Has anyone ever dealt with a brand name change, how smooth was the transition? I know that a well known brand name changing it's name to something new would be difficult on the customers.

We did it about 8 months ago and at first we had an increase in number of customers asking did we get sold or something along those lines. These questions were even asked with a mass email sent out (I don't think customers read any email you send them).

Other than that it wasn't a huge deal we continue to operate all the domains we previously had just with redirections.

Ali,

Interesting thread topic :agree: We're actually in the middle of rebranding our overall Inc. name / parent company. We made the mistake of putting our niche service name in our Inc. name and it confuses other customers of other divisions. lol, that's even confusing to explain.

Anyways, we're simply going with a generic new Brand that will parent all of our services.

The Inc. name change within Ontario Canada is costing me ~$700 through my accountant. I'm sure you could do this for less then a couple hundred on your own but I like knowing it's all done correctly.

Best of luck guys. I'm going to give more thought to informing clients of the change. I've thought about it but maybe not long enough. :D

Ali,

Interesting thread topic :agree: We're actually in the middle of rebranding our overall Inc. name / parent company. We made the mistake of putting our niche service name in our Inc. name and it confuses other customers of other divisions. lol, that's even confusing to explain.

Anyways, we're simply going with a generic new Brand that will parent all of our services.

The Inc. name change within Ontario Canada is costing me ~$700 through my accountant. I'm sure you could do this for less then a couple hundred on your own but I like knowing it's all done correctly.

Best of luck guys. I'm going to give more thought to informing clients of the change. I've thought about it but maybe not long enough. :D


Now that's very interesting and something we're going to end up having to do down the road. At the time we incorporated I was thinking well we're just offering web hosting no need to come up with some fancy name then a bunch of divisions. Here we are now and probably by the company year end there very well could be a need for another division.

I guess this sort of thing happens when you got a bunch of computer guys running a company right?

But I suppose paying an accountant $700 or around that range isn't really that bad.

That was something we struggled with as well. We were originally branded to appeal to a niche hosting market, however we found that our appeal in our local market went beyond just businesses, and now we're in the process of rebranding the company. Luckily the close relationship we have with our clients, and the fact that we hadn't really expanded, are facilitating a smooth transition. Our latest boom came after the major changes had been made.

I think the key is to make it smooth, take a cue from Cingular/AT&T, their call centers went from something like; "Thank you for calling Cingular Wireless." and "Thank you for calling AT&T" to "Thank you for calling the NEW AT&T, formerly Cingular Wireless". Continually communicating this brand change to your existing customers, and presenting the new brand to new customers, is key I think. Any other suggestions?


-fin
Thales

I think the key is to make it smooth, take a cue from Cingular/AT&T, their call centers went from something like; "Thank you for calling Cingular Wireless." and "Thank you for calling AT&T" to "Thank you for calling the NEW AT&T, formerly Cingular Wireless". Continually communicating this brand change to your existing customers, and presenting the new brand to new customers, is key I think. Any other suggestions?



Here lies the truth.
Another way to keep this brand change in front of them all the time, is to possibly incorporate the old name in the logos. Assuming that you will be changing the site design with the brand change, you could make the logo mention something like "WebHostingTalk.com - An iNetInteractive Company"

Another thing to consider is the sudden change of name on your customers' credit card statement. Maybe make note of that in the payment receipts? If you have an IVR on your phone system, make mention of the brand change in your audio greeting?

Has anyone ever dealt with a brand name change, how smooth was the transition? I know that a well known brand name changing it's name to something new would be difficult on the customers.

It is difficult (or seems to be)...

Changing the name of a website was fairly easy... I've done that a couple of times... although, my sites were MUCH smaller back then. Don't know how that would work out now.

We have to go trough this again on a larger scale this summer. To be honest, back in the day, I never thought I'd still be in business (or growing), so the business is setup with odd things... like an "e" in the first part of the name. Remember when "e" everything was cool (ie ehosting, edinner, ebeer, estupid)?

Now, I'm moving over to a more "traditional" name as my main business identiy. I'm thinking it won't be that bad or difficult since it my customers only see the name change... my sites won't change, so no confusion there.

The merchant account change will be the most difficult... will have to plan that out so that customers are not confused on who charged them.

Thinking about it, I need to start a plan of action file for the change.

Ali, if I was ever to comtemplate a brand change (which I wouldn't because I have what I consider to be near perfect brands now) I would give existing clients LOTS of notice, with multiple emails letting them know of the name change. So not just the one email, which most probably won't read, but several emails, letting them know of why you're changing the name. Lots of communication is the key here, to ensuring your customers are aware of what's happening.

Post an announcement of such in your forum, and then attach a link to that announcement in all your billing and helpdesk reply emails too.

Also remember to have your old domain still pointing to your new brand. You also might want to add the old name in the logo - "Formerly <brand_name>".

Good luck with the name change. :)

Thanks for all the suggestions.

A brand name change is definitely not an easy thing to do after several years of reputation based on the name but I guess it's certainly possible.

Great advice from everyone, keep them coming if anyone else has anything to share :)

Also remember the golden rule with your new brand - secure all the space around your domain, such as the various main extensions, plural/singular, hyphenated, new_domain_sucks.com, wwwnewdomain.com, and a bunch of typos too. Be imaginative with the typos. Point them all up to your main brand. You should come up with 30 domains there, and it's the cheapest and most effective brand protection you'll ever do. :)

And 301 all those domains to your new main domain...