The Essential Steps to Rebranding Success

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This is a podcast episode titled, The Essential Steps to Rebranding Success. The summary for this episode is: <p>In this episode, we're taking a deep dive into rebranding—the good and the bad—with Sharmin Kent, Manager, Content Strategy Lead at Studio Science. You'll discover the one question every marketer needs to answer before embarking on a rebranding journey, and we'll also unveil the essential research needed to find the perfect voice for your brand's fresh new look. We wrap up by exploring how to keep your messaging consistent across channels and what metrics to measure the success of your rebranding efforts.&nbsp;</p><p><br></p><p><strong>Quote:</strong></p><p>“Research is tedious and I hate it, but it is absolutely foundational and necessary.” - Sharmin Kent, Manager, Content Strategy Lead, Studio Science</p><p><br></p><p><strong>Time Stamps:</strong></p><p>* (01:02) Meet Sharmin Kent, Manager, Content Strategy Lead at Studio Science</p><p>* (03:13) What is visual content design?&nbsp;</p><p>* (06:22) The question to ask yourself before rebranding</p><p>* (10:13) Signals to look for before rebranding</p><p>* (17:05) How to use research to find the right voice for your rebrand</p><p>* (21:41) Keeping consistency in messaging across different channels</p><p>* (25:25) What metrics to use to measure the success of your rebranding</p><p>* (31:28) Ryan and Drew’s key takeaways</p><p><br></p><p><strong>Contact Us</strong></p><p>Got a topic idea? Hot take? Guest pitch? We’d love to hear from you! Reach out to us at <a href="mailto:PageOne@DemandJump.com" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">PageOne@DemandJump.com</a>.</p><p><br></p><p><strong>Sponsor</strong></p><p>This podcast is brought to you by <a href="https://www.demandjump.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">DemandJump</a>. Tired of wasting time creating content that doesn’t rank? With DemandJump you know the exact content to create to increase 1st-page rankings and drive outcomes. Get started for free today at <a href="https://www.demandjump.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">DemandJump.com</a>.</p>
The key question every marketer needs to ask before considering a rebrand
00:21 MIN
Signals that might trigger you to consider a rebrand
01:12 MIN
What research should be done when considering a rebrand?
02:26 MIN

Speaker 1: Welcome to Page One or Bust, your ultimate guide to getting on page one of search engines. Today's episode is all about rebranding. That's why we're talking to Charmin Kent, manager and content strategy lead at Studio Science, where she works with companies to uncover, craft and refine their narrative strengths. We'll dive into the crucial question every marketer needs to answer before embarking on their rebranding journey, and we'll share some tips on how to conduct research to find the right voice for your brand. Plus, we'll explore the metrics that matter most when measuring the success of your rebranding efforts. But first, a word from our sponsor. Page One or Bust is brought to you by Demand Jump. Get insights, drive outcomes with Demand Jump. Get started creating content that ranks for free at demandjump. com today. And now, here are your co- hosts, Drew Detzler and Ryan Brock.

Drew Detzler: Welcome to Page One or Bust. This is Drew Detzler, and as always, I'm joined by my co- host Ryan Brock. Ryan.

Ryan Brock: Yo, how's it going?

Drew Detzler: Great today, because we are joined by Charmin Kent, the content strategy lead at Studio Science. Charmin, welcome to the show.

Charmin Kent: Thank you for having me.

Ryan Brock: Welcome, Charmin. I feel like every time we talk it's very enlightening and I walk away with a lot of new thoughts in my old melon, so I'm excited for that experience here with you today.

Charmin Kent: Oh, I admire your melon. And thank you, it's always an adventure to chat with you.

Drew Detzler: Oh, Ryan's melon. We talk a lot about Ryan's melon.

Ryan Brock: melon admiration. Yeah. Add that to your... Who's got that on their bingo chart for today's episode?

Charmin Kent: Mutual melon admiration. I'm here for it.

Drew Detzler: I love it. So Charmin, you and Ryan know each other. Why don't you go ahead and tell the audience here a little bit about your role in Studio Science.

Charmin Kent: Sure. So starting off, how Ryan and I know each other is, way back in the day, when SEO was fresh and new, we were both in the foundational stages of SEO. Ryan was running Autonomy, and I was just getting introduced to SEO. So my job at Studio Science is leading content strategy. And at Studio Science, what that means is I work with clients of all sizes and industries, and I help them do everything words and word adjacent. So messaging, positioning, website content and strategy. Sometimes we even do marketing, digital marketing campaigns for some of our larger clients. And because I work for a design consultancy, I work really closely with our design practice teams to integrate that word, that content strategy into design strategy. I've been in content marketing and strategy for I think about 15 years now, and it wasn't really until I started with Studio Science that I began to understand just how integral visual design is to content strategies. So I've been in the game for a minute, but I'm always learning something new, particularly in this particular role.

Ryan Brock: Interesting. Do you ever use the phrase content design or think about that in context of your job?

Charmin Kent: It's interesting. I hadn't really thought of the concept of content design until I started at Studio Science. I mean, I hesitate to say that I was classically trained, but I'm a liberal arts major. I was an English major. I've done nothing but words, so I didn't really think of it as a design, if that makes any sense. I certainly do now. I certainly see the intersection of the visual and the written word now in a way that I hadn't in my career before.

Ryan Brock: I've run into the concept a few times and seen people I respect and appreciate, on LinkedIn or whatnot, talking about content is design, content design. And I'm like, " That's something that I completely agree with, but I don't think I understand fully yet." And I don't know how I can say that without sounding like a moron, but it's like, " Yeah, I get what you're saying." It's hard for my mind to wrap around it, because I don't live in the advertising world or the more poetic side of copywriting versus the long form side that I'm used to in the SEO world. But it's an interesting concept, thinking about your words as shaping that experience.

Charmin Kent: And especially when you think about something like UX, you're using words and images to guide someone toward an end result, a desired result, whether that's putting something into a cart or reading from top to bottom, getting them past that fold, getting them below the fold. Words have a lot to do with drawing someone in, keeping them on a page, keeping them engaged. That's design, right?

Ryan Brock: Yeah, 100%. And I'm thinking back to our early days in SEO, and how far we've come since then. That thinking was not happening in 2011 or 2012 when it comes to content. It was content assembly, not content design. It was like just cram stuff together and get eyes on it. And actually, sometimes we don't even care if there's eyes on it. We care if there's robots crawling it, but it's just such a shift from how we used to think about it, and it's refreshing.

Charmin Kent: But I think you hit the nail on the head. We thought about SEO, I know I certainly did when I first got started, as, " What are the bots going to do?" So we weren't at all thinking about actual living, breathing, thinking emotional humans. A lot of the time, even now, even though I'm not very involved with SEO, there's this idea that we're writing to a machine. That's one of the things we say at Studio Science is we design with people, and you have to write for and with people. That's what words are about.

Drew Detzler: Love that. I love that. I can just get out of the way and let you guys talk all day. I remember this from the webinar we did. It's very easy to just get out of the way and let you guys do your thing, which is great. Well, that brings us to today's topic and what I'm interested to pick Charmin's Brain about, and that is reintroducing yourself to your target audience and rebranding. In my mind, there's nothing more terrifying than a rebrand.

Charmin Kent: You are correct.

Drew Detzler: Okay. Okay.

Charmin Kent: There are few things more terrifying than a rebrand, and I've either led or been a part of rebrands pretty much throughout my career. And Drew, again, you are correct. It is scary AF.

Drew Detzler: And why is that? Why? What are we afraid of?

Charmin Kent: For me, it's the unknown. It's change. I mean, regardless of whether it's just a brand refresh or you're completely changing your name and your brand identity, or you are introducing a new product or a new product line, that's change. You're taking something that you've been comfortable with, that you're very familiar with, that you've lived in for a really long time, and you're saying, " No, I don't need that anymore." And more importantly, I don't think the people that I'm talking to need it or want it anymore. So there's a lot of uncertainty. Are you doing the right thing? Why are you doing this? One of the things I always ask as a marketer and a writer and content strategist is, " Who's asking for this?" Is anybody really asking for this change? Or have you clearly identified a need for a change? Because if you haven't, then you're spending a lot of time and resources on something that's not going to get you a return. So it's change. And then it's the fear of the unknown. Are people actually going to like this? If they actually are asking for it, are they going to like what they get? Ryan, I have a feeling you have feelings on this.

Ryan Brock: I wish that marketers would ask the question, " Who's asking for this?" about literally everything they do.

Drew Detzler: Yes.

Ryan Brock: That's all. I'm hearing you say this, and I'm like, we write a lot of content that nobody's asking for. People throw events nobody wants to go to, they send emails nobody wants to read. They put together videos and ads and all sorts of stuff no one cares about. It's just interesting how your perspective can change if you just take a step back and be like, " Who is this for? Who wants this?"

Charmin Kent: Yes.

Ryan Brock: And if you can't answer that well, then don't do it.

Charmin Kent: Yeah. Honestly, that's kind of where I've lived in my career. Now, my actions and my roles haven't always given me the Autonomy to be able to say, " Hey, maybe somebody's not asking for this."

Ryan Brock: Oh, yeah. Because it's not a thing you say in any boardroom, especially if you're not comfortable with people. You just go, " I'm sorry, who asked you?" That's just not the way you build bridges, probably.

Charmin Kent: And sometimes it's more than, " Who's asking for this?" It's actually being proactive and seeing what's happening in an industry with a brand, with a customer base, with a target audience. What are they doing? Who do they respond to most favorably? Who are your favorite brands and why are they your favorite brands? What are your favorite products and why are they your favorite products? As a strategist, I think it's my job to proactively look for those answers and then use those answers kind of like Jeopardy to come up with questions that I can then present to a target audience or to an industry and say, " Hey, I've noticed that you're doing this thing, and here is a potential way to make your life easier or to make your day easier."

Ryan Brock: Yep. Drew, have you ever been through a rebrand?

Drew Detzler: Well, I was a part of our merger with Home Advisor at Angie's List. Yeah, we were part of that.

Ryan Brock: Oh, that's a, that's got to be a whole... Especially when you're not just starting from scratch, but you're trying to scaffold things together. Yeah.

Drew Detzler: Yeah, exactly. The fear of the unknown hits home. And also, " Should we really be doing this? Who wants it?" Because I can't tell you how many times I've been around a table of a marketing team and someone has an idea and it gets going and gets momentum, and then months later, we realize that we never should have have spent any time on it to begin with. So both of those hit home with me. Now let me ask you, Charmin... If it's decided the market wants it, the audience needs it, they're asking for a rebrand... In fact, let me back up. What are some of those signals that you determine that the audience is asking for it or that it is required or it is needed to rebrand?

Charmin Kent: From a marketing perspective, from a strategy perspective, it's looking at customer behavior and audience behavior. Technically... And sadly, I'm not terribly technically inclined. But are you getting the same kinds of engagement? Are people still engaging with you on your website, on your social media platforms? Are your salespeople using the content that you're writing? And is that use successful? Is it effective? Are you seeing the lag in the way your products or your services or your messaging... Is it hitting the same? Because if it's not, then that's a surefire sign that for me. That's like the biggest sign. Is there a lag? Is there a negative change in how your target audience is interacting with you?

Drew Detzler: Yeah. There are signals. And you'll get those signals. And the signal isn't sitting around a table saying, " What if we updated our logo?" That's not the signal. The signal comes from outside.

Ryan Brock: What's funny is you guys are talking about being afraid of rebrands... I've only been in the driver's seat of one rebrand ever, and that was from Autonomy Media, my agency. And it was a lot of fun, probably because I was doing it completely wrong, probably because none of it for the right reasons. It was just our first logo and our visual brand and our colors and our website and all of that was just something I crapped out. At one point. It was like, " Oh, here's a logo." So I was just like, " Ooh, I have enough money. I can pay some actual brand thinkers, some designers, some really smart people... Shout out to CODO Design in Indianapolis, Indiana... to make something that really communicates who my agency is, like who we are to the world. And it works really, really well. And I don't think anybody asked for it except me, and I had the money, and that's why we did it. But it was a lot of fun. I'll tell you that.

Charmin Kent: I'm glad that someone thinks rebrands are fun. As I said at the top of this, I've been part of several rebrands for a wide range of reasons. The first big- girl marketing job that I had, about a year in, we discovered that we were going to go through a rebrand. And the executive team was like, you got this right? And I was like, " Who, me? Huh? All right, then." And I was the content marketing coordinator. So again, I'd been there for a year and some change, I was just figuring out how to do content marketing, how to do digital marketing in SaaS, and then somebody dropped an entire rebrand project in my lap. Now, granted, I had a really great partner in Studio Science, shout out to my current employer, but it was still my responsibility to figure out, " Okay, what does all of this mean? How do we time this well so that it works? How do we get all of these ducks in a row to make sure that the customers know what's happening once we drop this new brand, this new identity, this new messaging? How does everybody internally feel about it? How will our existing customers feel about it?" So much of a rebrand is project management, that it can be fun, but especially with a rebrand of that size at the time and being one of just a few people responsible for pulling it over the finish line, that was scary, bruh. It was really scary and a little confusing, but I think I figured it out.

Ryan Brock: Was it worth it? Was it a bad enough state that you were coming out of that it was warranted, I guess is my question.

Charmin Kent: I think the question, the way you're asking it, may be above my pay grade. But I think it was time for a shift like a rebrand. So one of the things that you mentioned, Ryan, is that Autonomy was your kid and you had the money, it was your thing, and you had the money to be able to fix or evolve.

Ryan Brock: Plastic surgery for the ugly child. Yes. Right.

Charmin Kent: Yes. But I mean, a lot of startups are just kind of put together with passion and duct tape and hope. And I think a lot of companies, especially in the early 2000s, when startups were really the thing, that's how they started. So it made a lot of sense that a lot of companies that were startups would get 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 years down the road and go, " Is this us still?" And I think, especially with startups or newer companies, there's the separation or at least a delineation between the brand and then the people. Very rarely, and it does happen, but very rarely do you see a bunch of people start a company and start with brand. They start with a product, they start with an idea, and the idea is not necessarily the brand. And a lot of times I don't think it should be like your product and your brand should have somewhat separate identities. But particularly when people start a company, they don't always think, well, this is what our messaging should be, or this is what our brand identity should feel like. This is what our brand voice should sound like. They start with an idea, they start with the tangible thing.

Drew Detzler: So you touched on it there a little bit, the messaging portion of that. Talk to me a little bit about it. I mean, this hits home. You're six years in as a startup. " Are we who we were? Is this us still?" You're kind of rethinking the branding and the messaging. How do you go about defining that new voice?

Charmin Kent: A lot of it has to do with research. Research is foundational, especially to something like tone of voice. Research... I can't believe I'm going to say this out loud, but I hate it. I hate research. I hate doing it. It's tedious, and it seems like it never ends, but it is absolutely foundational. It has to be done, because that's where all of your answers are. How do your customers feel about you? How might your prospective customers feel about you? What's going on in the market right now? And a million other questions. And then using all of that data, using all of that information to start sketching something, to start sketching a voice or a message house or something that will help you connect with your target audience.

Ryan Brock: Can we take a step back? You just said you hate research, and so I want to make you talk about it a little longer. I am interested, because I think this is something that two people who aren't creatives and aren't in this vein of marketing... Sounds nebulous, I think, to our listeners, especially because we're on a podcast called Page One or Bust and we're talking about organic content. But at the end of the day, our whole thing is pillar- based marketing. And our thesis for organic content is understanding the journey that your customers are on is the most important thing. If you get that right, and we think that there's ways to quantify that, it seems like there wouldn't be... And it's not building a keyword list. It's doing other things, but there's a way to quantify that can help you get started. So I'm interested in what are the ways. Let's get a little bit more specific. What are the ways you quantify a brand's relationship to its customers? Who are you researching? Who are you talking to? How? What qualifies as good input? What's bad input? Just anything you got on that I think is going to be helpful for our listeners.

Charmin Kent: At least in my current job, it is starting from square one. It's starting with the people that you're talking to. That can be the company itself. You should actually always start with the company itself. A lot of the projects that I work on, I'm contracted to work with companies who need a new brand identity or new messaging. And it's figuring out how they're using what they have now. So what do you currently have? How is that working out for you? How do you feel about it? How do your customers feel about it? How does your internal team feel about it? And then you go one step removed. You start with, " Okay, we know how the internal folks feel about it. How do your customers feel? Are they still connecting with you? Have they gone beyond the point where they need something new for you from you? Or are they looking for something new somewhere else?" Then it's what is the market doing? What are your competitors doing? Are they doing things that are better than what you're doing? Are they taking a different tack? Is it a matter of a different identity or a tone of voice? Are they more friendly where you are more stern or vice versa? And that's customer interviews. That's taking the time to read a competitor's website from top to toe. It's taking a really long hard look and audit of your existing content. The part that I love the least, and I'm glad I don't really have to do anymore, is looking at stats. What do your website visits look like? For instance, yes, how have those changed over time and why have they changed? And that's harder to get at, but it's asking questions then asking more questions, then sometimes repeating the questions that you've asked to get answers in different ways. Because sometimes, asking the same question several times means that you can get deeper or different answers. Research is tedious, and I hate it, but it is absolutely foundational and necessary.

Ryan Brock: Yeah, I'm just working to draw connections to the world of SEO here. And I get why that's necessary. And the same is actually true. You look at like SEO and the way people search for information and they devour information on a topic. Cannibalization has been something that people have been so afraid of for so long. I can only target one concept at a time, or if I target a concept with this article, I can't target it again somewhere else. And the fact of the matter is people need that. They need to reengage ideas again and again. And so that's something else that we're doing differently these days. It's just not being afraid of touching the same topics again and again. Because just like if you're trying to learn how to serve somebody, you want to ask them the same question several times. If you are trying to serve yourself and learn, you're likely going to want to engage the same ideas again and again before you grasp them fully and are able to respond to them. So it's fun to see that connection there in what you're talking about.

Charmin Kent: And search isn't linear. We may want to search for the same thing. We may search for a car, but the way we search for it, the three of us, will be very different. And depending on where we are on our personal buyer journey, the way we search will change. The way I search for a car at the top of my funnel will change significantly from the way I search when I'm ready to actually hand over money. The way you search is going to change. The way people seek information is going to change, even if the information, the answers they're looking for, is the same.

Drew Detzler: I love that. Okay. Charmin, how do you ensure consistency in this messaging via tone of voice or otherwise across different channels?

Ryan Brock: Yeah, man. Like there's channels and there's stages. You talk to different people who want different things. That can be hard.

Charmin Kent: It is. At Studio Science, we use a concept of a unifying theme. So what's the one thing you want your audience to know about you or to feel or to connect with? What's your" Big Idea"? Everything branches out from there. So for a company, the first company that comes to mind is Apple. I believe Apple's big idea is technology for everyone. It's high end, it's expensive, but it's technology that everyone can use and that everyone wants. And all of their messaging, all of their design spokes from that hub of one big idea that it is easy to use, it is simple, it is stylish, and it is helpful. That is their big idea. And if you keep your unifying theme, if you keep that in the center of everything, it should be easy to do to keep messaging consistent. So what does simplicity mean on Twitter? Or what does simplicity mean for somebody who only interacts with the internet via mobile? What does simplicity mean for an enterprise company versus an SMB or a startup? And granted, simplicity will look different. It will manifest itself differently for different people. But the concept of simplicity is the same. Having one idea and then morphing that idea for different channels, audiences, that's how it goes. Does your visual design carry out that unifying theme? If your theme, for instance, is simple, is your visual design simple? For Apple, the answer is yes. It's always been very simple. So yeah, using that unifying theme, that big idea, as a guidepost for everything that you do. And if you get lost, you go back. Is this still simple? Is it still useful? Is it still helpful? And if the answer is no, then you're probably using your messaging wrong.

Ryan Brock: I want all search marketers to listen to that, because the amount of times I get pushback from people who aren't ready to develop content that answers the question that they think is too basic for their audience or doesn't align with their solution or whatever, it's just something I think we all need to get over. The idea that your theme, your story, your brand, your message can be present, even in places where you're not selling, where you're just providing value to somebody. That is a core part of how I think search is going to have to differentiate from... I don't know if the robots that... Charmin and us, we've talked about before in so many other places... There's so much change coming. We have to be willing to be helpful and to have a brand that is real enough that we don't have to be going through our pitch deck for it to be evident. I think that's a huge takeaway.

Charmin Kent: Nobody wants to be sold to. Even when we are shopping, nobody wants to be sold to. I want to be helped. I want to learn something new. I want my life to be easier. I want a product that can shave a few minutes off my day, or that frees me up to be creative. I don't want to buy anything, not because I'm cheap, but I am. But I don't want to be sold to. And so much of search is, " Click on this thing, do this thing," instead of asking how you can help or how you can make someone's life easier. Even if it is clicking a thing, does clicking that thing make your life easier? Does it teach you something?

Ryan Brock: Well said.

Drew Detzler: One more, then we're going to go to the lighting round.

Charmin Kent: Awesome.

Drew Detzler: Charmin, how do you measure the effectiveness of a rebrand? Is it strictly increase in revenue or increase in impressions? What is it?

Charmin Kent: Yeah, that's the tricky part, particularly in the kind of work that I do, because I am almost never tasked with carrying out and measuring the effectiveness of my work. But there are opportunities for me and for other companies and organizations to measure the effectiveness of rebranding. One is engagement, another is longevity. How are you feeling about this new change? Does it feel odd? Are your customers reacting to it? Internally, that's also huge. And I think that's something a lot of companies don't necessarily pay attention to. Once you've done this big rebranding thing, is the entire team on board? Does it feel like an ill- fitting pair of shoes? Or does it feel like an opportunity to do something new? If that makes any sense.

Drew Detzler: Yeah.

Ryan Brock: Yeah.

Charmin Kent: That's not technical, that's not bits and bytes and numbers. But I think how you feel about something and how you show up in the world is also an important metric.

Ryan Brock: Yeah, it is just nice to hear almost permission to say, " You don't need to break this down into bits to measure it. You can just feel it." There's a little bit of intuition left in marketing. I think that's a relaxing thing for me to hear you say, Charmin.

Charmin Kent: And I'm not saying that you should just go on vibes, but...

Ryan Brock: Right.

Charmin Kent: But at the same time, if what you've done, if the project that you've created, if the rebrand that you've conducted feels good, if it feels better than what you had before, if it feels more effective, if it feels like it gives you an opportunity to connect more deeply with your existing audience and maybe gives you an opportunity to connect with new people, then you've done the right thing.

Drew Detzler: Love it. With that, I'll take us to our lightning round.

Charmin Kent: Let's do it.

Drew Detzler: Charmin, what was the last thing you searched?

Charmin Kent: Keithadilla.

Drew Detzler: Like-

Ryan Brock: Love it. See, this is what we got to do.

Drew Detzler: Buying-

Ryan Brock: We want to peel back all your armor and get to the heart of who you are as a person. And I think we've accomplished that.

Charmin Kent: I didn't know what it was. I saw it on Twitter. I was like, does somebody have a lisp? Who is Keith? And then I went down this rabbit hole of Keith Lee. And now I kind of want to Keithadilla. So yeah, that was the last thing that I searched.

Drew Detzler: Now Ryan and I are both searching Keithadilla.

Ryan Brock: No, I knew what it... I did just search it, cause I wanted to see what came up. But this has to do with the whole fajita quesadilla thing, right?

Charmin Kent: Yep. Shout out to Chipotle.

Ryan Brock: Yeah, there you go.

Charmin Kent: Yes. And the sour cream and the vinegarette and mixing it together. And... Yeah. I am also in my spare time kind of a foodie and had seen that I think on Twitter in a food channel or something, and was like, " Who is Keith? And why does he have a quesadilla? And why should I care?" And I cared enough to type it into a search bar.

Drew Detzler: I love that. Love it.

Ryan Brock: I still don't know who Keith is, and I don't care.

Charmin Kent: It's fine. It's not going to change your life, I promise. It's not that important.

Drew Detzler: All right. One for one. Okay. Charmin, are there any marketing myths that you've busted during your career journey?

Charmin Kent: "Your audience doesn't know what they want until you tell them." And that might be a salesy kind of thing as well. But customers... People know exactly what they want. They just need you to give it to them in a way that's palatable and attractive. So yeah, " Your audience doesn't know what they want until you tell them," that's not true.

Drew Detzler: Okay. Love it. Last question. Charmin, what's your best prediction for SEO trends in 2023? And I love this, that you're not an SEO.

Charmin Kent: I think I'm going to cheat and go back to our last conversation, Ryan, and say that AI is going to become a lot more involved. And I don't know that that's necessarily a good thing. I think the rise of AI is going to warp SEO quite a bit.

Ryan Brock: Yeah. I'm with you. We've talked about this so much. I think of AI as a tool, like a calculator. Writers who never had that, they have it now, doesn't replace the work, doesn't replace the theory. You still got to know what you're doing. And at the same time, there are some kinds of queries that, yeah, I'm going to accept what a robot has to tell me, but not always. There's plenty. And it's not going to change any time soon. So yeah, I agree. The change is coming. I think the thing that I'm most afraid of is that people think it's farther along than it is, and we're going to have some rude awakenings.

Charmin Kent: Yeah, that's where I am with it, too. I think people are expecting this to be an easy button or a magic wand, and I think that SEO as a discipline may suffer a bit before things get better.

Drew Detzler: Well, Charmin, thanks so much for being an awesome guest today. This is a fantastic conversation. Before we let you go, is there anything that we should keep an eye out for around Studio Science?

Charmin Kent: Just announced an investment. We are growing. This is going to be a really cool year for us. This is 25 years as Studio Science as an agency, and I cannot wait to see what the rest of 2023 looks like for us as an organization.

Ryan Brock: Congrats. That's awesome.

Drew Detzler: Yeah. Congrats. That's very cool. Love it. Well, thanks Charmin.

Charmin Kent: Thank you.

Ryan Brock: Well, that was a really cool conversation. It was nice to get into the creative side of things and think about things like on more of a feelings versus data perspective. We think about data a lot on this show, but Drew, I'm interested in what your biggest takeaway was from that talk with Charmin.

Drew Detzler: Yeah, look, as a marketing leader, I mentioned it. Rebranding is terrifying for the reasons that Charmin mentioned, the unknown, the potential waste of time and resources. And before you do a rebrand, stop and think, " Who's asking for it?" Do the research. Do the research within your company, within your customer base, outside of your customer base. Is this what people want? Are people asking for this? Is it worth it? Before you waste a lot of time.

Ryan Brock: Well put. And ask that question for literally everything you do. I know I've said that. It sounds obvious, but I've worked with a lot of marketers who just don't. They're just like, " I think it'd be fun if we did this." And then there's your campaign. I've done that. I've done that a lot in my career. And nobody asked me at Autonomy Media to produce a Superheroes of Writing campaign. But I did it, cause I thought it sounded fun. And then of course it went nowhere, and it was a complete waste of time. And it's just like, yeah, the feelings are good, the data's good. It's all good. Just ask, " Who cares?" And not in a critical way. Just ask, " Who cares?"

Drew Detzler: Cares? Exactly. See what your audience is asking. Well, that's it for this episode of Page One or Bust. See you next time.

Ryan Brock: Peace.

Speaker 1: Are you ready to dive even deeper into pillar- based marketing? Here's your chance. The brand new book, Pillar- Based Marketing: A Data- Driven Methodology for SEO and Content That Actually Works by co-hosts Ryan Brock and Christopher Day, is now available in paperback, hardcover and e- book editions. Find it at Amazon or Barnes and Noble, or look for the link in the show notes.

DESCRIPTION

In this episode, we're taking a deep dive into rebranding—the good and the bad—with Sharmin Kent, Manager, Content Strategy Lead at Studio Science. You'll discover the one question every marketer needs to answer before embarking on a rebranding journey, and we'll also unveil the essential research needed to find the perfect voice for your brand's fresh new look. We wrap up by exploring how to keep your messaging consistent across channels and what metrics to measure the success of your rebranding efforts. 


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Today's Host

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Drew Detzler

|Chief Marketing Officer
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Ryan Brock

|Chief Solution Officer

Today's Guests

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Sharmin Kent

|Manager, Content Strategy Lead at Studio Science