Most small businesses change their look by accident: a new sign here, a different flyer there, a logo someone’s nephew redrew in a hurry. Ten years on, the storefront, the website, the menu and the business cards each tell a slightly different story, and none of them looks like the business the owner runs today.
There is one time of year when changing all of it at once feels natural rather than strange: January.
Why the new year works
Customers expect it. A fresh look in January reads as a business with plans for the year. The same change in the middle of a busy season can read as a different owner, or a business in trouble.
It is quieter. For most local businesses the weeks after the holidays are the slowest of the year. That is when you have the time to answer questions, approve designs and walk through a new website without stealing hours from customers.
The paper runs out anyway. Business cards, menus, loyalty cards, gift certificates and letterhead usually get reordered after the holidays. Reordering them with the new look costs no more than reordering the old one.
It gives you something to announce. “Same people, new look” is a reason to email your customers, post, and invite people back in during the month they are least likely to think of you.
Signs it is time
You do not need a reason beyond wanting to look as good as you are. But these are the usual ones:
- Your logo does not work small. It is blurry on a phone, unreadable on a social media icon, or impossible to embroider on a shirt.
- Your website says a different thing about you than your storefront does.
- You only have your logo as a picture someone emailed you years ago, and nobody has the original file.
- You have added a location, a service or a generation of the family, and nothing you hand out says so.
- New customers tell you, “I almost didn’t come in.”
How to plan it so it lands on time
A January refresh is planned in the fall. Working back from a new look on the first of the year:
- Now through mid-November: decide what you are keeping. Your name, your colors, the thing people already recognize you by. A refresh keeps what customers love and fixes what holds you back; it is rarely a start from scratch.
- Late November: the logo. Everything else is built from it, so it comes first. Get it in every format you will need, including a version that works in one color and at the size of a thumbnail.
- December: the website and the printed pieces. Built and approved quietly while you are busy, ready to switch on.
- January: switch everything at once. Website, Google listing, social profiles, cards and signage in the same week, so customers see one business, not two.
The most common mistake is changing one piece at a time over a year. Customers see the old and the new side by side for months, and the refresh looks like confusion instead of a plan.
What we do
We design logos and build websites for local businesses in Solano County, and we keep your logo, colors and files in one place so every piece matches: the website, the cards, the sign. A website is $995 to build and $125 a month after that, which covers hosting, security and every change you need through the year.
If you would like your new look to be ready on the first of the year, now is the time to start. Tell us a little about your business and we will come back with a plan and a price.