I recently had the pleasure taking part in an ‘in-conversation’ style keynote with Claire Eva (Director of Audiences & Media, V&A Dundee) as part of the AMA Conference 2021, and we took a deep dive into the recent rebrand project I lead for National Museums Liverpool. We spoke about everything from the briefing process, stakeholder engagement through to how we developed our brand strategy, creative direction and how to make our new brandworld come alive through exciting applications. Of course, we also spoke a lot about how we faired trying to deliver this rebrand project through the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and the pros and cons of delivering the project almost fully online.
It was great to have so many delegates joining the session and for all their questions throughout, some of which we were able to answer during, but not all. I also invited further questions after the event and received quite a few, and thought a better to try answer them properly would be to put them into an article instead of trying tweet responses.
If you’re interested in finding out more about National Museum Liverpool’s rebrand project, then take a read of a recent interview I did with Museums Association.
YOUR QUESTIONS, MY ANSWERS
What should and shouldn’t go into a brief?
You should always articulate why you’re embarking on a rebrand or brand development project at that specific point in time. Specify what you’ve currently got in place, why it isn’t working, what you’re hoping to achieve and what success looks like as result of rebranding or creating a new brand. You should also ensure you’re clear as possible about expected outputs along the way and your desired final deliverables as it will dramatically effect costs overall.
Things to consider;
Research & Engagement: What activities do you want the agency or consultant to undertake with stakeholders (trustees, employees, funders, audiences etc.) to engage them in the process and through what means (workshops, surveys)?
Mock-Ups, Templates, Print-Ready Artwork & Production: You should try and specify if you want design mock-ups for certain things so you can see how they could look, what useable templates you want (e.g. Letterheads, Presentations) and/or what specific print-ready artwork you want delivering so you can print / produce yourself (e.g. Business Cards, Banners, Uniforms).
Website: State whether you want your website re-skinned or redeveloped by the appointed agency or consultant, or whether your existing digital agency / in-house team will undertake this work.
Manufacturing: For some organisations you might have wayfinding or exterior building signage. You should state if you want mock-ups produced but importantly whether you want the agency or consultant to handle the manufacturing and physical replacement.
Timeline: Give an indication of your ideal timeline for the project, and when you would like it to be completed, and don’t forget to flag any key milestones such as anniversaries or launches that need to be met. In my experience, you should expect a rebrand or the development of a completely new brand to take at least 4 months, and possibly lasting up to 12 months depending on the complexity. Agencies will provide their own proposed timeline for the project, and sometimes it’s a negotiation, but don’t rush it.
Top Tip: Brand is not simply about a logo or colours. It’s deeper than that, and its a brand strategy that you require, and your creative outputs (logos / colours) are an extension of your brand strategy. I specifically state in my briefs I do not want to see creative concepts at the point of agencies quoting. Whilst it’s tempting and exciting, its distracting, and it’s not really aligned to anything other than what they perhaps think might look good. I ask for examples of work they’ve undertaken for other clients that demonstrate their ability to deliver certain types of work and achieve certain types of objective. Their existing work will give you a strong indication of their expertise as well as a sense of their originality, flare and creativity but don’t just choose an agency because you like their visual portfolio - you must dig deeper.
Top Tip: I always like to be clear about what I also don’t want. For example, since god knows when, I state I don’t want Brand Guidelines as a PDF because they’re too rigid, not easy to update and tend to collect dust (virtual and physical). You can now use solutions such as Brand Cloudlines, and if you’re interested in using something similar, say so in your brief and state that the initial set-up costs should be included in their quote, along with information to understand on-going costs.
Top Tip: Don’t fall into the trap of dictating minute detail such as your preferred colour options and fonts. Those choices happen at a much later date, based on the work you do as part of the process to devise your brand strategy, and if you’re too prescriptive, you could actually put some great agencies and consultants off, its what they do, they are the experts, and they want to do it through a proper process, not for it to be a fait accompli.
Top Tip: You should state if you’re open to paying for a custom typeface (font) or not. Custom fonts can be very expensive, so if that’s not possible, specify that it must be an existing font from a foundry, licensable at a reasonable cost. You will be responsible for paying license fees to use any fonts regardless whether its existing or custom, and the costs will adjust depending how you want to use them such as a) distributing it to all users in your organisation b) use in commercial products such as merch and c) use on your website / apps. Once you get to exploring typography options as part of the creative process, ensure they don’t just provide you with nice looking fonts without understanding the costs associated with the points I’ve stated above.
Top Tip: This is a personal choice but in my experience I never state the budget available [to the frustration of some agencies or consultants] because if you say you’ve got £30k you will find you’ll get quotes which are essentially based on that alone, and more often than not, and by some kind of miracle, your quotes will be very close to the top end. You will also find there is a lot of ‘other costs’ outside of the core quote. I prefer to simply say we’re not providing a specific budget. When they present their costs, ask for a rate card alongside.
Top Tip: If you’re a charity, ask in the brief whether the agency or consultant will offer you a discount, and of course how much.
I could write an entire article on just developing briefs and things to watch out for (maybe another time) but essentially you’ve got try and avoid any surprises for either those responding to the brief, and importantly yourself.
What are the key steps in a brand project?
Most agencies and consultants will have their own approach but as indication you can expect something along the lines of:
Discovery: Understanding of the project and/or organisation, defining the project requirements, market and competitor research, engaging with stakeholders...
Strategy: Explore your mission, vision, aims and defining your brand proposition, principles…
Architecture: Explore your current approach and define your future architecture model…
Creation: Develop creative concepts, evaluate with stakeholders and refine concepts down to a single creative direction…
Application: Create final assets, develop templates, build guidelines…
Activation: Plan your rollout approach to ensure your brand is across all of your key assets such as your website, signage, posters etc. You might also develop a specific launch campaign, a creative activation (e.g. art installation inspired by your brand) and even host an event…
Management & Analysis: Training of staff to protect and manage your new brand, on-board organisational brand champions, undertake analysis about the reach, effectiveness and impact of your new brand etc…
When refreshing or establishing a brand which encompasses different venues [or high-profile programmes] how do you create a strong connection between them whilst still then allowing them to have their own personalities?
National Museum Liverpool has seven truly unique museums and galleries, each with their own unique collections, exploring very different themes, and attracting and connecting with different audiences. Naturally, this means each of our venues has a distinct personality already, and our intention from the outset wasn’t to suppress this distinctiveness but to elevate it, give it more freedom, connect our venues better with each other and our masterbrand (National Museums Liverpool), and use a strong brand strategy as the framework for better storytelling.
We spent a lot of time exploring what those connecting factors were and could be, and if we could distill them into our brand strategy which created connectedness but gave each venue greater permission to be more experimental and embrace their uniqueness further.
I’m brief, what we came up with was:
Brand Essence: Never Dull
Brand Personality: International Known. Locally Respected.
Brand Values / Principles: Curious & Imaginative, Brave, Approachable, Responsible and Essential
Brand Tone: Inspirational, Encyclopaedic and Dramatic
We then established a visual connector with our symbol (energy wave), typeface and brand architecture but how we use these, and reflected our essence, personality, values and tone could be uniquely applied.
I think another good example of taking on this challenge is someone like Channel 4 in my view. It has it’s masterbrand (Channel 4) but then its unique sub-brands such as E4, More4, Film 4 etc. and even then, different types of programming across their network. However, like National Museums Liverpool, they share the same brand essence, personality and principles and yet they feel so unique, but you instinctively know they’re connected, and not in name only.
How much should you spend on a rebrand or new brand development project?
This is quite a difficult question to answer because it will depend whether it is for a project or organisation, a rebrand or new brand, of course if it’s a single or multi-site brand and the reach of your brand (or intended reach). Other things which alter the cost will be what you need to change or create such as physical and digital assets and how you will ‘activate’ the brand through perhaps a local, national, or international campaign etc.
If you’ve never undertaken a full rebrand or new brand development before and want to get an idea of what kind of budget you’d need, you can always find a consultant to help you map out the potential costs before you get going. Using a consultant in the early stages will have a cost itself but it could save you a lot of headaches, time and ultimately expense further down the line.
It’s not an exact science and it really varies but below is a rough guide to what kind of overall budget you’d need for different types and scale of brand project.
| Small Project | Small Org / Venue | Medium Org / Venue | Large Org / Venue | Festivals | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| £5k | x | ||||
| £10k | x | x | |||
| £20k | x | ||||
| £30k | x | x | x | ||
| £40k | x | x | x | ||
| £50k | x | x | x | x | |
| £100k | x | x | x | ||
| £200k | x | x | x | ||
| £300k | x | x | |||
| £400k | x | x | |||
| £500k | x |
Should you involve stakeholders from the start?
Yes, absolutely! We conducted 1:1 interviews, facilitated group conversations and workshops as well as distributed polls and surveys. Your goal should be to try and engage a broad range of people including trustees, employees, funders, partners, and visitors and non-visitors. We even spoke to local businesses as well as local and national competitors.
You should create multiple moments for engagement to not only receive information but to share your findings and progress. Identify key stakeholders from the outset, put them in clearly defined groups and create an engagement ladder for each group (which simply means at what points in the project you will engage with them) and stick to it rigorously. I would also recommend using someone neutral to lead your conversations and workshops as you’ll find people are more open to sharing their real thoughts and feelings, if its not you doing the asking.
How would you go about dealing with internal negativity towards a rebrand, and getting everyone involved, engaged and onboard?
In my experience, there can be a whole host of reasons why you receive negativity when trying to rebrand. You’ll often find it’s never just one thing either.
I would start by asking whether you’ve articulated properly why you’re rebranding to begin with. Strangely, and quite often, when I’ve joined a project after an attempt has been made to start, I find this is one of the things which isn’t communicated properly, and specifically beyond the team leading the project itself. You can also find that negativity builds as result of trying to engage people too late in the project, and they feel like you’re doing the whole ‘illusion of inclusion’ type thing.
On the other end of the scale, I’ve seen issues arise because the culture of an organisation is fragile, and there is a fear a rebrand signals a major change in direction, which it probably should do, but rebranding makes change very real therefore their negativity can just be a reaction to the change coming.
Rebrands also don’t mean ripping everything up, its trying to enhance and evolve what you have but you must set out with the process being inclusive, open and transparent. Believe it or not, it should also be fun and exciting!
Like I say, there never is just one reason, and whilst you should do your best to alleviate any concerns, the truth is you can’t and won’t please everyone. Most ‘negativity’ from colleagues is actually often because they are so passionate and invested in your organisation/project, and they want to protect it, at all costs. Engage them properly, and you should be able to alleviate any fears, and even convert them into brand champions.
Top Tips:
Develop a shareable FAQ document and keep adding to it. Try and respond to the following;
The existing brand is fine, why do you even need to touch it?
What difference will a rebrand really have?
How much will it cost and where is the money coming from to do this?
Do we not have better things to be spending the money on?
How will other colleagues be involved?
How long is it going to take?
What will success look like?
Ensure your Leadership & Senior Management team are all on the same page, and actively helping to share the right messages.
Articulate the benefits, short, medium, and long-term.
Explain how you’ll approach finding and appointing a brand agency or consultant.
Create an opportunity for colleagues elsewhere in the organisation, at different levels, to be involved in shortlisting, interviewing, and appointing.
Share key stage progress throughout the process, not all at the end. Be open to feedback and making changes throughout the initial stages.
How long was the process for National Museums Liverpool?
We began work in May 2020 and our agency handed everything over to us in December 2020. We then had a three-month period designated in our programme to undertake a comprehensive audit of all our assets to identify what needed refreshing and replacing, and make headway with that work. We started rolling out our new brand internally from around February 2021, and gradually moving through to activating the brand publicly, with most of our major visible changes happening in June 2021, as part of our programme season launch.
The hard work begins once your brand strategy and creative direction has been handed over to you and your teams. You can expect it to take about six months for it to be truly embedded, and remember, you need to be open minded along the way because it will mature and you’ll develop confidence using it, and random things will pop-up you never considered.
What’s the most challenging part of undertaking a brand project?
Well, where do I start? I’m joking…
Every project is unique, and the challenges you face during one project don’t always crop up in the next so its difficult to be specific about this. In my opinion, if you’re thorough in your brief, realistic in your timeline, robust in your selection process, have a strong plan for engagement and participation, then you shouldn’t face too many challenges along the way that you can’t handle in the moment.
What are your top tips for someone undertaking a rebrand project?
Don’t rush.
Be collaborative.
Be clear who is making final decisions.
Invest time in developing your brief properly.
Your brand is the amplification of your organisational mission, vision and aims so make sure you’re not going down a path which is in opposition or a contradiction.
Keep in mind a great brand strategy is a framework for great storytelling.
Places audiences at the heart of brand.
A rebrand project can be a great way to connect and create stronger understanding / alignment with your organisation values. Don’t waste the opportunity.
Be clear if your project is tweaking and adjusting what you have, or if it’s truly a rebrand where everything is on the table.
Don’t just look at your obvious competitors, look outwardly to new and leading sectors.
Make sure you choose an agency or consultant whose work inspires and excites you.
Host meetings with a shortlist of agencies or consultants before you make any decisions. They may well be very experienced, have an impressive client list but if you don’t have a good rapport then the project won’t work.
If agencies bring in people as part of their pitch team who excite you then ensure they’re on the actual project team before you sign the dotted line.
Plan in time to activate your brand.
Remember that a corporate brand doesn’t mean it has to be restrictive, dull and lack playfulness.