#332: How to Navigate a Rebrand with Clare Schmitt

#333 | Dave is joined by Clare Schmitt, a seasoned marketing leader and a member of our CMO community, to walk through what it actually takes to lead a rebrand at a mid-market B2B company. Clare shares how she partnered with her CEO to drive a full rebrand, from hiring a naming agency and running an RFP, to managing a small decision-making council, rolling out the new brand across every department, and measuring success post-launch. If you're a marketing leader thinking about a rebrand, this episode is a practical, top to bottom playbook from someone who just did it.

Timestamps

• (00:00) - Why rebrands come up and what this episode covers
  
• (03:04) - Clare's role at Piedmont Global and how the rebrand got started
  
• (05:19) - Should you hire a naming agency? What it costs and what they actually do
  
• (08:47) - Running an RFP and why they chose Focus Lab
  
• (09:33) - Why the CEO has to own the rebrand go-to-market
  
• (11:09) - Keeping the decision-making council small and who was in it
  
• (18:03) - How to get CEO buy-in: framing a rebrand as infrastructure, not a marketing initiative
  
• (20:40) - Timeline: how long a rebrand actually takes ($50M+ companies)
  
• (22:22) - The rollout: project management, execution, and building the website internally
  
• (24:19) - Measurement, post-launch QA, and tracking whether your narrative is sticking

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Dave [0:00:01]: You're listening to The Dave Gerhardt Show.

Dave [0:00:02]: Hey, My guest on this episode is Clare Schmitt, We talk about how to navigate a re brand, Clare was running marketing at a mid market company.

Dave [0:00:24]: Let's call it fifty million to two hundred fifty million revenue range, and they went through a whole re brand and we talked through the whole thing.

Dave [0:00:30]: Top to bottom.

Dave [0:00:30]: How she work with the CEO from navigating a naming agency branding agency to how to execute it?

Dave [0:00:36]: How long it should take, how you should think about it, how to project manage this?

Dave [0:00:39]: It's something that comes up a lot in Exit Five is how to navigate a re brand And I thought Clare did an awesome job explaining how she did this at your company.

Dave [0:00:46]: If this is something you're going through.

Dave [0:00:48]: I think you're gonna get a lot of value from this episode.

Dave [0:00:50]: Here's my conversation with Clare.

Dave [0:00:52]: My guess is Clare Schmitt.

Dave [0:00:54]: We've been hanging out behind the scenes talking about life and parenting and dealing with the inevitable you know, journey an evolution of life that it throws at you, but we're gonna talk about marketing today.

Dave [0:01:04]: Clare is a marketing leader and brand builder in b to b, and she's a member of our CMO group at Exit Five, and we were kinda, like, passing notes back and forth and she went through and did a re brand last year and had a bunch of lessons learned and insights and things to think about.

Dave [0:01:19]: And I was like you know what, we haven't done a specific episode on a re rebranding.

Dave [0:01:22]: So let's do that.

Dave [0:01:23]: We're gonna put that on the record today.

Dave [0:01:24]: Clare is gonna talk through some of the lessons learned how to think about a re brand how to measure it And I'm sure some other stuff that will uncover along the way, But Clare, maybe first, let's set the stage of, like, quick explain of, like, the company, where you're working, the company and then how did this project of a re brand come up.

Clare [0:01:40]: Okay.

Clare [0:01:40]: Great.

Clare [0:01:41]: Thanks for having me on.

Clare [0:01:42]: As well said, I'm Clare Schmitt.

Clare [0:01:44]: Head up marketing at Piedmont Global.

Clare [0:01:46]: And I joined the company.

Clare [0:01:49]: The CEO was very honest with me.

Clare [0:01:50]: He said your next twelve to eighteen months biggest priority is changing us.

Clare [0:01:55]: It was category change and brand change.

Clare [0:01:58]: So we were a language services company.

Clare [0:02:01]: We had started in twenty thirteen.

Clare [0:02:03]: That was obviously well before I joined the company.

Clare [0:02:05]: They had started as just Piedmont translations.

Clare [0:02:08]: Evolved gradually and into Pg, piedmont global language services and then realized Ls p's are frankly dying, and it's not just about what language I'm speaking to someone in anymore.

Clare [0:02:22]: It's cross cultural.

Clare [0:02:23]: There's a lot of things that go into it, and we were changing from a category of Ls language services provider, which, by the way, Didn't even know that existed when I joined the company.

Clare [0:02:32]: And then it's so it was an unknown, but it's it was seventy billion dollar category and then we're changing into a different category, which was strategic globalization, which was something we invented, and there's a lot of learnings which I'll get to in a few on that.

Clare [0:02:46]: But that essentially is that's cross cultural operations.

Clare [0:02:49]: So whether it's multi multicultural teams, you know, global operation, whether that's a hospital system in New York City that's serving a variety of different population that kinda say it's whether it's across the street or across the globe is sort of that span of the cross ratio.

Clare [0:03:05]: So we help at every single point on that that can be data that can be content that can be market research.

Clare [0:03:10]: It's a lot of different.

Clare [0:03:11]: Alright.

Dave [0:03:12]: Yeah.

Dave [0:03:12]: Let whatever.

Dave [0:03:13]: Less about yeah.

Dave [0:03:13]: We don't care about that.

Dave [0:03:14]: Okay.

Dave [0:03:14]: Yeah.

Dave [0:03:15]: Yeah.

Dave [0:03:15]: Less about what they do.

Dave [0:03:16]: Talk about marketers like, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Clare [0:03:18]: Yes.

Clare [0:03:18]: But here.

Clare [0:03:19]: The category explanation, which I just

Dave [0:03:21]: see...

Dave [0:03:21]: So...

Dave [0:03:21]: But no.

Dave [0:03:22]: But, like, that's helpful.

Dave [0:03:22]: Right.

Dave [0:03:23]: The CEO says our...

Dave [0:03:23]: It's two things.

Dave [0:03:24]: Number one is category number two was...

Dave [0:03:26]: What did you say it was?

Clare [0:03:27]: Was the re rebranding.

Clare [0:03:27]: So actually branding.

Clare [0:03:29]: So that was that category strategic globalization, and then Okay.

Clare [0:03:31]: Now, who are we within that category, which is going from Pg gl to Piedmont Global?

Clare [0:03:36]: We work with the naming agency long story, I can talk about that all day, but we...

Dave [0:03:40]: Well, let's hold on.

Dave [0:03:40]: Take a brett.

Dave [0:03:40]: Let's pause and try to like, unpack that.

Dave [0:03:42]: So so, this is the big initiative?

Dave [0:03:43]: Yep.

Dave [0:03:44]: Where did you start?

Dave [0:03:45]: Let's just talk through the whole project.

Clare [0:03:48]: Okay.

Clare [0:03:48]: So the first thing when I joined was we started with a name, So what's our name gonna be?

Clare [0:03:52]: We ended

Dave [0:03:54]: for the category?

Clare [0:03:55]: No.

Clare [0:03:55]: Not name for the category.

Clare [0:03:56]: So what we started with the re brand.

Clare [0:03:57]: What's our new name going to be.

Clare [0:03:59]: We hired a naming agency, Yep.

Clare [0:04:02]: And then we ended...

Dave [0:04:03]: What does that look like, by the way?

Dave [0:04:03]: Where does one get a naming agency?

Dave [0:04:05]: Was the naming agency costs?

Dave [0:04:07]: Like...

Clare [0:04:08]: So I didn't know that those...

Clare [0:04:09]: I will say I didn't know they existed, but I wasn't super familiar, and I wasn't sold by the way on using a naming agency as our starting place.

Clare [0:04:17]: The CEO.

Dave [0:04:18]: My my name agency is Chat, and it cost me twenty dollars a month.

Dave [0:04:21]: I'll come up with twenty names for you for a hundred grand.

Dave [0:04:23]: Let's go.

Clare [0:04:24]: And there's certainly...

Clare [0:04:24]: And you shouldn't just use Chat, but also, in in the agency that we used ended up their business model has changed significantly.

Clare [0:04:32]: So even two years ago, that's how much Ai has changed where it's...

Clare [0:04:35]: There's a lot less appetite for that because My brand...

Dave [0:04:39]: My naming agency people that are listening this or are never gonna hear this and not be happy.

Dave [0:04:42]: Like, I'm just...

Dave [0:04:43]: That is said in ingest.

Dave [0:04:44]: I think, ultimately, if someone is gonna help me name this really valuable thing, like, It doesn't matter to me if I paid twenty dollars for or two hundred thousand dollars But if I get the name, then the return is gonna be there.

Dave [0:04:55]: So, obviously, that's a serious thing.

Dave [0:04:57]: So you can get a naming agency and then...

Clare [0:04:59]: Was trademark and other think considerations that, you know, the average person or even average marketer isn't gonna know.

Clare [0:05:04]: So we work...

Dave [0:05:05]: And you're doing this By the way, you're not doing this as, like, a brand new company.

Dave [0:05:08]: This is a company that had hundreds of millions in revenue.

Dave [0:05:10]: There's a significant scale here.

Dave [0:05:12]: So you're trying to move this big ship.

Dave [0:05:14]: Right?

Dave [0:05:14]: And tell everybody, it's called something different.

Clare [0:05:17]: Yes.

Clare [0:05:17]: Exactly.

Clare [0:05:18]: And so I was not completely sold on the idea of starting with the name.

Clare [0:05:22]: There's a lot of ways as you know that you can do a re brand.

Clare [0:05:24]: Some are name focused.

Clare [0:05:25]: Some are more logo focus.

Clare [0:05:27]: There's a lot of work to it back actual like men?

Dave [0:05:29]: Like the ultimate like, thing.

Dave [0:05:30]: Like, okay.

Dave [0:05:31]: We're going to, like, we're gonna move this house?

Dave [0:05:34]: Like, there's my house.

Dave [0:05:34]: I can see it out my window.

Dave [0:05:35]: We're gonna move it over here?

Dave [0:05:37]: It's like, well, do we have to do that?

Dave [0:05:39]: Or is there other things we could do first?

Dave [0:05:40]: Yes.

Dave [0:05:41]: Did you land on the, ultimately, like, what's the short answer And, like, sign.

Dave [0:05:45]: Yeah.

Dave [0:05:45]: We do actually have to do this the?

Clare [0:05:47]: So the short answer is that our name didn't tell what we were doing anymore and our entire brand was built around language services, which was went from being the majority of our business to basically one eighth of our business.

Clare [0:05:58]: So you couldn't we

Dave [0:06:00]: have sourcing function.

Dave [0:06:01]: We always talk about like, guard rails are really good in marketing because, like, you can do anything, Anything can work you can make So Like...

Dave [0:06:06]: This is the guard relic.

Dave [0:06:07]: Like, we have to change the name.

Clare [0:06:09]: Okay.

Clare [0:06:09]: So was nothing's broken, but we're actually no longer...

Clare [0:06:11]: Even our name isn't saying what we do anymore.

Clare [0:06:14]: And so...

Clare [0:06:14]: Okay.

Clare [0:06:15]: It's a...

Clare [0:06:15]: Yeah.

Clare [0:06:16]: Much harder thing to tell.

Dave [0:06:17]: What was the next step from there?

Clare [0:06:19]: So the naming agency, we went through this a bunch of rounds with them, and I'll just say back to my first day where we ended up, sorry naming agencies.

Clare [0:06:27]: We didn't actually need a naming agency.

Clare [0:06:28]: We ended up my very first day at P piedmont Global, on my CEO's office door, it said Pg and he said, he gave me this long thirty minute explanation, and then at the end of it, he said, really, we just have to slash the Ls, which was the language services part.

Clare [0:06:45]: And that is what we came back to and said we went through this great process.

Clare [0:06:50]: It was great.

Clare [0:06:51]: We use name storms.

Clare [0:06:51]: They were phenomenal, and they came up with a bunch of great names that would have served us, but it was...

Clare [0:06:58]: We already have a lot of origin story with Piedmont with Global, and that's our name.

Clare [0:07:03]: I just took it back.

Clare [0:07:04]: I said to the CEO, you had such conviction.

Clare [0:07:06]: We said, really we're just slashing the Ls.

Clare [0:07:07]: Let's just slash the.

Clare [0:07:08]: So, obviously, we're not Pg where Pete piedmont Global.

Clare [0:07:11]: So, at that point, we decided on that.

Clare [0:07:14]: The the category piece was just basically in my CEO's head and, like, four hundred voice that he had sent me over the hiring process in my first few months.

Clare [0:07:21]: And then I put it out to Rfp.

Clare [0:07:23]: So I did.

Clare [0:07:24]: That was my first experience doing that in the past, I just used sort of inbound agencies or somebody that I had a relationship with.

Clare [0:07:29]: This was a big project.

Clare [0:07:30]: It was b to b a allotted at stake for needed somebody that understood category and brand two different things.

Clare [0:07:36]: Long story short, We ended up going with Focus lab for the majority of our brand work, wound up with a couple of...

Clare [0:07:42]: Nice.

Dave [0:07:43]: That's Bill Kenny.

Dave [0:07:43]: Right?

Clare [0:07:44]: Yes.

Clare [0:07:44]: That's Bill Kenny.

Dave [0:07:45]: Cool.

Dave [0:07:45]: Like I've done some great stuff bill.

Dave [0:07:48]: Eggs if I remember, but he's...

Dave [0:07:49]: I found Bill because I think they did, like, a Market head back in the day and they did sales loft, and I got into that world because I...

Dave [0:07:58]: He was on a shortlist list for brand stuff.

Dave [0:08:00]: Okay.

Dave [0:08:00]: So keep yeah.

Dave [0:08:02]: Okay.

Dave [0:08:02]: Keep going wanna know the tactical stuff.

Dave [0:08:05]: Like, you engage a company like Bill and then what's the process and what's the output?

Clare [0:08:09]: So a couple of learnings from that, I will say it really helps when you have the CEO own go to market.

Clare [0:08:15]: Branding has to be run, like any other go to market.

Clare [0:08:18]: It's part...

Clare [0:08:18]: You know, the Gt for branding.

Clare [0:08:19]: And that was great.

Clare [0:08:21]: He had a strong vision.

Clare [0:08:22]: He knew what he wanted.

Clare [0:08:23]: He knew how he needed to change.

Clare [0:08:24]: He knew that it had to impact everybody in the business, and he gets brand.

Clare [0:08:27]: He understands the importance that.

Clare [0:08:28]: So that was super helpful.

Clare [0:08:29]: If you don't have a CEO who that's true for, I would say really try to educate them or have someone again, ideally, it's the CEO, but you need somebody with a vision that is really clear on what it is that we're trying to accomplish and that also can own that Gt end end.

Clare [0:08:49]: If it's just a marketing initiative, I think it will fail.

Clare [0:08:52]: I truly believe that.

Dave [0:08:54]: Yeah.

Dave [0:08:54]: Well, it's interesting.

Dave [0:08:54]: I haven't done things at, like, a big, huge scale.

Dave [0:08:57]: I've had a bunch of say little, like, tiny side projects or Exe five is a small little business.

Dave [0:09:01]: Somebody told me this, I forget who it was I can't properly give them credit, but it was like, before my son was named Sam, the name Sam and nothing to me.

Dave [0:09:10]: But now that he's Sam, He's Sam.

Dave [0:09:11]: Of course, he's Sam.

Dave [0:09:12]: That's his name.

Dave [0:09:13]: And I feel like so much of the whole brand and naming process is like, it's really hard.

Dave [0:09:17]: It's very rarely like so obvious or so good.

Dave [0:09:20]: It's like, your brand is going to become that.

Dave [0:09:23]: And so I'm kind of a believer in that.

Dave [0:09:24]: I think you can pick the wrong name, but I also think inability to act is gonna hold you back, and so it seems like because you and the CEO, he had this clear vision for this and, like, a lot of thoughts.

Dave [0:09:34]: Okay?

Dave [0:09:35]: There's probably four or five names you could have chosen and could've have made it work.

Dave [0:09:38]: It's most important to, like, pick a lane take some action.

Dave [0:09:41]: Let's get every root...

Dave [0:09:41]: Because, otherwise, you could just go on in circles with this thing forever.

Dave [0:09:44]: Else?

Clare [0:09:45]: Yes.

Clare [0:09:45]: One of the challenges too was the...

Clare [0:09:46]: We kept our decision making counsel very small deliberately because there's a lot of stuff in brand that...

Clare [0:09:53]: It doesn't actually matter.

Clare [0:09:55]: I okay.

Dave [0:09:56]: Who was in it, and how did you make it small intentionally.

Dave [0:09:58]: This comes up all the time and I love this as an idea.

Dave [0:10:01]: Yes.

Dave [0:10:01]: We made the decision making group small.

Dave [0:10:03]: Who I didn't?

Clare [0:10:04]: And you also can't just have executives.

Clare [0:10:05]: I've seen councils where it's all executives.

Clare [0:10:08]: And then there's such a disc connect from the people that are actually selling or marketing, you know, that we joked on the last podcast about I.

Dave [0:10:15]: You have at least fake it and make people think they.

Dave [0:10:17]: It's like my...

Dave [0:10:19]: It's my...

Dave [0:10:19]: No different than my children or myself.

Dave [0:10:21]: If you make me think it was my idea.

Dave [0:10:23]: I'm gonna probably do a the better at

Clare [0:10:25]: Yes.

Clare [0:10:25]: So there was a couple of ways we were able to keep it small one was CEO was completely on board.

Dave [0:10:30]: Right.

Clare [0:10:30]: There was also a little bit of apa empathy in the organization around it.

Clare [0:10:34]: Not a lot of people were excited about it until we got very close to the end.

Clare [0:10:37]: They didn't understand.

Clare [0:10:38]: So I would say, on the executive team, I felt like my CEO was really the only person that actually got it.

Clare [0:10:44]: Got the importance of it got it how much it was gonna impact.

Clare [0:10:46]: But we were very aligned with was very helpful.

Clare [0:10:49]: We also knew that we had to get a lot of the information.

Clare [0:10:52]: Upfront in the research stage, so we did a very comprehensive research stage with every department, both executive interviews and also boots on the ground interviews, not everyone has the time or the budget or the appetite for that, But I highly recommend if you can and Bill Kenny and his team did a great job on the research piece and interviewing everybody.

Clare [0:11:12]: We also, of course, interviewed customers, etcetera.

Clare [0:11:14]: Which...

Dave [0:11:15]: What are they going to learn?

Dave [0:11:16]: The research folks?

Dave [0:11:17]: Yeah.

Dave [0:11:18]: Like, all these people that get to...

Dave [0:11:19]: Be interviewed across the company.

Dave [0:11:20]: What's the goal What's the point of that?

Clare [0:11:22]: So the goal is to get the input of sort of it's a little bit of an internal brand audit of both, especially for customer facing.

Dave [0:11:29]: Who we are, who we serve.

Clare [0:11:30]: But yeah.

Clare [0:11:30]: Who we are who we serve, and then also the perception.

Clare [0:11:33]: Right?

Clare [0:11:33]: So there's the what we think we know then it's...

Clare [0:11:35]: Well, what are you actually hearing from our customers?

Clare [0:11:37]: Or what do you think the company?

Clare [0:11:38]: Because you get a different answer across operation sales, marketing product etcetera.

Clare [0:11:42]: So we did a lot of that research.

Clare [0:11:43]: We got it without having everybody on the council.

Clare [0:11:46]: They felt like their voices were heard they got an opportunity to weigh in, and we did have check points where we brought in a broader audience, like Hr product, technology to weigh in...

Clare [0:11:57]: So we had checkpoints points, but the actual day to day working group was just me, my CEO, of course, the focus lab team, we worked with Lauren and Morning of Villain branding as our sort of brand strategist.

Clare [0:12:07]: So she kinda came on, like, half agency half internal strategist with us, and then my content manager who is incredible, Maddie.

Clare [0:12:15]: So it was really just the four of us as the core counsel decision makers.

Dave [0:12:21]: How much was the CEO involved with like the focus lab stuff were they on those calls?

Clare [0:12:25]: So he left a lot of that to me.

Clare [0:12:27]: I mean, of course, he had opinions, but we had a good working...

Clare [0:12:29]: Part of the reason we chose them was they were so good at project management.

Clare [0:12:32]: They were a little rigid, so I will just say that they don't cater to your process Cater take their process, but I wanted that, that was a big part of why Chose them because I knew with the way we operated as a company building the plan as we fly.

Clare [0:12:43]: And we needed that structure.

Clare [0:12:44]: Well, everybody like He's the one that's doing it an hour before we're having the all hands, not the guy that's do, you know, crafting two weeks ahead of time.

Clare [0:12:52]: So...

Clare [0:12:53]: Yeah.

Clare [0:12:53]: I need just beat.

Clare [0:12:54]: Know, Was like, and I had to stay on him.

Clare [0:12:56]: He was, you know, vision and you have to have that strong operator that understands all the logistics behind.

Clare [0:13:01]: He didn't wanna deal with what's gonna go on our columns in our office, and how are we gonna roll this out?

Clare [0:13:06]: He wanted the big decisions, and then he trusted me to work with Bill and his team and Lauren to actually bring this to life.

Clare [0:13:13]: So there were things obviously, colors and imagery and the brand identity and how we talk about ourselves that he cared about a lot, and he was in all of those decisions, but we kinda had...

Clare [0:13:23]: He joined all of our weekly meetings, which I think is an absolute requirement.

Clare [0:13:27]: You have to have that are sort of strategy meetings.

Clare [0:13:30]: And then the execution means, we kinda separated those out so that it was we could just have sort of the things of, okay, Jordan, can you give us the, you know, specs for a d cal for the values that are going on in the office and...

Clare [0:13:42]: You know, things like that he doesn't need to be involved.

Clare [0:13:44]: So I think dividing that work up into that strategic and execution and not having him need to be in the weeds on those was really helpful.

Clare [0:13:50]: But he was...

Clare [0:13:51]: He watched all the videos because I don't know if...

Clare [0:13:54]: How much you know about their process the face sent.

Clare [0:13:56]: So you have your meeting, but they deliver you loom videos, each Friday, and then you have until Tuesday morning to basically react to those.

Clare [0:14:03]: You watch them respond.

Clare [0:14:05]: So it was kinda neat to have that asynchronous.

Clare [0:14:07]: You can then get your thoughts.

Clare [0:14:08]: You watch it.

Clare [0:14:09]: You process it, you get your thoughts out, and then we review it in a meeting together.

Clare [0:14:12]: So several were times that he just sent me asynchronous.

Clare [0:14:14]: You know, We joke that we had, like, four thousand hours of voice memos.

Clare [0:14:17]: And so that was how we...

Clare [0:14:19]: He and I worked well together, So I would just kinda take that, combine that with the counsel feedback, and then we'd do it that way.

Clare [0:14:25]: So that was really helpful.

Clare [0:14:26]: But he was very involved the entire process if he had been doing some of the M and A work that he's, you know, doing now during that process, I don't think it would have worked.

Clare [0:14:34]: Yeah.

Clare [0:14:34]: Very.

Dave [0:14:35]: I feel like having interviewed lots of people on the other side just involved.

Dave [0:14:38]: It's, like, It's so obvious that the key ingredient in the success here is having someone at the CEO level being invested in this project because it's hard enough on its own with all the moving pieces and all these opinions that affect everybody.

Dave [0:14:54]: You almost need that charging.

Dave [0:14:56]: Like, no.

Dave [0:14:56]: We're doing it.

Dave [0:14:57]: It just makes it easier.

Dave [0:14:58]: I think a lot of this stuff falls down is half the management team is kinda bought in.

Dave [0:15:04]: There's kinda of this other direction.

Dave [0:15:05]: Then it just falls on Clare and then Clare ends up being kinda, like, are the committee leader who's gotta go make all these people happy, Like, the fact that it was, like, alright.

Dave [0:15:13]: You and your CEO, Fist bump.

Dave [0:15:14]: Like, we're gonna go do this is, like, one of the biggest ingredients to this thing.

Clare [0:15:19]: That is one of the biggest ingredients.

Clare [0:15:20]: That I would say, probably the reason that we were successful.

Dave [0:15:24]: So how do we make that actionable for someone?

Dave [0:15:25]: Like...

Dave [0:15:26]: Yeah.

Dave [0:15:26]: If you know this now and you were giving advice to someone?

Dave [0:15:28]: Is it push hard?

Dave [0:15:30]: Like, show them this is the level that this has to be.

Dave [0:15:32]: How do we...

Dave [0:15:32]: I don't want someone to be like, well, my CEO just doesn't care and that's the takeaway.

Dave [0:15:35]: How do we help them?

Dave [0:15:36]: There.

Clare [0:15:37]: You have to educate.

Clare [0:15:38]: I mean, most CEOs, if they have a marketing team and they're going to approve the budget for the re rebranding.

Clare [0:15:43]: I'm assuming that you're at that stage where they have said yes, we're going to do this, helping them understand making them one hundred percent believe that this is not just a marketing initiative.

Clare [0:15:53]: So there's some great research out there, which actually I can send I don't know if you include links and it have the words that I can send, but the idea is you have to understand that a red is infrastructure, and it touches everything from the moment that talent, you're sending out that recruiting notice.

Clare [0:16:08]: You're giving them the brochure all the way through from where ops is doing their quarterly business review with the customer.

Clare [0:16:15]: So walking the CEO before you get anybody else involved, you and the CEO if you're a leading a re brand.

Clare [0:16:20]: You're locking in with that CEO and saying, this is every step of the journey, you know, often most CEOs are familiar with the customer journey, you paid that picture of them from that we want the people.

Clare [0:16:31]: You know, most people understand, We need people to run our business.

Clare [0:16:34]: Right?

Clare [0:16:34]: All the way through to you want our customers to have this same experience across every.

Dave [0:16:40]: That's a perfect way to sum that up is to make them think of it as infrastructure.

Clare [0:16:44]: Yeah.

Clare [0:16:44]: Right.

Clare [0:16:44]: Not window addresses it's not changing a logo It's not...

Clare [0:16:47]: It's that stuff...

Clare [0:16:47]: I mean, that matters, but it's...

Clare [0:16:49]: That's the window dressing part.

Clare [0:16:51]: It's actually the identity and making sure that everybody can speak from Hr through operations, sales and marketing.

Clare [0:16:57]: Everybody's telling a different story.

Clare [0:16:59]: It's gonna hurt your bottom line.

Clare [0:17:00]: And for more financial CEOs, I've had worked with some that were more Cfo background and some that were more CMO background.

Clare [0:17:06]: Obviously, you have to cater your story to who your audience is.

Clare [0:17:10]: But for the financial ones, I will say that I'm not as good at that.

Clare [0:17:13]: Luckily, I had somebody that understood the importance of the storytelling and why we needed to have the same Line all the way through, But you can paint the picture of...

Clare [0:17:22]: There actually is a way to say, hey, this is actually gonna cost us dollars and if you do a graph essentially and, hey, these are all the leakage points and then that cost us business.

Clare [0:17:31]: So you have to tailor the story to your audience obviously.

Clare [0:17:34]: But if you can just before you go down the path and sending our fees or selecting your agency or bringing in more of the management team, you've gotta make sure that the CEO understands, and I would say, as many meetings as it takes to get them one hundred percent bought in.

Clare [0:17:45]: So that they're the one, and I'll give my CEO a lot of credit saying when somebody says, well, this is a marketing initiative.

Clare [0:17:51]: Well, that's just marketing initiatives, he's saying no.

Clare [0:17:53]: Everybody needs this on their quarterly goals for the next three quarters.

Clare [0:17:57]: If you're an executive at this company, you better have the re brand as part of your goals for this work.

Dave [0:18:02]: K.

Dave [0:18:02]: Let's talk about time frame.

Dave [0:18:03]: How long did this whole thing take And what's a reasonable goal for people to have for this type of project?

Clare [0:18:09]: I would say typically, depending on how fast you work, Would say six to nine months for the actual start to finish.

Clare [0:18:15]: I know folks there's a woman in our CMO council that I think did it in three, and I know folks who have done it in eighteen.

Clare [0:18:21]: So those are very different numbers.

Clare [0:18:24]: But for us, I sent out all the Rfp and selected the agency right before Christmas twenty twenty four.

Dave [0:18:31]: If you're listening to this, though, if you are a small company a startup up, and it takes you six to nine months to do this, then you just paying up this podcast.

Dave [0:18:39]: Go go do something else.

Dave [0:18:40]: Speed is your friend.

Dave [0:18:42]: But if you're at a company that has real scale and stage, and you have employees and revenue and you're talking about doing this at the level of, like, we need the columns wrapped in the office, then, like, Yeah.

Dave [0:18:53]: You're saying to do this right.

Dave [0:18:55]: It's gonna take at least six months.

Clare [0:18:57]: Yes.

Clare [0:18:57]: If you're doing it for a startup up and it's scrappy.

Clare [0:18:59]: Yes.

Clare [0:18:59]: You can do it a lot faster and chances are, you don't already have main recognition.

Clare [0:19:03]: You're not having to convert clients from this to this.

Clare [0:19:06]: It's a little bit of a different approach.

Clare [0:19:07]: So, yeah.

Clare [0:19:08]: For those listening.

Clare [0:19:09]: This is really for those fifty million plus established companies that have been in business for, at least five years and have some...

Dave [0:19:17]: Okay.

Clare [0:19:18]: So know in the market.

Dave [0:19:19]: Six to nine months.

Dave [0:19:19]: Yeah.

Dave [0:19:19]: And then as far as, like, the actual...

Dave [0:19:21]: Roll out.

Dave [0:19:23]: How did you block and tackle there because...

Dave [0:19:25]: Alright.

Dave [0:19:25]: Now we got all this stuff.

Dave [0:19:26]: It feels like you get this huge package back.

Dave [0:19:28]: Now you're ready to deploy it.

Dave [0:19:30]: You gotta change the website.

Dave [0:19:31]: You gotta change the polls in the office.

Dave [0:19:33]: You gotta change the email.

Dave [0:19:34]: You gotta change the social media managers the ads creative what how do you make sure that happens?

Dave [0:19:39]: Like...

Dave [0:19:39]: You know, I'm sure you yes I had a magic wand and it just all happens overnight?

Dave [0:19:42]: Like, yeah.

Dave [0:19:43]: How does it?

Clare [0:19:44]: You'll get yourself a great project manager if you have budget, which I had an amazing one, Kristen who I've worked with before and she helped us...

Dave [0:19:50]: What is a great project manager do?

Clare [0:19:52]: So the great project manager is obsessed with the details.

Clare [0:19:54]: They're the ones that will be checking and making sure measuring the detail length on those columns that I talked about.

Clare [0:20:00]: They're the ones that live in spreadsheets that are thinking through every single details.

Clare [0:20:04]: So I was sort of that bridge.

Clare [0:20:05]: Right?

Clare [0:20:05]: Like, I'm visionary, but also execution oriented, but not don't ask me to write a checklist for launch day of all the things that from t shirts to pens to all those things.

Clare [0:20:15]: So somebody who understands the vision understands the outcome, what we're trying to do but is very detailed oriented.

Clare [0:20:22]: Is upset...

Dave [0:20:24]: Like, one point of contact on all this stuff too working with all of the teams.

Dave [0:20:27]: It's not just like, they're keeping a list of activities.

Clare [0:20:30]: Yeah.

Clare [0:20:30]: So I was point of contact for what I will call the idea.

Clare [0:20:33]: Like, once we went from...

Clare [0:20:34]: Okay.

Clare [0:20:34]: We've selected our vendor, to...

Clare [0:20:36]: We had our category identity, then we had our brand identity, then we had our verbal and our visual visual was the final things.

Clare [0:20:42]: That took about six months.

Clare [0:20:44]: Then it as soon as we flip the switch into execution mode, then Kristen became the point of context.

Clare [0:20:48]: So every department is going through her.

Clare [0:20:50]: Oh, I need my Hr onboarding templates redone.

Clare [0:20:53]: Oh, I need my sales deck redone.

Clare [0:20:55]: Oh, I we have a conference in October two days after the re rebranding, but we don't wanna use old branding, but we can't advertise the, you know, we can't in August take the Val because we haven't announced it yet.

Clare [0:21:06]: So all of those things, then she became that person.

Clare [0:21:08]: So then I was still focused on some of the bigger pieces of a re brand, which is employee engagement, brand training, the website, we did that internally by the way.

Clare [0:21:17]: So that was thing.

Clare [0:21:18]: A lot of the folks I've talked to.

Clare [0:21:19]: They had an external agency doing their website.

Clare [0:21:23]: We did that internally.

Clare [0:21:23]: So we took the assets that focus had given us and actually worked with.

Clare [0:21:27]: It was, you know, me Lauren Maddie B and our developer the five of us.

Clare [0:21:31]: It was this small working team.

Dave [0:21:33]: Okay.

Dave [0:21:33]: So they didn't

Clare [0:21:34]: got that down.

Dave [0:21:35]: They didn't give you a website.

Dave [0:21:36]: They gave you elements, then you decided how you're gonna turn that into the website.

Clare [0:21:40]: Yeah.

Dave [0:21:40]: Cool.

Dave [0:21:40]: Yeah.

Dave [0:21:40]: Okay.

Dave [0:21:41]: And then let's wrap this up and just put a bow on this and talk about measurement.

Dave [0:21:44]: I think you talked about this as one of the key things at the beginning.

Clare [0:21:47]: Yeah.

Clare [0:21:47]: So as we know, brand is a little bit harder to measure, and one of the things that I think is really important is that a lot of folks stop at launch today.

Clare [0:21:54]: Right?

Clare [0:21:55]: So they say, okay, we launched everybody knows it, we've done a couple of brand story hours, and That's it.

Clare [0:22:02]: And then you're gonna see some fall off.

Clare [0:22:04]: There's two things that I would say that I want you to take away as far as post launch.

Clare [0:22:07]: One is you need at least three to six months as part of your plan after launch day.

Clare [0:22:13]: To make sure that everyone...

Clare [0:22:15]: You're sort of doing Qa on the sales team, the ops team, making sure that what I talked about in the beginning about getting that CEO bot in and about every step of the way every department this touches this is infrastructure, it's making sure that we actually did launch it That sales is only using the new decks that you're not having product pull up on a live demo an old Pg branded deck, which has happened.

Clare [0:22:35]: That's a real example.

Clare [0:22:36]: That you're not still having somebody go, hey, can you put on the website minority owned Ls.

Clare [0:22:42]: No.

Clare [0:22:43]: I can't because we're not an Ls anymore.

Clare [0:22:44]: So that kind of thing where we're eradicating all of that old language from every department, you're not gonna just launch day.

Clare [0:22:51]: Oh, now everybody's...

Clare [0:22:52]: You know, even if you train them well, you're still gonna have sort of the old school slipping back.

Clare [0:22:57]: The other thing is you have to evolve.

Clare [0:22:59]: Right?

Clare [0:23:00]: So you've gotta iterate and make sure that you may do this and you get some learnings from clients from team from customers that you're going, oh, we need to tweak this Or they're not actually understanding.

Clare [0:23:08]: We thought we have this great idea.

Clare [0:23:10]: We did all this research, but it's not actually sticking the way we wanted to.

Clare [0:23:13]: So you need to put in some time to be iterating and testing that.

Clare [0:23:16]: And then also, this is probably less of a factor for folks probably.

Clare [0:23:21]: But if you are changing category, and brand at the same time.

Clare [0:23:25]: I highly recommend trying to separate that.

Clare [0:23:27]: I mean, you're doing training, really do category training separately from brand training Because otherwise, they kinda get mixed in and inflated.

Clare [0:23:33]: So that was something that for...

Dave [0:23:35]: Do you explain the difference?

Dave [0:23:36]: Like, how would those two break things be different?

Clare [0:23:38]: So in our example, it's category.

Clare [0:23:40]: We are a strategic globalization and our brand is Piedmont Global.

Clare [0:23:43]: We're the Pioneer and this doesn't gonna be other strategic globalization companies.

Dave [0:23:46]: So teach deal about the industry, the competitive Exactly.

Clare [0:23:50]: Yes.

Clare [0:23:50]: And so not every is gonna be, you know, category defining obviously.

Clare [0:23:54]: So that's a smaller percentage.

Clare [0:23:55]: And then from an execution standpoint, so it really is sort of seeing that through and making sure that as you're measuring that you can really tell the story to finance.

Clare [0:24:03]: So I'd prep them three to six months is the minimum that you're gonna actually see any kind of financial results typically.

Clare [0:24:08]: Again, I'm not talking startup up where we're talking about establish, you know, fifty million to two hundred fifty million dollar companies.

Clare [0:24:14]: I would say give yourself a little bit of time, but be tracking those things to be able...

Clare [0:24:18]: You'll see an initial dip a lot of times, especially with a big change.

Clare [0:24:21]: People don't like change people or people.

Clare [0:24:22]: Right?

Clare [0:24:23]: We're selling to people.

Clare [0:24:23]: They don't like change.

Clare [0:24:25]: So I say to budget for about fifteen percent.

Clare [0:24:27]: It depends on the industry, it depends on a lot of factors.

Clare [0:24:29]: But prepare your finance team that you're gonna see a little bit of a dip.

Clare [0:24:33]: And that was the other thing I'll say.

Clare [0:24:35]: Our CEO knew that we were putting this stake in the ground, and he was not afraid of that.

Clare [0:24:39]: He said, we will be misunderstood.

Clare [0:24:40]: There will be people that will be confused, but we are gonna see this through.

Clare [0:24:43]: And so having that commitment that isn't gonna say, oh, we're a month in, and we saw website traffic dipped fifteen percent.

Clare [0:24:50]: Nope.

Clare [0:24:50]: It didn't work.

Clare [0:24:51]: Let's go back to the old, you have to be willing to do the weight to actually see if this work.

Clare [0:24:56]: And again, depending on industry and new selling to it can take longer or shorter if your sales cycles are longer or shorter it's gonna take time for ours, we knew we were committing to a year.

Clare [0:25:04]: So we'll be looking, you know, a year's time from September in this September.

Clare [0:25:09]: Hey, how did we do what percentage of our services how we've been able to expand, etcetera.

Clare [0:25:13]: So I think that the two things that I'll say are make sure your CEO owns the Gt and is fully bought in and we'll be with you every step of the way, and also, make sure that you budget for that education post launch day and do all of the Qa so that you really are telling the same story from Hr telling a candidate about our company all the way through to ops doing that quarterly business review.

Clare [0:25:38]: And if they're getting each department has their own flavor.

Clare [0:25:40]: Right?

Clare [0:25:40]: You wanna give people enough autonomy to be able tell the story in their own way, So it doesn't sound like a script, but they have to understand the brand at each level to be able to tell that story through.

Clare [0:25:50]: And then also, you know, looking at things like I think we talked about this on our Seo one about Ai, but looking at is the market picking up when we type it into GPT, are we getting back the narrative that we want to be getting back?

Clare [0:26:01]: So that's another thing I think to look at is sort of is the market reflecting back to what you have put out there or not?

Clare [0:26:08]: Are we still in the old language.

Dave [0:26:11]: Awesome.

Dave [0:26:11]: Okay.

Dave [0:26:11]: Clear.

Dave [0:26:12]: That was great.

Dave [0:26:12]: Some specific tactical advice on how to navigate a re brand super useful, especially for the people I listened that in that kinda of mid market, fifty to two hundred fifty million dollar revenue range.

Dave [0:26:22]: Go find Clare on Linkedin Clare on Linkedin.

Dave [0:26:24]: Tell her you heard about her here.

Dave [0:26:26]: It was helpful, send a message.

Dave [0:26:27]: If you're going through a re brand too.

Dave [0:26:29]: Clare, always good to see you.

Dave [0:26:31]: I appreciate all your contributions.

Dave [0:26:32]: Thanks for giving us a great little episode on how to think about a re

Clare [0:26:36]: Thanks so much for having me bing.

Clare [0:26:37]: It was a fun conversation as always.

Clare [0:26:39]: Awesome.

Dave [0:26:44]: Hey, Thanks for listening to this podcast.

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