Updating a global brand: 3 lessons I learned by doing

"But Teresa, have you ever been to Indonesia?"

I froze. It was 2018. I was standing in front of a room of my peers, in a conference room in Singapore, in the middle of a presentation about a global rebranding effort I was leading.

I was talking about updates for all our product and business imagery for almost two dozen countries across the globe. It needed to be done. Our corporate brand was a disaster. Disjointed. Not built for our target demo.

And the chief sales officer had just interrupted me.

"No, I -..." I stammered.

"Then how do you know this is going to work for them?"

I was dying up there. My mind was racing. Was my plan a bad one? I had thought through every detail. But now I wasn't sure. Only one way to find out. If you're going through hell, keep going...

So I kept going.

"Well," I said, "this look and feel represents our brand, as we've discussed. Simple, healthy, clean. There are certain elements I've deemed important for each image to contain so our brand can be easily identified. And these images will be available to all markets. If a market would like to create in-market imagery that combines this look and feel with the unique needs of their particular country's demographic mix to enhance our brand presence, they are able to make a request for additional funds and support through the brand department using this simple form, here. Marketing and creative will just need to sign off on a few details to ensure brand integrity."

I got through the presentation (eventually). But not without a few more interruptions and (thankfully) some welcome backup from the CTO.

And you know what? The markets loved the new imagery. And they used it. A lot. And many of them did create their own in-market imagery as well. It worked out fine.

So here are three lessons I learned.

Tip 1. Change is hard. Don't be afraid of making global brand updates, or the people who are afraid of it.

Updating branding on a global scale is a huge undertaking. Much like the eating an elephant analogy, there isn't just one way to go about it. Alternatively, there are also multiple wrong ways to go about it, one of which is to simply ignore that there's an elephant to be eaten.

I realized this is what a lot of brands end up doing. And then when someone comes along with the audacity to tackle the problem, it's very easy to be a naysayer without offering solutions or collaborating to get to a better winning scenario.

To be clear: I think it's important to listen to any and all concerns. Be curious about them. But don't let them derail the work that needs to be done.

Tip 2. Align brand updates with sales, marketing, and market size.

As part of the brand imagery rollout, every single product SKU needed new imagery. But we didn't have additional budget, and we only had two in-house photographers to start building this brand new product and lifestyle library. How to choose what to update, when?

We needed alignment. First we started with all the similar products across all markets. Check. Then we organized them by top sellers. Check. Then we looked at the calendar and started laying out the top products in the place on the calendar where it would make the most sense for our sellers to sell the product and the most sense for our customers to buy the product. THAT is when we needed the images by. So we needed the photographers to work on those images the month before. And so on and so forth.

From there, the Global Marketing Calendar was born.

Local markets, sales, and marketing all had the images they needed for all customer touchpoints (website, email, social media, product page, shareables) on time each month, and slowly but surely, each product received the brand updates they needed, including imagery and messaging, SEO keywords and phrases, and more.

All of the new images and information were then placed into a digital library for use whenever internal teams needed them down the road.

Tip 3. Create a process for localization.

As I mentioned in the introduction, having a localization process is key for a successful global brand rollout. While most markets used the corporate-created assets just fine (and we created them specifically so they could be used cross-market), larger markets with more resources wanted to create a similar look and feel but ensure it had a local touch. It's important to maintain a strong relationship amongst the corporate office and the local markets, building trust so that your brand is strong, authentic, and consistent no matter where in the world a customer is interacting with it.

To that end, our process looked like this:

• The market was responsible for taking the corporate brand book to a local creative agency to acquire a bid for the work to be done.

• The market then filled out a short form and sent it back to brand and creative at the corporate office. It included market details, the local creative agency they wanted to work with and their details, the quote for the work, as well as the detailed explanation of how they would complete the work to stay on brand.

• Brand marketing and creative would both review the work from the creative agency, provide any feedback needed, and then approve the quote and the funds for the work to be done locally.

• The market was responsible for working with the agency to complete the work, and then the images were uploaded for corporate use. If any images did not meet brand requirements, then they were flagged at this time (this generally didn't happen as work had already been approved, but every once in a while...gotta be careful).

Always be updating

The branding project I mentioned above? That presentation I was giving that day? It was the start to a process that took more than a year to complete. But we were never really done.

That's the secret of staying ahead on your brand. A brand needs to be consistent, yes, and feel authentic and true. But it also needs to feel alive and current and fresh. A brand is not a logo. The logo may only change a few times or get a few small tweaks over decades. What surrounds it? It needs to be evolving and growing, just like the rest of us.

Don't let your brand stay static. Always be looking at how you can reinterpret your brand voice. Add a new color or element or angle to your imagery to help your audience see you in a new way. Lead instead of follow...this is the most important thing I learned.

Yes, the updates were necessary, and yes, they took a long time...but they were also never done. That elephant always needs eating. Yum.