When is it Time to Rebrand?
By Barbara C. Carey and Mike McCall, RN
What is Rebranding?
Rebranding is positioning your hospital for the vision that the hospital leaders have of the hospital now and in the future. It is establishing a new identity that reflects the hospital’s current services and strategy and differentiates the hospital from competitors.
It is telling a compelling story to patients about why they should prefer your hospital over other choices. It tells the story verbally in a strong positioning statement and visually with a revised logo projected on digital and traditional communication platforms.
What is the Major Advantage of Rebranding?
A strong brand enables the hospital to attract patients at a lower cost per acquired patient. It also develops brand loyalty which helps a hospital or hospital system to successfully compete with rival brands, including the new national players like Walmart. Why does a runner go into a sports store and purchase a Nike shoe from all of the other choices? Brand strength and loyalty. The purchase of hospital services is also influenced by the strength of the brand. Insurance coverage is the number one driver of hospital selection. But if the insurance company has multiple hospitals in their network, the patient has a choice of providers just as the runner has a choice of shoes. Why should they select your hospital? Brand strength drives that decision.
What are the Signs that a Hospital should Rebrand?
The Vision of the hospital as a service provider has changed over time. Leaders should consider the hospital’s position 15 years ago. If there have been significant changes in focus, strategies, services and providers, the brand needs to reflect those changes. Google’s original name was BackRub. Rebranding as Google has served the Company well.
Geography has changed or if the system is encompassing a wide area. Hospitals that have expanded out of their original boundaries should rebrand. Their potentially new patients may be of different ages, cultures and have different needs.
The Hospital is developing a system of healthcare facilities. It is critical to consider rebranding if the hospital is developing a system of facilities. The brand must reflect the system itself, unite the system and speak to the different patient populations. Having a unified strong brand that truly reflects the system significantly reduces the cost of per patient acquisition at each facility.
The hospital has a negative perception. If employees don’t want to wear their name badges in public and the hospital has difficulty recruiting staff and physicians, negative perception exists. Changing the brand starts a “clean slate” that can build a more positive reputation.
The current brand does not differentiate the hospital from other choices. The hospital brand may be telling a complex story of many services, providers and benefits. The brand is not focused, it is diffused over many messages. Community hospitals often brand themselves as “Quality care close to home.” This is so commonly heard that it is not an effective differentiation.
The hospital is building a replacement facility. This is a giant opportunity to consider rebranding. A new facility will attract new patients, staff and physicians. Rebranding accelerates that process and attracts more positive attention to the institution. Rebrandingcosts are lower because everything needs to be new.
The hospital is in merger and acquisition mode. When publicly traded banks begin to acquire other banks, they often leave the original bank name in place on those branches. By doing this they retain the goodwill of the acquired institution. However, after a year or two years, customers who are loyal to the bank are accustomed to new staff, expanded services and benefits. At that point, banks rebrand and put the system name on the acquired branches. They have built up loyalty, so the brand change doesn’t lose existing customers. Hospitals can follow this model.
Any one of these reasons should trigger a strategy of rebranding.
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