It’s tempting whenever we launch a new product to build a logo to go with it. Months and sometimes years of development have gone into it. Research teams have been called in. Management has debated. And we’ve survived iteration upon iteration of prototyping, Alpha, Beta and MVP builds. Finally we’re ready for launch!
We buy the domain. We start drafting ad campaigns. We want our newest offering to have an identity, to be memorable, to become a success. But what about the parent brand? What about the equity we’ve already built and the trust and recall our customers already have in our company name?
When we make a decision whether to ‘logo’ and custom ‘brand’ a new product, we need to consider a few key things.
Does our target audience already love and trust our brand through previous product purchases?
If we go to market with a new product name, logo, look and feel, will our existing customers recognise it as part of our core brand and trust it enough to give it a try? Or will they think it’s built by someone completely different?
Is the new product complementary to our existing product suite? Will it become an up-sell? Or a cross-sell? And if it does, will consistency be key?
If we go to market with a standalone product brand, will we need to redesign our communication infrastructure? Will the Sales team need new email addresses @newproduct.com? Will this confuse customers where they’re buying multiple products at one time? How will we cross-sell in digital channels?
Not all products need their own logos. Some can be added to an existing suite, updated in nav and marketed as a bundle to already captivated audiences. Some are more powerful with the success of the parent brand behind them. Sometimes the best question to ask ourselves when deciding to ‘logo’ or not to ‘logo’, is whether we really need one at all.