How to Do a Rebranding Process for eCommerce

In such a competitive virtual environment as we have today, establishing strong branding for your eCommerce is more crucial than ever. While positioning is one of the most important thing to launch your business, your brand identity is not set in stone. If you still haven’t made a concerted effort to introduce your eCommerce to the world, it’s time to fix that. Do some rebranding work.

And even if your business already has strong branding, there may be instances along the way where you realize you need to change your brand identity. It could be due to many factors, from a merger and change in business direction to keep up with market changes and culture.

If you’re considering rebranding, here are five essential steps to succeed in the eCommerce rebranding process.

 

Have a plan for rebranding 

Before starting the rebranding process, it is essential to have a project management plan to define the schedule, budget, goals, and actions necessary to complete the task.

Visuals are great for making this complex task simpler. For example, to define the schedule of actions and the professionals involved in each activity, try using a Gantt chart, an easily editable type of chart to follow the evolution and changes.

The project management plan should be a formal document that presents how a project should be executed and should present the teams involved in each activity, such as research, development, and analysis of results.

Consider including in your planning a visual checklist showing everyone involved the steps and actions that the project must complete in a given period. DesignCap Checklist Infographic Maker is an excellent tool for communicating tasks in a friendly and memorable way, providing people with material that is easy to refer to and can be edited as activities are completed.

Additionally, in checklist infographics, design elements help separate activities by department, using different colors or shapes for each sector involved.

To manage the entire activity without neglecting any aspect, you’d better form a dedicated team and make a schedule.

You can use a timeline infographic to break the process into more minor phases while listing responsible individuals and designing deadlines. You can make phases, such as creating the new logo, defining new content, and communicating the rebrand.

Thinking of the number of stages and stakeholders involved, you can also use task management software to approach the process in an organized way and track progress.

 

Conduct research

While rebranding isn’t an irreversible process, you can’t change your company’s image every two years. Therefore, before embarking on the process, it is vital to conduct extensive research to hit the target.

Rebranding aims to create a stronger and more memorable brand identity that your target audience can better relate to. So start surveying your customers, understanding how they perceive your brand and if this aligns with how you want to be seen.

It will help you identify gaps in your current brand and get ideas for your rebranding strategy. You should also assess your competitors and decide how you would like to differentiate your brand and reposition it.

Another critical point is to do a SWOT analysis. This type of diagram helps to visualize strengths, opportunities, weaknesses, and threats and compare them with those of competitors.

 

Redefine mission and positioning

Business of eCommerce rebranding goes far beyond changing the eCommerce logo. It is a structural transformation of mission, values, and positioning reflected in the visual identity and content you will create.

Based on the insights you’ve gained from the survey, it’s essential to identify problem areas, measure customer satisfaction. You can deliver improvements on the new brand to meet business objectives.

Take Domino’s Pizza as an example. It decided to reinvent itself after receiving a bad reputation for selling pizzas with little topping. From bringing new recipes and enhancing service and updating its logo and communication tactics, Domino’s has managed to reposition itself and change perceptions.

To identify gaps and establish your brand’s mission, repositioning it to meet customer needs better.

The best way to connect the insights you’ve gained from research and repositioning is through concept maps. Using this type of visual image makes it  faster to present your ideas to the teams involved. And the image encourages brainstorming collaboration.

See how a concept map connects concepts and actions starting from a central idea. A marketing strategy is branched into secondary points, tactics to achieve a particular objective, and points to define the necessary actions.

 

Redefine content marketing

Once you’ve established the new positioning, it’s time to implement it in your marketing materials and communication channels.

It’s a great idea to create an extensive list of everything that needs updating as part of the rebranding exercise. Here are some items to get started:

• Redesign the site to reflect the new branding;
• Optimize website content and meta tags to rank for new keywords;
• Update social media profiles with new profile pictures and header images;
• Update email signatures.

Think through all the internal and external touchpoints and make sure you make the change to ensure consistency.

 

Communicate the changes

After all the work you’ve put into the rebranding strategy, design, and implementation, it’s critical to communicate changes and keep customers, employees, and partners informed.

Start by informing your employees, particularly your customer support teams. Tell people what led to the evolution and redefine the way forward. This change needs to reflect your business plan, and that can only happen if you involve your employees and are transparent.

Communication with the customer is another important aspect. You don’t want your customers to come across new brand identity and find your eCommerce site strange.

You can pay an agency to send out a press release. Besides, you can publish a company blog post or even send an email to your customers announcing the rebrand to build brand awareness.

 

Conclusion

Doing a good rebranding has a substantial impact on how your audience will perceive your eCommerce store. Before creating an online store or revamping your image, you should not change branding frequently.

So, when deciding to remodel your brand identity, make a detailed plan. Research in-depth the image that your customers have of your eCommerce; analyze the competition and establish a clear schedule and objectives.

Remember to openly communicate to your audiences through newsletters, blogs, and social networks. Even you can communicate them though the press that you have repositioned your brand. To avoid awkwardness and generate curiosity about your new image.