It would appear that, to stay ahead, every now and again you have to rebrand or at least rename yourself. Sometimes it’s a big change (Marathon to Snickers or Opal Fruits to Starburst…both of which still break my nostalgic heart), sometimes it’s a small change Kentucky Fried Chicken to KFC...whatevs). Sometimes it works (Andersen Consulting to Accenture), and sometimes it doesn’t (PWC to Monday…and back again by Tuesday). So I’ve been thinking…
The big players spend big bucks on the process - obtaining that name “Meta” allegedly cost $20 million alone. But that only represents around 0.02% of annual revenues for the social media giant. I wanna be like the big players….so I’ll spend sixpence on the process.
OK, Handy Jackson Services, Handy Jackson Services... Does what it says on the tin right? I’m a handyman, called Jackson and provide services. But that’s just too prosaic to even the least experienced branding wonk. Hummm.
Perhaps something utterly random, bordering somewhere along the spectrum of meaningless to pretention. Maybe “Blurggh” . Explosive but a bit close to an amazing 1990’s Britpop band. Maybe "Swooosh" emulating the sound of my broom as the leaves are swooshed aside...or maybe not.
Perhaps something hip and trendy, short and simple and easy to say (think of Kodak…which also benefits from the hard initial plosive “k” sound which, along with “p”, “t”, “d” and “g”, reportedly enhances recall, awareness and recognition). Maybe “Handy” – perfect! But sadly some other folks in the other Cambridge (Massachusetts) already grabbed that. Worth noting thought , that with predicted revenues of over $100 million per year, proof that there is money to be made from sweeping up leaves.
Or perhaps something around which you can shoehorn in an amazingly witty tag line (think of the many scaffolding firms who claim to be Erection Specialists…and still think it’s funny despite it no longer being 1983). Also easy to get it wrong – see https://www.boredpanda.com/bad-weird-brands-taglines-and-slogans/ if you have nothing better to do. Best I avoid “Handy Jackson….screwing things up since 2020”.
I could go for a customer 3.0 type name “The Handy Jackson experience". But that might backfire. And I may think I’m in an outcome-driven world of 4.0 (“leaves swept up”, or even worse "and you're screwed"), I fear many of my customers are not. Mark Davies’ article is well worth a read though nhttps://www.consultancy.uk/news/13498/guiding-principles-to-navigate-the-customer-40-revolution
So, having spent my sixpence thinking about it, I’m going to forget about it along with all the branding and marketing hype. I’m just gonna stick with Handy Jackson (dropping the Services ‘cos that’s implicit right….and soooooo 80s’).
Cool new logo huh?
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