5 Tips for Surviving After a Rebrand With SEO

To some people, the term “rebrand” is synonymous with the phrase “zombie apocalypse.” The thought that something was created, then died, and is now risen again in some horrifying, mutated form is enough to make you pull out your machete and head for the hills. While there may be a few decaying companies out there that remind us of the living dead, you can avoid having your company rot away by thinking of your rebrand as a different creature: a butterfly. Metamorphosis takes a caterpillar, which is cute, but slowly crawling along, and transforms it into a beautiful butterfly, something with the strength to bust out of the old shell and reach unexpected new heights. Your SEO content marketing can not only survive a rebrand, it can be a force that propels your company’s wings up the ranking charts. Here’s how you can emerge into a new form with brilliance and wonder as you help your company soar.

1. Start With a Plan

It may sound cliché, but you need to do some thinking and planning about why the rebrand is happening (company merge, refresh, brand acquisition) in order to create an effective plan for your website content writing services. As the SEO manager, you’ll be in charge of instructing your team about the steps that need to be taken and the path that should be followed as you navigate the changes. Having a detailed plan in place is the only way you’ll be able to clearly do this and reach a destination your whole company will be happy with.

2. Transition Smoothly

Maybe you’re really excited about the changes and are gung-ho to get the new site going. That is great news, but don’t forget that your current clients are used to visiting your old site. You may have sent out newsletters announcing the change and posted notices on your site, but inevitably there will be some clients (maybe many) who didn’t get the memo and may attempt to visit your site only to find an error message. Do these folks a favor and make the change a bit smoother. You may decide to leave the old site up for a few weeks, few months, few years or even indefinitely. You should have a redirect notice on the site letting visitors know that fresh content is going up on your new site and they’ll need to visit there, but maintaining both for a time will prevent a major loss of confused customers. Inactive sites do require some maintenance, but it should be minimal and allow you to focus on the new page.

One thing that needs to be mentioned is the fact that redirects need to be used effectively in order to avoid frustration and keep customers happy. Do this by creating individual redirects for each page that send readers to the most relevant page on the new site. If you have kept the same URL, this should be fairly easy.

3. Tell Your Story

Modern customers want to hear a story, so your first act as a rebranded company should be to create an article detailing the changes, why they happened and what the future goals are. Whether the move was because of a new acquisition or total revamp, there should obviously be a positive light on anything mentioned. If your company hit financial woes, spin that in a good direction by focusing instead on the desire to grow and offer more services. Here is an example of one’s company rebranding statement.

A great way to use your article or infographic is in your announcement of the changes on social media. Clients who don’t always check their newsletters may miss the change, so shouting it from the rooftops (or every social media avenue possible) is your best bet for making sure everyone is aware and can avoid future frustration.

4. Integrate Your SEO

In addition to directing your online content writing services in the direction you would like the rebrand to go, you can also help faithful customers feel more at home by revamping some of your old SEO pieces to incorporate the change. While this can be as simple as changing the brand name, more effective updates can promote growth at the same time as welcoming your current customers on board. Here are some tips for repurposing your old content.

• Pay attention to the small details like fonts and headers
• If you can’t keep an old topic, create a new post as closely related as possible
• Be sure to include updates of the top posts from your previous site
• Alert sites that have backlinked to you of the change so they can update their pages

In addition to these tips, be sure to get your SEO content writing team to write, write, write! Following these steps can prevent a drastic drop in search rankings, but initiating a giant content push at the beginning of your rebrand can give a boost to push you back up to your previous position as quickly as possible. You may find that you are able to rise even higher than before. For the fastest blast of content, add in as many repurposed pieces of your old content as possible. Be sure that as you are pushing for more and more content, you are also making sure those pieces are high-quality. A few great posts will be worth far more to your company than a dozen poorly-written articles.

5. Don’t Forget to Update Your SEO Optimization

One thing that may need to be redone is your keyword research. If your rebranded company has altered goals or services, you will need to conduct new research to find keywords that match. As long as the changes aren’t too drastic, you can likely repurpose old content with the new keywords. If that is not possible, you’ll need to submit the changes to your website content writing services to be sure your SEO matches your rebranded company.

A decision to rebrand is not a death sentence and does not mean your company will come climbing out of a grave on launch day. Use updated SEO to help your business blossom into a stronger, more colorful and higher-flying entity after metamorphosis.