with those keywords in it on the web.

Your brand reputation strategy, like your marketing strategy, can’t leave social media out. Tools like Talkwalker, Agorapulse, or Keyhole can help you quickly address negative feedback and boost positive posts.

 

7. Know how (and when) to respond to feedback

Social media has opened up entirely new avenues for brands to talk to their audiences directly, and vice versa. While some feedback is positive, other feedback isn’t quite a glowing review. Your brand reputation strategy needs to have a protocol for dealing with comments and concerns on social media.

Wendy’s has become infamous for its clever Twitter “clapbacks”. But the consistency and cohesiveness of their posts points to a deliberate strategy for handling all kinds of comments and requests.

Meanwhile, General Mills struggled in 2021 with a lack of a plan. A man claimed he found shrimp tails in his Cinnamon Toast Crunch. While the company was “privately very nice”, their public Twitter account dismissed the incident. As a result, General Mills became the butt of many jokes.

The man who found the problem continued to be transparent about his experience with the social media and customer support teams, including publicly stating that he had lost trust in the brand.

Unfortunately, this isn’t all that unusual. While the cancel culture phenomenon seems to impact a new brand or celebrity every day, few seem to know how to react. Creating a plan for feedback like this ahead of time as part of your brand reputation strategy can allow you to take control of the narrative – before the internet takes that control away.

 

8. Have a strategy for events

Cancel culture also tends to show up around a few key events, like Pride Month, Black History Month, and Indigenous Peoples’ Day. Why? Brands that don’t have an authentic stake in these communities year round may try to show up solely for these events, but the results can become tone-deaf and performative.

Your brand reputation strategy, like your marketing strategies, can’t be static. You have to be willing to let your brand grow and evolve, particularly in culturally sensitive situations. A branding agency with brand reputation services can help you overcome your own blind spots and be proactive about cultural sensitivity year-round, rather than simply on one holiday a year.

 

9. Encourage people to champion your brand

There are many ways you can encourage satisfied customers to become strong advocates of your brand. The simplest is prompting users to leave a review after their experience with you. You can take this a step further by offering them a referral code for a discount on future purchases.

You may also choose to work with affiliate marketers or influencers as part of your brand reputation strategy. A quick word of advice if you go this route, though: make sure you specifically work with influencers who reach your target audience.

Influencers help you leverage emotional branding because their audiences feel close to them and know what they represent. When your brand aligns with theirs, you can amplify the emotions your brand creates and build even stronger relationships with potential customers.

 

10. Ask for help when you need it

Finally, don’t be afraid to ask for help when you need it. Crafting a brand reputation strategy has a lot of different parts– it’s not easy to keep them all under control all the time.

Putting that extra work on yourself or your team before you’re ready can lead to extra stress and burnout. In turn, that can hurt your workplace culture and customer experiences, defeating the purpose of trying to improve brand reputation.

While your team is adjusting, you might choose to work with a brand positioning agency like Flux. An agency can help figure out who you are, what you offer, and what’s important to your customers. We’ll then give you a clear strategy for communicating it across touchpoints, whether that’s social media, events, sales, customer service, or anything else. When you have clarity and authenticity in your core concepts and messages, it’s much easier to engineer and maintain a strong brand reputation.

Your brand reputation, in many ways, is your brand. It’s the way people think, talk about, and act towards you, and it can’t be neglected.

Get in touch today and see how Flux can help you maintain and improve your brand’s reputation.