Whatever the size and reach of your charity, rebranding your organisation is a big commitment.
In February 2023, after many conversations and a lot of work, our charity On Road Media became Heard.
Conversations about letting go of our name – and finding a better way to tell the world about what we do – had been percolating for several years. Like most charities, we are often consumed by the day-to-day, and we found it hard to justify the time and spend when we were up against challenges of capacity and demand for our work.
2021 was the right time for us. For 15 years we’d been known as On Road Media – we’re a communications charity working with charities, campaigners and the media to inspire content that changes hearts and minds. It was a name that I chose related to the work I was doing at the time, not knowing how our work would evolve. Understandably it was an identity that our team, and others, felt attached to – although we felt sure that it wasn’t resonating with the new audiences we were trying to reach.
We knew from the outset that we needed more than a lick of paint. We wanted a name that would more immediately communicate the essence of who we are and what we do, a new aesthetic and renewed approach to our own communications.
We landed on Heard. Why? Because we all need to be – and to feel – heard. Being heard in the way you intend matters to us all and it’s essential to making progress as a society. Our new identity has galvanised our team and refreshed our mission to spark better conversations and communication.
It felt cathartic to reflect on how we arrived at this place, the groundwork we did and what we learned. And I hope it might help those thinking of making the change. Here are our top takeaways…
1. Is it the right time for your rebrand?
Sounds obvious, but one to consider carefully. We’re a modest-sized team, and relatively young in charity years. And although a rebrand had been on our minds for a while, we deliberately spent recent years focussing on the strategic direction of our organisation, and growing our team.
We needed to be in a position where we had enough capacity to embrace the rebrand process in a dedicated way. We also needed to be confident in our organisation’s strategy as this would provide shape and direction to the rebrand.
2. Identify your audiences
Something we’re glad we did early on was dedicate time to thinking about who our audience(s) are. Once we’d completed that work, we could think clearly and with confidence about who our rebrand was for and its objectives.
This work became an important reference. Anything we did with the rebrand would need to resonate with our audiences. We work with a wide range of collaborators – from the media to funders, our network colleagues to charity comms professionals – so having them defined kept us on track.
3. Get your key stakeholders on board
We knew consulting our networks was crucial, but we underestimated the amount of time that was needed to do this well and at the right pace for us.
Excited about getting started, we engaged a design agency (more on that below) before we had completed the consultation. Luckily the agency was flexible (not all agencies will be!) and we paused, and took our time to explore how people felt about our existing identity. What did they like? What didn’t they like? What parts of that identity resonated with them? We did this by sending a questionnaire to a broad range of collaborators in our networks and then running a workshop to delve deeper.
This told us a lot – particularly the emotional connection that many people had with our organisation.
It was also a signal that how we worked with stakeholders throughout the process was just as important as the content of the rebrand itself. Finding ways to engage our wider team, the people who contribute to our work’s success, was vital.
4. Find good collaborators to work with
Throughout the process I worked closely with our communications director – now a consultant at Heard – Nicky Hawkins. Nicky led on the rebrand and identified the design agency Onwards after being drawn to their creative design on Larger Us.
Within our team, we had the skills to do the strategic thinking and project management, but we needed an external partner to help us bring this to life. Working with Onwards felt collaborative and fun, and they knew how to guide us through the process without getting bogged down in details like colours and fonts. Once the big decisions were made – like the name and the general creative direction – it was pretty smooth sailing from there on.
Another top priority for us was to find ways to live our brand values beyond the launch. Our work is all about clear, accessible communications and our choices needed to reflect that. Greg Cochrane was invaluable in helping us to establish a tone of voice, digital strategy and set of legacy tools that would help our team inhabit our new identity.
5. Prepare to make amends, adjustments and mistakes
Not a piece of groundwork as such, but rather a mindset I’d encourage you to embrace early on.
At times a rebrand can be a bumpy ride and, if you’re doing it right, it will surface lots of strong feelings and passionate inputs. Take the time to work through how people feel about it, making sure your stakeholders can regularly feed into the process.
But don’t be afraid to take decisions at pivotal moments, even if there is a little push back here and there. You won’t get 100% consensus on the name or the look and feel – but if the process is transparent and consultative, and you’re not afraid to pause, rewind and go again, you’ll have everyone’s support and enthusiasm at the end of it.
We’d happily talk to you about our experience, and the work we do. You can find us via the contact form on our lovely new website.
Want to explore the important strategic and creative building blocks that make a strong brand? Join us for our upcoming Charity brand and creative conference.
For more rebranding inspiration check out our Brand 360 Guide, and you may also want to read:
- Collaborate to succeed: lessons from creating an inclusive rebrand
- Realities of a rebrand
- Putting tinnitus front and centre with a powerful new brand identity
Banner Image: Francesca Saraco on Unsplash
