‘It’s just a word’. ‘It tells a story’. ‘It doesn’t mean
anything’. ‘It needed to be short and easy to pronounce’. ‘It’s meaningless’.
These are just a few of the ways that senior figures from Yell have described
their new name ‘Hibu’.
The
company’s rebrand comes as its share price dropped 21% following results
revealing a pre-tax loss of £1.42bn. Unfortunately, without a change in
communications strategy, I’m not sure the name change will be the solution that
Yell needs.
A brand is more than just a name or a logo. A brand should
tell us something about the organisation behind the name. A brand is an
organisation’s identity. Just as you can tell a lot about a person by their
appearance and the things they say, you should be able to get an idea of what
an organisation’s values and vision are from their branding.
But a brand only works when everybody – management, staff,
partners and customers – can get behind it. From the comments being made, it
doesn’t sound as if the senior management team really understand the new brand.
And if they don’t understand it, it’s going to be difficult for others to get
enthused.
Yell needs to communicate internally before it communicates
externally. It needs to help its staff, partners and stakeholders understand
what the new name is about and what it stands for. It needs to explain how the
re-brand is making the most of the Group’s past, but is also pointing towards
its future. Investors and customers will only believe in the new brand if the
company itself believes in it.
Some have defended the choice of Hibu by saying that before
it became famous, “Yahoo!” didn’t mean anything either. This isn’t quite true.
A quick Google search tells us that the name is short for “Yet
Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle”, reflecting both the way the
database is arranged (hierarchical) and its use as a source of truth and wisdom
(oracle). In addition, Yahoo!’s creators liked the definition of a yahoo:
“rude, unsophisticated and uncouth”.
Admittedly, most people have no idea what Yahoo! stands for,
nor do they care what it means. But its creators and early users understood the
name as part of the brand identity, believed in the strategy and communicated
this to the world. Now, Yahoo! is a household name.
A new name alone will not raise Yell’s share price. But if
the company improves its communications strategy and effectively promotes the new
brand and what it stands for, we may still be yelling ‘Hibu’ in a decade.
Jo Nussbaum
Consultant
Posts
1 comment:
Good posting. I actually quite like the visual identity, but I couldnt agree more with you about the importance of communicating it effectively. Perhaps the worst aspect is the way it was launched. It's been covered everywhere but if you go to hibu.com the impression you're left with is the antithesis of what theyre hoping the new brand will stand for (there's a picture on our facebook page, in case they change it - facebook.com/communicatemagazine). Youre certainly not given the impression that Hibu is going to become a global online powerhouse. Theyve said one thing, and are doing another.
Post a Comment