Rebranding Your SaaS: A Comprehensive Guide to Transforming Your Business Identity

Freshdesk, a SaaS company that focuses on customer service solutions, had a big moment in 2017. Since Freshdesk offered more than just helpdesk services, the name “Freshdesk” no longer summed up the company’s main goal.

The company changed its name to Freshworks to better match its wide range of services. This strategic move demonstrated the company’s transformation into a comprehensive provider of business solutions.

Rebranding can significantly impact SaaS founders seeking to realign their business identity with their evolving mission and audience. However, the process is intricate and requires meticulous planning and execution. This article describes how to do a successful rebrand, with real-life examples.

1. Understand why you need to change your brand.

Rebranding is more than just changing your logo or tagline. It means changing how people think of your business. This step can be crucial if your current brand fails to reflect your company’s goals, products, or market positioning.
For example: Sendinblue was famous for its email marketing services, added more marketing tools to its list of services in 2023. The company changed its name to Brevo to better reflect its full suite of services. This change demonstrated its transformation from an email-focused platform to a comprehensive marketing solution.


2. Audit Your Brand

Look at the pros and cons of your current brand. Get feedback from customers, employees, and other important people to find out how they see things and where you can improve. (have a Branding workshop with your agency)

Act-On Software, a SaaS company specializing in marketing automation, recognized the need to update its brand identity to align with current market trends. They did a full brand audit and found key areas that needed improvement. This led to a successful rebrand that spoke to their target audience. search15 citeturn

3. Figure out your brand’s strategy.

Make a brand strategy that spells out your mission, vision, values, and what makes your business special. All of your branding efforts should be based on this strategy.

For instance, Zendesk initially concentrated on helpdesk solutions, but it has subsequently expanded its offerings to cater to larger businesses. The company changed its brand strategy to focus on proactive customer engagement. This made the company’s identity more in line with the services it provides.

4. Create a visual and verbal identity that fits together.

Create a brand voice and visual elements, such as a logo, colour palette, and fonts, that showcase your core values, vision and product. Make sure that all platforms and materials are the same.

For instance, HelpScout, formerly known as Brightwurks, renamed itself to more accurately represent its operations. As part of the rebranding, the company got a new logo and visual identity that better showed what it does, which is help customers.

5. Spread the word

Make a plan for how you will tell people inside and outside the company about the rebrand. Explain why and how the change will benefit people.

When MYOB changed its name to become known as a modern cloud-based SaaS platform, it started a full communications plan to show off its unified, flexible platform and stress how well it knew how to help businesses. 

6. Begin the rebranding process and monitor its progress closely.

Spread the new look of the brand through all of your channels. Monitor customer feedback and make necessary adjustments to ensure the rebrand resonates with your target audience.

Following their name change, Freshworks closely monitored customer feedback and market reactions. This helped them make changes that were in line with what their audience expected.

Rebranding is a big job that can bring your SaaS business back to life and help it reach your strategic goals. You can get through the complicated process of rebranding and come out with a stronger, more meaningful brand identity if you learn from companies like Freshworks and Brevo that have done it successfully and follow a structured plan.

Looking to rebrand your Saas business – talk to us. We can organize a Brand Audit and help you map your way to an outstanding Brand. Drop us a line here to expand with the changing online buying future.