Rebranding a Rebrand: 10 Insider Tips for Gaining the Confidence and Support of Law Firm Leadership Throughout the Creative Process

Every great brand tells a story, conveying the history, values, mission and distinctions of an organization. As owners of a brand and design agency that helps law firms redefine their visual brand identity, we think the story behind the story is equally important.

For legal marketing professionals, that story not only involves leading key aspects of the design process, but also conducting an all-out campaign for change within the firm — where building consensus across key stakeholders and other constituents can be difficult. Though the firms and circumstances may vary, in our experience, the most successful campaigns share common qualities worthy of consideration.

To help you prepare for your next rebrand, we’ve gathered ten inside-expert tips for gaining the confidence and support of firm leadership throughout the creative process:

1. Articulate the Problem: “In order to gain the support of firm stakeholders, you have to be able to articulate the problem you're trying to solve,” advises Chelsea Berglund, marketing and business development manager at Greene Espel, a Minneapolis litigation boutique. “Make sure your stakeholders understand why the current brand is no longer delivering an effective message for the firm.”

2. “Show Them You Know Them,” Berglund adds. “As marketers, we have to demonstrate that we understand the firm’s culture, values and aspirations in order for the stakeholders and other attorneys to trust us to build a brand that effectively communicates those intangibles to clients, prospects and the general public.” She offers, “We did an extensive brand exercise ahead of starting our project to outline our firm’s core attributes and our unique value proposition. We could then tie design decisions back to that outline and ensure that our visual brand connected to our firm’s core attributes. This was key to buy-in and to getting it right.”

3. Choose Wisely: According to Senior Graphic Designer Luis Martinez, selecting a vendor was key to the rebrand process at Fredrikson, Minneapolis’ largest law firm in 2024. “We had several strong candidates, each with their own strengths and specialties. It was critical to find the right vendor that balanced the key stakeholders’ desires with marketing’s vision.”

Case in point: As the former director of marketing and business development at mid-sized Minneapolis law firm Maslon LLP, Pamela Erwin Roemer discloses, “We kicked off our rebrand by engaging a prominent national design agency specializing in legal, but felt we received lackluster service and stock results. For us, moving the rebrand work to a small local agency delivered the level of personalized service and tailored, intuitive design we needed to move the firm forward with confidence.”

4. Go Together: Emily Lawson, current director of marketing and business development at Maslon LLP, points to an African proverb for guidance: “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” She explains, “I am always the most confident in decisions reached through significant discussion and listening, and particularly with those who know the firm and its clients best. If we haven’t listened to the people who know the firm inside and out — including how it has evolved over time — we are almost certain to miss the mark."

Lawson continues, “Remember: partners are owners — and associates are future owners — of the law firm. No matter how much they trust the marketing team, they also care deeply about what is being presented to their clients and have a lot of value to add to the process. In my experience, the end product reached through collaboration with stakeholders throughout the firm is always better than what my team or I could have come up with on our own."

5. Find Your Champions: Martinez suggests identifying key stakeholders within the firm who will champion the brand. “Engaging these stakeholders fosters a sense of ownership and commitment to the new brand. It also creates a collaborative environment where everyone feels valued and aligned with the rebranding goals. This approach ensures they have a stake in its success and adoption.” He adds, “These champions lead by example, discussing their role in the process with others, using new templates and updating their signatures and social media accounts with new branding at launch. This encourages others to get on board.”

6. Rebrand the Rebrand: “It’s not uncommon for firm members to feel hesitant about a rebrand — whether due to strong ties to their existing brand or concern about the time and resource investment — which makes demonstrating value and generating buy-in all the more important," notes Roemer. "In some cases, ‘rebranding the rebrand’ through a more instructive, inclusive approach can help instill that it is not simply a change for the sake of change.”

She explains, “Once promising design directions were in place at Maslon, we created attorney focus groups representing a broad cross-section of the firm to ensure we gathered a full range of perspectives. Importantly, to avoid subjective feedback, we informed their consideration by first aligning them with the business case and strategic goals for the initiative. We then asked participants to consider which of the designs they felt best achieved those goals. Reframing the discussion in this way returned highly constructive feedback, which helped guide the design process that followed and leadership’s final approval.”

7. Establish a Rhythm: Martinez emphasizes the importance of determining the optimal level of stakeholder involvement — deciding how frequently they should review revisions and pinpointing crucial moments for their input. “This was essential to ensure broader buy-in for the rebrand launch. Once we established a rhythm, the collaboration became more seamless, allowing us to move forward with confidence. Ultimately, these challenges refined our approach and led to a successful rebrand.”

8. Include Clients: Martinez also stresses the importance of bringing the voice of the client into the rebranding process “so all may understand that the brand is steeped in the client’s perspective, expectations and needs.”

9. Be Thorough: “It is critical to understand the research and needs and to get the brand’s components right the first time to avoid costly and time-consuming revisions or updates, which can erode confidence and add frustration for those adapting to the new materials,” Martinez warns. “Test how the design works in real-world applications. This thorough approach will save you headaches, money and time. It will also build trust with those who use the new brand every day and need it to be user-friendly and functional.”

10. Communicate Early and Often: Last but not least, Martinez advises, “Regular firm-wide communication and updates about the rebrand progress help to keep everyone informed and invested.”

Leading a law firm rebrand is no small undertaking, but we hope the above wisdom will help turn your “story behind the story” into one of great impact and success for the firm. As both designers and creative allies, we firmly believe that our best work is achieved when our client leaders and their larger organizations are engaged, involved and respected throughout the process. To quote Julian Zebot, partner and member of Maslon LLP’s board of directors, “You don't realize how much a rebrand is needed until you see what's possible."

Learn More About Marketing Management and Leadership with the Third Edition of the LMA Body of Knowledge The content in this feature correlates with the Marketing Management and Leadership domain in the LMA Body of Knowledge (BoK). Dive deeper and access the latest edition of the BoK online. The Third Edition of the LMA BoK showcases enhanced expertise across every domain, introduces new competencies in Client Services, Communications and Technology Management, features more advanced skills across all domains and broadens coverage of competitive and business intelligence skills. Plus, it emphasizes a stronger commitment to nurturing diversity, equity, and inclusion across the entirety of the BoK. Learn more.