When does rebranding work and when does it not

[Tracy]

Over the past decade I have seen time and time again an admin getting disappointed because their site is not drawing in the traffic that they want and think it should.
And time and time again I have seen those same admins contemplate rebranding their site with a new domain name. Apparently they are under an expectation that a simple rebranding of the domain name (and associated logos) is going to be a magic pill to suddenly result in an influx of traffic.
And over the years I have seen this fail almost every time.

Let's add to that the concentration of many (usually older admins) on getting the "perfect" .COM/.NET/.ORG TLD. They want it as short as possible and distinct. But we all know that those 3 TLD's have been around for 40 years now, so all those "good" ones are already taken. And if you do find one you like, you can usually expect to shell out a "few" dollars for it. Yet they refuse to even contemplate any of the newer TLD's that might fit even better into a domain name use. It is as if they think that users are still typing in the URL in the address bar instead of clicking on links to get there. It is a rare occasion that I type in a URL in the address bar. I usually hit from a bookmark or a link I find elsewhere.

As I have said repeatedly, it's not necessarily the domain name that draws your traffic (but it can help with SEO), but the content. There is a reason that there is the old saying that content is king. And it needs to be good, interesting and enticing content. Not the fluff you find on other sites in the same niches time and time again. I see this regularly in the world of admin sites. You have users posting the same content (usually light content) in an attempt to engage in discussion. It is frequently only 2-3 lines long and there is no real encouragement to engage in the topic because there is no meat in the post to engage with. They are frequently open ended posts that take no real position that encourages others to engage.


Now, don't get me wrong, I can see rebranding if you want to take your site in a totally different direction and you can fold your current site content into it. But to keep the same content and just a name change is not the panacea for the ills of the site (lack of traffic/participation). The cure to that is to generate more interesting content to draw users in and encourage them to participate.


Agree?
Disagree?
What are your thoughts on the effectiveness of rebranding, especially when keeping the same content.

 

[Shawn Gossman]

I try to stay away from rebranding.

You probably remember my previous "Discuss Communities" forum which was an admin forum. Then I closed it and soon after made this forum. I didn't rebrand. I just wanted AAF back which used to be my admin forum back in the day. I saw that the domain was available and so I restarted it, but I did so from scratch.

I'd rather pivot than rebrand. Rebrand is changing the name but pivoting is changing the niche.

However, I did rebrand a while ago with a blog. I was giving blogging advice using ShawnGossman.com. I decided to rebrand that blog as SeriousBloggers.com. The reason being is I want to focus it on blogging that makes money, and I felt SeriousBloggers.com made more sense.

For the most part, I avoid it, but I have done it, too.

 

[Tracy]

I "somewhat" did it one time when I first started into this. I registered a domain and was setting up a motorcycle site. The problem was the domain I chose was regional based, and I decided I would rather have it not limited to an area. So it was moved under a new domain. But the content was kept since it was mainly still general riding commentary.
I've still got a couple of "gimme" coffee cups laying around from those days.