Thinking about a rebrand? Read this first (Dave’s Newsletter)

18 Marketers Share Stories From Rebrands

Editor's Note: About a year ago we rebranded Exit Five. New logo, new website, new newsletter design, new everything. It went pretty smoothly – we worked with an amazing design partner who hit every deadline, and the whole thing came together fast. But here's what I didn't realize at the time: we got lucky. Most rebrands don't go that way. And I put it off for so long because I didn’t want to sign up for that pain proactively. But: brand is a huge part of marketing, and sometimes a rebrand is necessary. So when someone recently asked, "What do you wish you'd known before leading a rebrand or name change?" the responses flooded in. Trademark nightmares. Budget battles. Things that broke after launch. And multiple people said they'd never do it again. So I'm sharing the lessons here because whether you're picking a name, changing a name, or going through a full rebrand, I don’t want you to learn it all the hard way.

Here's the thing nobody tells you about rebrands: the name and colors are usually the easy part.

It's everything else that will get you.

• The trademark that takes 18 months to clear in Asia.
• The sales team still using the old deck six months after launch.
• The brand colors that look perfect on screen but are impossible to match on the 10,000 t-shirts you just ordered for your conference.
• The budget conversation where the CEO thinks a rebrand costs $20k and the agency comes back with a $200k proposal.

Or the fact that you'll spend more time managing internal opinions than you will on the actual creative work.

The marketers who've done this before? They all learned the same lessons. Just at different companies. With different budgets.

Here's what they wish someone had told them before they started.

WHAT WE'RE HEARING

Nail These Five Things

Every smooth rebrand starts with getting the fundamentals right. Here's what to do first.

1. Run a trademark search ASAP.
Before you fall in love with a name, run it through the US trademark database for your industry here.

Five minutes of searching upfront can save weeks of wasted time and emotional investment.

And if you're planning to operate internationally, start the trademark process early. Getting approvals in APAC and other regions can take over a year.

2. Never use a single common word as your company name.
If your name is something really common (like "Copper" or "Steel"), you're setting yourself up for SEO confusion and wasted ad spend for years to come.

One person inherited a company with a name like this. The result? Impossible media monitoring, terrible Google Ads targeting, and constantly being tagged in posts that weren’t relevant.

3. Lock in your budget.
Multiple people mentioned tension around cost expectations.

Get leadership to commit to a budget range before you start talking to partners. Even a rough "we absolutely won't spend more than X" number helps you find the right agency and set realistic scope.

4. Decide who the decision makers are (and keep that group small).
Here's the pattern that works: cast a wide net early for input so people feel heard. Then shrink the feedback group dramatically for actual design reviews.

One marketer said their smoothest rebrand happened when they worked directly with the CEO. No committee. No endless rounds of feedback from the entire org.

5. Get alignment on tone and vision before design starts.
This is the thing that prevents scope creep and endless revision cycles.

If everyone agrees up front that you want to be seen as fun and approachable, then when someone suggests removing all the color or making everything super formal, you can point back to that agreement and keep moving.

When You’re In Execution Mode Focus On These 3 Things

Once you're in it, here's what ends up being way more important than most people expect.

1. Document everything obsessively.
For one company with thousands of existing assets and hundreds of web pages, the documentation became the most critical piece of the entire project.

They tracked every asset, every timeline, every piece of the project in tools like Brandfolder for digital asset management and Monday.com for project tracking.

The tool doesn't matter. What matters is having one central source of truth so nothing falls through the cracks. When you're updating that many touch points, you can't rely on memory or Slack threads.

2. Choose your colors carefully (solids work best).
Your brand colors need to work everywhere. Not just on screens.

Think about embroidery on swag, physical signage at events, how they'll render on partner websites. Colors that look great digitally can be impossible to match in print or fabric.

Use solid colors and test them across mediums before you commit.

3. Reverse image search your potential designs.
Before you decide on a logo concept, reverse image search it. You don't want to be surprised about it looking similar to another brand that already exists.

The Post-Launch Reality: Here’s What To Expect

The rebrand doesn't end when you hit publish.

1. You will never update everything at once (and that's okay).
One marketer stressed about getting every single asset updated the moment the new website went live. Case studies, product videos, old decks, everything.

The reality? Marketing is the only team that notices. Updating secondary content more slowly would have saved so much stress and let them focus on the high-impact stuff first.

Prioritize what really matters and work through the rest over time.

2. You'll be reminding people about the new brand for months.
Nine months after one rebrand, the marketing team was still tracking down salespeople using old decks with the previous branding.

People will forget where the new assets live. They'll default to what's already saved on their desktop. Build a system to keep reminding them and make the new assets ridiculously easy to find.

3. Have fun with it.
Make it a moment. Launch with a hype video. Host an event. Get the team excited. Don't let it just be another initiative that ships – make it something people remember.

At the last two companies I worked at, marketing was the momentum driver. We tried to launch something big every month to move the company forward; to give us a reason to go back out and talk to our audience.

A rebrand can be one of those "marketable moments" for you.

The Biggest Mistakes To Avoid

Here are some of the landmines other marketers stepped on so you don't have to.

Rebranding when you don't need to.
A former head of brand was direct about this: most rebrands aren't necessary. If your brand is working, you might just need a refresh to clean things up and create consistency.

That's way cheaper and faster than tearing everything down and starting over. Don't rebrand just because you're bored or because the CEO saw a competitor's new site and got inspired.

Changing your name when you already have years of legacy.
One marketer helped with two rebrands. One succeeded. One got killed before launch.

The difference? The successful rebrand was at a startup without much existing brand equity to lose. The one that got killed was at a company with decades of legacy in their market.

They realized the risk of losing existing brand recognition outweighed any benefit from a new name. Sometimes the smart move is keeping what you have.

Getting stuck trying to find the perfect name.
YOU WILL NEVER FIND THE PERFECT ANSWER. It's like naming a child. When my son was born, the name "Sam" felt so weird to me. Now, he's Sam! Of course he's Sam! Imagine if we named him Karl? (No offense Karl).

Pick a lane and go become the new name. The brand equity comes from what you do with it, not from the name itself.

If You’re Thinking About A Rebrand, Here’s My Advice

Start by asking yourself: do you actually need to rebrand? Or do you just need to tighten up what you already have?

If you do need to rebrand, start with budget and decision makers. Get those locked in before you do anything else.

Run the trademark search before you get attached to any names.

Document everything. You'll be updating assets for months after launch and you need one source of truth.

And remember: you will never find the perfect name. Pick something, commit to it, and build the brand through what you do with it.

– Dave

P.S. When we rebranded Exit Five, I didn't realize how lucky we were until I heard everyone else's stories. We had the right partner, the right timeline, and somehow everything just clicked. But reading through this thread made me realize how easily it could have gone the other way. So if you're in the middle of a rebrand right now, or thinking about taking that on this year, I want to hear about it. What went well? What would you do differently? Why did you want to rebrand? Reply back – I want to hear from you. Or just vent to us if you want. We are here…

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