Branding is the image your business projects. It starts from the company’s name, builds with a logo and develops into a full set of branding guidelines which will influence your website, company documents and advertising. The public will recognise you through your brand, which is why it’s important to create something memorable. 

Common Mistakes

Everyone makes mistakes. To err is human. But in an online world, mistakes are no longer easily forgotten. Making a mistake with your branding can resonate for a long time, and potentially negatively impact your business. 

Here is Squideo’s round up of the top five most common mistakes you can make while branding. 

01. Imitating Competitors

Branding strategies that have been successful for your competitors might seem like an ideal place to start planning, but copying their work can actually damage your brand. It makes your business appear generic and possibly fraudulent. Instead, research what made their branding resonate with customers and apply that knowledge while creating something original. New Paragraph

02. Jumping on Trends

Trends have their place, and some are indicative of something new that’s here to stay. Look at stories – they were a trend introduced by TikTok, now they’re a mainstream of social media. However most trends are fickle; they come and they go. To develop a timeless brand, come up with something unique to you and your business instead of relying on a fad. Trends have their place in marketing content, but not in the founding identity of your company. 

03. Forgetting Market Research

A brand is designed for its audience. The branding for a toy company and a human resource firm, for example, will look very different because they’re not catering to the same demographic. Conducting market research helps you learn what your audience vales in a brand and what makes them connect to a company, saving you time and money experimenting with different branding styles. 

04. Dreary Copy

Branding might seem visually-centred, but copywriting plays a big part in creating your company’s brand. From the business name, a slogan, tagline, website content and social media captions, it’s important to maintain a consistent branding tone. Consider what vocabulary, style and tone your audience will best respond to. Should it be formal and technical? Or casual and friendly? 

05. Choosing the Wrong Partners

What may be a suitable partnership for some businesses might be wholly unsuitable for others. In 2023, the Royal Opera House became the last British cultural institution to end its sponsorship by BP. The partnership had brought a lot of criticism and damaged the brand of the ROH, whose audience responded negatively to its support of the oil giant. Which is a good reminder to conduct market research on your partners too. 

Top Blunders

There are plenty of mistakes to make when branding, but what happened to the businesses who went ahead and made these errors. Let’s explore five examples of some of the worst branding mishaps of the past ten years. 

01. Mind the Gap (2010)

When you have to reverse a rebrand within a week, you know it was bad. Like some other large companies at the start of the 2010s, Gap Ltd. decided it wanted to shake up its brand which had remained the same for thirty years. As soon as the new logo was released, Gap faced a torrent of ridicule that took the rebrand into news headlines. Clearly Gap should’ve conducted some market research before the debut, it could have saved them a lot of money. 

02. Don’t Be So Qwikster Judge (2011)

Poor Qwikster, dead within a month. Perhaps if Netflix had done its market research before launching this new spin-off business the entire mess could have been avoidable. While Netflix argued the issue was consumer confusion about its pricing and subscription plans, the real issue was they created a company no one wanted. Qwikster was meant to take over the DVD-mailing service Netflix had dropped to focus on streaming, not realising the market for DVD-mailing was gone.

The tagline certainly didn’t help either – “Launching soon, so start popping the popcorn.” It only becomes popcorn once it’s popped Netflix! Hire a copywriter next time. 

03. Avoid the Subway (2015)

Just like selecting a partner or sponsor, it’s important to research any potential brand representatives before signing them. Subway had used Jared Fogle as a spokesperson for several years, who had famously lost weight while in the role – supposedly from eating Subway sandwiches. In 2015, Subway launched the online game ‘Jared’s Pants Dance’ in reference to the trousers Fogle had since outgrown. The promotion for this game came out at the same time that Fogle pleaded guilty to a series of sex-related crimes. What terrible timing!

04. You Really Pepsi-ed Up (2017)

Let’s refresh what was happening in 2017 when Pepsi decided to drop the mother of all branding missteps. Black Lives Matter marches were taking place across the United States. Me Too had blown up the internet, prompting women’s rights protests around the world. And Pepsi hired The Kardashian’s star Kendall Jenner for an advert, attending a non-descript march, handing a police officer a Pepsi, and achieving peace. The advert was soon pulled and Jenner had to deliver an apology for her involvement. Don’t address social issues in marketing content unless you’re prepared to do your research first; or face the wrath of the internet.

05. The North Red-Faced (2019)

Clever or manipulative, I think we can all agree the greatest mistake North Face made was announcing the trick they had pulled. The brand substituted pictures on Wikipedia pages for high-traffic tourism destinations like Guarita State Park and Isle of Skye with images featuring their products. Condemned by the public and the Wikimedia Foundation, both the marketing agency and The North Face had to apologise for the stunt. It’s important to get your brand out there, but piggybacking another company stained this company’s reputation. 

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