Unexpected Ways a Rebrand Can Supercharge Your Team Culture

Your brand says everything about your organization. We’ve written before about the power of branding for social impact, but have mostly focused on the external benefits. Often, people underestimate the power a rebrand can have on your internal team culture. Namely, the clarity of purpose that a rebrand creates can have a massive impact on the morale and effectiveness of your entire organization.

A rebrand may not be the top priority for everyone at your organization and garnering support can be difficult. Budgets are perpetually tight and there’s so much other work that needs to be done. But before you kick the can down the road, take a minute to explore some of the internal benefits a rebrand can offer.

There are four overlooked advantages to a rebrand that ultimately push your cause forward in ways you may not realize. A rebrand:

• Re-energizes your team around the work they’re doing

• Clarifies purpose and aligns your team

• Ensures you’re moving in the right direction

• Creates buzz when you reintroduce your new identity to the world

When it’s the right time for your organization to do so, a rebrand is worth it — and simpler than you think to make a case for.

What’s in a Brand? More Than You May Realize

Ambiguity is one reason many organizations put off a much-needed rebrand. What do you need to change? What are all the tangibles and intangibles that should be revamped? What’s the ROI?

Your audience knows your brand by its visual logo or wordmark, colors, imagery, and messaging. But in reality, there are many other important aspects of your brand that are often overlooked.

A rebrand also directly impacts your:

• Mission, Visions, and Values: The pillars that shape strategy and decision-making for your brand

• Niche: How you fit into the larger social impact ecosystem, and how you are different than other players in the space

• Communications: Messaging and positioning, as well as your tone and personality in both written and spoken communications

• Website: The visual look and feel of your digital hub and everything on it — iconography, photography, video, and digital content

• Social media accounts: The language you use and the content you share

• Collateral: Presentations, printed materials, t-shirts, marketing materials

• Physical space: Your office space, organization owned vehicles, signage, even furniture

• Experiences: Your events, as well as other real world interactions that you organize and manage

• Needle-moving actions: The marches, protests, or other actions you lead, fundraising drives, or other mobilizing work

• Interactions with your community: How you participate and contribute to those in your geographic community and cause community

As you can see, there’s a lot more to your brand than meets the eye. A rebrand forces you to peer into all the dusty corners of your organization that you never considered as part of your story.

The choices you make, the things you say, the places you show up and the things you do — they all define your brand. It all matters, and it all needs to speak with a unified voice.

Revive Your Team’s Commitment to Your Social Impact Organization’s Cause

Work in the social impact world isn’t easy, but it’s all the more rewarding. A rebrand reminds your team why.

The kind of people who work for organizations like yours have an inherent passion for creating change. It’s likely what drew them to your organization in the first place. These people want to believe in the mission of where they work. Their job is part of their identity — more than a paycheck and benefits. This is especially true in the social impact sector.

But burnout still happens to the best of us.

And if your brand doesn’t effectively represent the credibility and value of the work your team is doing, it can make them feel unappreciated or even embarrassed.

A rebrand is the perfect opportunity to galvanize and remind your team why they’re there. It’s a prime time to reaffirm your organization’s vision, thereby encouraging a reconnection to the task at hand and with each other. And it can spark much needed momentum to push the work forward.

All of this — reestablishing your mission, vision, and purpose — is a real advantage that nonprofits, foundations, and social enterprises alike have over their for-profit counterparts. Highlighting why your team should be proud to be doing good in the world is an act that other sectors have a harder time genuinely pulling off.

In essence, a rebrand can be a robust morale booster. One that recommits people to the purpose behind the cause. It fuels them to work through long hours under tough constraints because of the reason behind it all.

Bring Clarity of Purpose to Your Social Impact Organization’s Team

Everyone has different priorities and perspectives on the work they're doing. It could be based on their role, life experience, prior work experience, or personal priorities. This often results in an internal dissonance and unaddressed lack of alignment behind your organization’s missions, vision, and values, or a shift in priorities over time.

Internal misalignment sucks the productivity out of your team. It can send the wrong message to your supporters and ultimately move you further away from achieving meaningful change.

A rebrand serves as a realignment and recommitment behind your purpose. To do it well, you have no choice but to define what your specific focus is and why. If you find your mission has splintered off in disparate directions, a rebrand is your chance to trim what’s unnecessary and get back to your core purpose.

Perhaps you’re challenged in a different way: You have a broad vision that everyone’s behind but it isn’t clear how you’ll achieve your goals. You don’t have a niche area of focus, or you’re too similar to other organizations in the same space. Perhaps you’re just trying to solve every problem you can because there are just so many and you can see how they all connect.

No matter where you find yourself, focusing on defining your niche in the ecosystem is the first step to getting everyone on board — including your supporters. There is truly no better opportunity to do this than during a rebrand. Working with a creative agency is a great way to help guide your team during this process.

Need to Pivot Where Your Organization is Going? Rebrand

Your organization has most likely organically evolved since it first started. From your founder’s story to today, your mission isn’t exactly the same. And that’s OK. But it’s still important to know where you’re going. A rebrand can help bring those hard-to-answer questions to the surface.

Asking questions like the following can shed light on those ideas and frameworks that no longer serve your mission direction:

• What work do we prioritize?

• Where do we put our focus?

• What projects do we say yes or no to?

• Who are we? And who are we not?

Mission creep is a slippery slope. Now’s your chance to combat it.

At the end of a rebrand, your team will be confident in the path that’s laid out ahead.

New Brand, New You: Ignite a Spark and Reset Expectations

Your most loyal supporters will follow you through thick and thin. But for others who haven’t bought into your organization yet, a rebrand may be what captures their attention — and finally convinces them.

If you’re looking for a way to raise your organization’s profile, jumpstart your supporter base, or simply hit refresh, a brand rollout campaign has your name on it. When done right and with a creative agency’s expertise to guide you, it can signal that you’re fresh, relevant, and ready to take on the world. Or, at least tackle systems-level change in your area of focus.

Not only can debuting a new brand story create buzz around your cause, it can also reset expectations for your supporters and realign them behind your mission.

Like your team, maybe their idea of what you’re all about has gotten skewed along the way. Now’s your chance to set the record straight.

A Rebrand Is a Long, Winding Path That You Shouldn’t Travel Alone

By now you realize that a rebrand brings a lot of positive advantages to the table. It should be no surprise, then, that a rebrand is also a heavy lift. It requires different areas of expertise to do it well and to do it right.

But it’s worth it — for your team, for your supporters who depend on you to inspire and inform them, and for your mission.

Of course, you don’t have to figure it out on your own. Nor should you. That’s where a creative agency fits in.

If your brand no longer reflects your organization and what it stands for, let’s connect.