- August 22, 2018 -
Rebranding your company can be risky business.
Good news is it can be done...and in a bit, I'll share a very cool story of a colleague that pulled it off in spades.
But for every one rebrand success story, there are ten flops.
Case in point...the Comcast-Xfinity disaster.
Comcast had a bad reputation of high prices and abysmal customer service and one day someone came up with the idea...
...to just rebrand with a slick new name in hopes that everyone would come down with a serious case of amnesia and forget how much they hated Comcast.
It was an attempt to show customers that they're no longer the "same old company" - they're now an "innovator." Hmm...
Rival Verizon was quick to pounce, calling out Comcast-Xfinity for the nice paint job.
And eventually people complained that it just sounded a little edgier when they were put on hold...with Xfinity.
Ironically I was so fed up with Verizon internet service last week after outages for days that I just switched to the only other option...Comcast (or Xfinity or whoever the heck they call themselves.)
I'm a sucker for giving everybody a second chance.
Comcast...
"Don't let me down, don't let me down.
Can you dig it? Don't let me down."
(Are you hearing the Beatles or Chainsmokers version in you head?)
Sorry. Not sorry...couldn't resist.
One of our colleagues recently went through a rebrand...and it's one of the coolest stories I've heard in a long time.
Firstly, it had nothing to do with a reputation issue.
It had everything to do with a shift in their service focus.
And that is to help businesses develop systems and processes to eliminate the 2-minute repetitive and menial tasks that everyone is over-qualified to perform.
In short...to create major efficiency.
I'll save their new name until the end -- but here's where they got their inspiration:
A burger restaurant in the UK.
When you first get seated in the restaurant, you're asked if you've ever been there before and if you know how the system works.
Once they're sure you understand their process, you're given a menu and a blue clothes pin (called a "peg" in the UK) is attached to a tin cup in the center of the table.
You go up to the counter to order and pay for your drinks and food.
When your food is brought to your table and a server has checked on you to make sure everything is ok, the blue peg is removed.
When it's clear that you're finished, a staff member clears the table and asks if you'd like any other drinks or dessert.
When the bill is brought to the table, the blue peg is attached once again to the tin along with the bill.
Once you pay the bill at the table, the peg is removed.
The whole staff knows at a glance what the status of the service is at any given point.
If there's food on the table and a blue peg...that means that no one has been around yet to check on you.
If there's food on the table but no blue peg....you're not continually hassled with staff asking: "Everything OK?"
"Is everything all right?"
"You doing ok here?"
Such a simple system.
Any member of the staff can glance across the entire restaurant to see what's going on at each table.
Who's still waiting to order?
Who's been served?
Who's been checked up on?
Who hasn't settled their bill?
Efficiency and customer service in it's most simple form.
Guess the name of the company rebrand...
Pretty brilliant, wouldn't you say?
Inspiration from a totally unrelated source.
And that's why I rant and blab about Aretha Franklin, the Steelers, and my favorite TV shows.
When you're ready to get inspired, you know what to do.
Later!
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