Why Changing Your Name and Logo Is a Waste of Time
At least once a year I attend a board meeting of a struggling business where someone suggests that the answer to their problems is a new name and a new logo. What happens next is absolutely predetermined: large amounts of money are spent researching and analyzing the current name, logo and positioning; and branding experts are brought in to sift through the data and make recommendations. After vast amounts of time and money have vanished, we review a selection of new names and logos about which everyone had emphatic, emotional, intransigent, and unequivocal views. After a very great deal of debate, we either choose the least bad or decide to make no change at all. Forgive the cynical tone, but I've sat through this process more times than I've had hot breakfasts. I know it for what it is: displacement activity. This is not to say that positioning problems don't matter -- they do, urgently. But here's a heretical thought: the name and the logo don't matter. If the positioning is right, you can call yourself anything. And if the positioning is wrong, you can also call yourself anything -- because no name or logo could save you.
What does the word 'Dyson' actually mean? Nothing. It has come to mean what founder James Dyson decided his name should stand for: products whose superior engineering yields superior performance. Is that inherent in the name? No. If he'd decided it stood for the world's cheapest vacuum cleaner, then that's what Dyson would now mean. Think of McDonalds. Stanford. Mattel. Do these names have any inherent meaning? No, they acquired it. And if you still don't believe names don't matter, go down to your nearest perfume counter and buy yourself a bottle of Poison.
Logos, those masterpieces of miniature graphic design, are a fulcrum for endless debate. What matters most is that they aren't stupid and will expand and shrink without losing clarity.
Does the Dyson logo do anything amazing? No. It's clean and legible and modern. McDonalds? Honda? They have functional logos that support, but don't contain, the company's products. Of course, a few companies have brilliant logos -- Apple springs to mind -- but the fact that Microsoft's logo is banal hasn't stopped them from selling operating systems. (Though I dread to contemplate the cost -- in time and fees -- of the detail between the letters O and S!)
Agonizing over names and logos is what companies do when they can't or won't answer the questions that really matter:
- What do you stand for? What are the qualities of your products or services from which you will never ever, on pain of death, deviate? What do you stake your business's life and reputation on?
- What processes do you have in place to ensure that every single person in your business knows this and can repeat it in their sleep? From the cleaner to the chairman of the board, this has to be crystal clear.
- Who are your customers? Do you know them like members of your family?
- Is there a fit between what you stand for and what your customers want? Do they have the money to pay for it? How does your offering make a difference to their lives?
- Are you ruthless in throwing out ideas -- and customers -- that don't fit the bill?