How to Succeed at B2B Branding After a Merger or Acquisition

When your company undergoes a merger or acquisition, it's the perfect opportunity to create a strong brand vision built on the enhanced benefits of your combined businesses. But your brand integration must be logical, seamless, and clearly and effectively communicated to your audience so they continue to trust and choose you.

Step 1: Brand Architecture - The Foundation of Your B2B Marketing Strategy Framework 

The first step is looking at the big picture. This includes defining how your brands fit together and relate to each other, and if they need to evolve to tell the most compelling story about your company. Your brand architecture is your road map to follow after the merger or acquisition, with your first stops being Brand Hierarchy, Brand Equity, and Brand Strategy. 

Brand Hierarchy

A well-built architecture, or organizational structure, will help bring clarity to the products and services you offer, while amplifying the collective value of your brands to your audiences. This will reap dividends from existing customers as well as new customers post-merger or acquisition because they’ll easily understand how each brand can help them in their own line of work. 

To figure out your brand hierarchy, or the levels of your brand architecture, you’ll want to think about the current brands and how they’re combined. Are both brands on the same level (common in the case of a merger)? Or is one now a subsidiary of the parent brand (typical with acquisitions)? If you don’t already have these established in the legal terms of the merger or acquisition, nailing down the structure and any potential levels of hierarchy is critical to informing your Brand Strategy and creating internal and external clarity for the rest of your branding work.

Brand Equity

Assessing brand equity, or the perceived value and recognition level of each brand, is also an important part of determining how to move forward. Gather qualitative and quantitative research from each brand’s identified target audiences to help inform your understanding of their equity. For example, you could ask questions like: Do the brands command recognition and respect? Is one more recognized than the other? If a name or brand went away tomorrow, would it be missed?  

The strength of your brands should greatly influence your branding approach. For example, if your combined audience is unfamiliar with one of your brands, then it’s logical to absorb it into the more well-recognized one. Or, on the other hand, if you already have a strong brand with exceptional brand equity, you’ll want to make it the lead brand moving forward. 

Brand Strategy

Thanks to the discoveries you made about your audiences as you defined Brand Architecture and Brand Equity, you’ll have a clear understanding of your brands, helping you put together an action plan, or Branding Strategy, for how to evolve them (which we’ll cover more in the following section).

But the most important thing you can do at this point is to support your company’s overall business goals and outline the steps you need to take to shift your brands in ways that grow your business and make the strongest impact on your audiences. Then, it’s time for brand evolution.

Step 2: Brand Evolution - Implementing Your B2B Marketing Strategy Framework 

The next step is evolving your brand communications to ensure all the pieces accurately represent your combined company, are relevant for your audiences, and are aligned with your Brand Architecture. For B2B companies post-merger or acquisition, the four areas that have the greatest impact on brand evolution are Messaging, Visual Brand, Website, and Social Media Strategy.

Messaging

Post-M&A is the perfect time to reassess your messaging. You’ll want to ensure you’re still communicating clearly and accurately about your brands and the products/services they offer. But things can shift, like one or both companies changing their capabilities or offerings, and, if that’s the case, you’ll need to update Messaging to reflect this. You should also use the merger or acquisition as an opportunity to revisit your company’s core Messaging and bolster it to promote the benefits gained from the combination. Take the time to establish talking points for how you will communicate these new advantages so that you can increase and retain customer loyalty. 

Visual Brand 

The evolution of your logo and overall visual brand will be based on your unique M&A circumstances. But we recommend taking this opportunity to modernize and strengthen all your visuals. 

Typically, your logos will now feel out of date because they’re weighed down by the baggage of the organizations they used to represent pre-merger or acquisition. You’ll likely find that the brands’ visual styles—the look and feel around your logos—aren’t creating a harmonious look. And the visual representations of products, processes, and services are suddenly in conflict from brand to brand. We’ve found that the energy and momentum of a merger or acquisition is the catalyst that enables strong companies to reimagine their Visual Brand in a way that feels natural, evolutionary, and receives quick buy-in from internal stakeholders. 

Website

It’s very likely that both brands already have separate websites. In that case, much like the logo and overall visual brand changes, the level of website updates will vary based on the brand architecture and strategy that’s decided. No matter if your websites remain separate or if one is integrated into the other, adjustments should be made to reflect messaging and branding updates. 

Social Media Strategy 

Your social media strategy plays a crucial role in communicating your brand evolution. Develop a cohesive B2B social media strategy that reflects your updated messaging and visual brand. This will help maintain consistency across all touchpoints and effectively communicate your new value proposition to your audience. For tips on maximizing your organic social media presence, check out our guide on B2B organic social media tactics.  

Step 3: Social Media - Leveraging Your New Brand Position for Lead Generation and Demand Generation

After establishing your brand architecture and evolving your brand elements, it's crucial to consider how your new brand positioning can drive both lead generation and demand generation in the B2B space. 

The Difference Between Lead Generation & Demand Generation 

While often used interchangeably, lead gen and demand gen serve different purposes: 

• Lead generation focuses on capturing immediate interest and converting it into actionable sales opportunities. It's about identifying and cultivating potential customers who are ready to engage with your sales team. 

• Demand generation is a longer-term strategy aimed at creating awareness and desire for your products or services. It's about educating your target market and positioning your brand as a trusted partner. 

Harnessing Your Post-M&A Brand Position 

Your newly evolved brand positioning post-merger or acquisition provides a unique opportunity to boost both lead generation and demand generation efforts: 

1. Enhanced Value Proposition: Use your combined strengths to create a more compelling value proposition. This can attract immediate leads (lead generation) while also building long-term interest in your expanded offerings (demand generation). 

2. Expanded Expertise: Showcase the broader range of services now available within your organization. This can help generate immediate leads from companies seeking comprehensive solutions, while also positioning your brand as an industry leader in the long term. 

3. Increased Resources: Highlight how your merged resources benefit customers. This can attract leads looking for a more capable partner, while also generating demand by demonstrating your enhanced ability to meet complex needs. 

4. New Market Opportunities: If the M&A has opened up new markets, use your brand positioning to generate leads in these areas while simultaneously building demand through targeted awareness campaigns. 

5. Customer Success Stories: Leverage success stories from both original companies to generate leads and build demand. These narratives can showcase immediate results for lead gen while also illustrating long-term value for demand gen. 

Balancing Lead Generation and Demand Generation 

Your post-M&A marketing efforts should strike a balance between these two tactics. 

• Use targeted campaigns and personalized outreach to generate immediate leads based on your new positioning. 

• Invest in content marketing, thought leadership, and brand awareness initiatives to build long-term demand for your expanded offerings. 

By strategically leveraging your new brand position to drive both lead generation and demand generation, you can ensure both short-term results and long-term growth in the competitive B2B landscape. 

The Takeaway

A merger or acquisition poses an exciting opportunity to leverage your brands and show your audiences your combined benefits, giving them more reasons to choose you. With the right branding partner, you can achieve your business goals and maintain positive momentum during this important transition. 

Moncur is a branding agency that works with leading B2B companies to propel their growth through remarkable branding and beautiful communications. We create a vision that elevates your brand, differentiates it from the competition, and drives results. With over 30 years of experience in industries like construction, manufacturing, education, and tech/SaaS, we’re the branding authority trusted by B2B leaders. Ready to take your brand further? Reach out today.