Ensure the the maximum impact of post-merger rebranding

As businesses evaluate the future, every company is assessing the landscape and making tough choices. For some, this will mean a fundamental re-think, often involving a merger or buy-out with former competitors. Restructuring is disorienting but requires fresh thinking, to really get creative – on every front. With a blending of assets, perhaps following a capital raise and a reboot of how a company works, we’ve often helped with parallel visual changes in terms of how it looks, too. When two companies merge, the new blend of personalities means considering if that requires new branding. Often at speed. So, now’s the time to start planning. Post-merger rebranding requires ingenuity, using budget carefully to ensure maximum impact.

Making the most of a one-off opportunity

Following a merger, the blend of existing business relationships, a new team and refreshed branding delivers a singular moment that should be seized at all costs.

Firstly, a new business setup with a wider skillset means a parallel wider audience who will assess your newly merged offering from the ground up. Our thinking is that, with the right marketing, new business will be driven by longstanding working relationships across the divide and also deliver curious new partners.

In short, it’s the perfect time to make a first impression – particularly on the web, where a client base (who may well be working remotely) will be most likely to check out your rebooted brand image.

Here are our five key approaches to post-merger rebranding:

1. Two obvious approaches are either to create a total break from your existing brand – or evolve the current design in a manner that flatters both merging partners in a balanced, modern way.
2. Launch online, on time. We are familiar with regulatory requirements meaning a timed, date-sensitive launch. We also understand the new site will have to set out your new proposition and put the legal press release announcement front and centre.
3. To make the project manageable, consider a slow reveal. Many firms evolve their new website in the months following launch, revealing the detail of their services in a series of planned, staged announcements. In a short-attention-span world, it’s a great way of making your point, step by step.
4. Consider all new media avenues. Deliver a series of podcasts from your refreshed management team, combining diverse voices, new colleagues and conversations across all levels of expertise. It’s inexpensive, can be done entirely online and with snappy production, embedded straight into your website, can make a serious impact.
5. Over the first months, release a series of pieces of ‘visual thought leadership’, downloadable newsletters or think-pieces from the new management team that, done well, could quickly become indispensable industry reading.

Evolving with impact: Investcorp-Tages

Our latest post-merger rebranding project is for investment firm Investcorp-Tages. This new firm was created as a standalone joint venture between Investcorp and Tages Group in May 2020.

We worked with the new team to deliver this project, at its first phase, entirely under lockdown, communicating virtually between ourselves and their team.

Initially conceived as a small project to get the website over the line for the launch date, we’ve recently completed a significant expansion of its scope, trebling the size of the site just months after the merger.

As I review this piece of work, I can’t help feeling really excited by it. Often corporate work is to a tight, specific brief, and this was no exception. That can limit creativity, but within our work in the financial services industry, I’ve often found a willingness to listen and work together, providing a strong, visual brand which is invariably considered reputation-enhancing.

During the Investcorp-Tages project, we worked with the new team to create an elegant brand approach that carefully blends the visual language across both sides of the merged partnership, yet charts its own, new way forward.

As part of the overall design of the site, we’ve been sure to apply current web techniques throughout, albeit in an unfussy, relevant way. For instance, and there the site features subtle animation of financial information. We’ve added a deft use of parallax effects as well as iconography drawn in-house, and an interactive map showcasing locations and contact information.

The second phase of work has really delivered on the promise of the first, adding pages on the firm’s product, awards collected across both merging firms, news and all relevant regulatory pagination. The site delivers detailed information about corporate and social responsibility, awards won over the years, research papers as downloads and much more besides.

It’s a modern, corporate website that defines a new business inspired the best of the firms that joined forces.

For the best impact of your post-merger rebranding – plan early

With advanced negotiations on your merger underway, now’s the time to plan how you present your new business entity. Why not get in touch to discuss a wide range of different approaches? We can work on designs from a straightforward launch to an expansive digital reboot, depending on your brief and budget.

Call us on 020 7351 4083 or email us direct.

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Find out more about our work for Investcorp-Tages

Visit the Investcorp-Tages website