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"Smart" Rebrandings (Day 223)

Do you know what the 3 dots at the top right corner even means???

Thank you for yet another wonderful "rebranding"... when it first happened I thought there's something wrong with my internet connection cos I totally believed that icon is indicating it's still "loading"...

If you ever set up a publication on Medium, you probably have already gone through the confused steps of publishing articles under a publication. Instead of fixing the usability issues, here comes the new logo...

Another example is echoed by many already -- the new Google app logos.

The biggest "brand mishap" I witnessed firsthand is done by some really smart people, and they spent big bucks to execute it. I still scratch my head whenever I look at their new branding...

Massdrop -- a brand states clearly of "group buy discounts" and uses "timed drops" that attracted a sizeable enthusiasts community. And the management decided to rebrand it to "Drop"--a word so common every digital marketing person would tell you how costly SEO would be. To add insult to injury, there was also dispute on infringement because the new logo looks awfully similar to another existing brand with the same name. And a 4-letter "premium" domain name, it probably cost them a fortune just to buy the domain.

The result? As the brand indicates, the "mass" is gone, and only thing left is to "drop"...

You have to give kudos to the company, cos if you do a Google search on the keyword "drop", it comes up on top, above Google dictionary AND ABOVE Dropbox!!!

Well, nonetheless, it doesn't change the fate as you can see fewer and fewer interactions in the communities on the site.

I wonder if well funded companies are obliged to listen to the expensive branding experts and MBA graduates and not listen to so many voices within their companies and communities--the voices of the people who use and care about their products? Or, maybe it's just me, being ignorant and all. These decision makers are very smart people after all.

  1. 2

    Oh true, they should definitely fix other parts. I don't like medium, at all.

    I actually thought that i wasn't on medium..

  2. 2

    The Google app logos is an exhibit A of misunderstanding the role of consistency. It can be extremely helpful to have things looking vastly different in an app.

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