In a world where trends come and go faster than you can say “Branding Compass,” it’s more important than ever to maintain a timeless branding strategy that keeps your business relevant and engaging. Updating your branding can be essential to staying competitive and building customer loyalty.

Understanding the importance of timeless branding and how you can update your branding without losing the essence of what makes your brand unique is essential. There are many benefits of a consistent brand image, including increased recognition, customer loyalty, and market share. Here are some practical tips on how to update your branding, from refining your brand message to refreshing your logo and visual identity.

Read on for valuable insights on how you can keep your brand looking fresh and relevant while staying true to your brand values and identity. Your brand is a living entity and will experience growth and change. The key is to have enough brand elements that remain consistent so that you can play with other elements.

Timeless brands are like timeless fashions

A good analogy of this is how individuals wear their clothes and style their hair. There are some people who are always up-to-date with fashion: if you first met them in 1982 and they were wearing parachute pants, you may not be surprised to see them in 1992 wearing an oversized flannel shirt. In contrast, there are some people who have a timeless style. They purchase classic clothes and are never very trendy.

A third group is those folks who seem stuck in a different era. They are still wearing their Flashdance-inspired cut-off sweatshirts and have a poofy perm.

Of all these groups, avoid the third category for your logo and branding. And while many aspire to be cool and trendy, it can be more upkeep than starting with a more classic look. Just like having some classic pieces in your wardrobe and spicing them up with accessories, it is far better to pick a timeless, non-trendy design, and then you can work with it and incorporate smaller design elements to hang off it. A well-designed logo will be a good investment for your company.

How to update your branding

Updating your brand means that while you keep things consistent, there are elements that change over time. Here are a few examples you may want to consider:

Changing your secondary colors

You should avoid changing your main color palette, but accent or background colors could change. A great place to try this is on your website. 

For example, a few years ago, there were many websites with light gray backgrounds in the main body area. Recently, white backgrounds have been favored. This is a change that freshens up your site while maintaining your corporate color palette.

Updating photographs

In both web and print designs, outdated photos make everything look old. The hairstyles, clothing, and even styles of lighting and posing models change over time. Look at any stock or royalty-free photos you’re using and see if replacing them might make your materials look more up-to-date.

Cleaning up contact info on your website 

Over the past few years, business owners have had more and more ways to keep in touch. First, it was fax machines, then email and cell phones, and now your social media platforms. In other words, the ways we communicate have changed. 

If it has been a while since you updated the contact info on your website and social media, take a moment to make sure they’re up to date. With small adjustments, you can update your brand and without changing the logo or other key elements.

Scaling elements differently

In web and print design, you can work with the same elements but emphasize them differently. A decision like this could be purely visual—make your headlines larger but in a lighter font. Or, they could be driven by your changing business—reorganizing website navigation or elements on a web page will make certain information more prominent. If you have changed the scope of services you offer, this is a particularly helpful change to consider.

To get an impact from your identity and branding, you need to maintain consistency. This helps you become recognizable and build the trust of your prospects. However, you want to make sure your website, printed marketing materials, and social posts don’t look stale or out-of-date. Work with your designer to update your branding or marketing materials to keep it fresh. 
If you want more impact from your branding, start Branding Compass for free.