It happens more often than most teams realize:
The leadership shifts. The product evolves. The organization gets clearer about who it’s for and where it’s headed.
But the brand? Still stuck in an older version of the story.
The result is a subtle friction—sometimes external, often internal.
The team knows what the organization is becoming. But the language, the visuals, the website, the messaging—they’re still talking like the old version. The pre-pivot version.
And that gap can slow everything down.
This isn’t just theoretical.
We worked with a team that had recently evolved their strategy—tightened their focus, clarified their audience, and started moving with real intention. But along the way, something small started to shift: a secondary color in their palette started showing up… everywhere.
Decks. Docs. Internal tools. Presentations.
It wasn’t the primary brand color. It wasn’t meant to be.
But it was resonating—internally and externally. It became the visual shortcut to their new focus.
Urban planners call this kind of thing a desire path: the trail people actually walk, even when it’s not the one that was paved.
And as we moved through the brand work together, we had to make a call: follow the original system, or follow the energy?
We pivoted the palette. Officially. Not because the old primary was wrong—but because it no longer reflected where the brand was headed. And the new direction needed to be legible, consistent, and felt at every touchpoint.
Letting go of what used to work isn’t always easy. That’s why brand systems include secondary and tertiary options. It gives us space to evolve, to feel things out, to hesitate.
But eventually, great brands make the call.
They align the story with the strategy.
They pave the path people are already walking.
Brand lag is real. And it’s fixable.
We see this often with smart, growing teams. They’ve done the work to redefine their strategic direction. But they’re still operating with a brand that was built for a different era.
Not wrong. Just doesn’t serve the new direction.
What used to feel aligned now feels off. Or generic. Or stuck.
That doesn’t mean you need to burn it all down. But it does mean it’s time to bring your brand along for the ride.
Signs your brand hasn’t caught up to your strategy:
- You avoid sending people to your website because “it doesn’t really reflect who we are now”.
- Your team is using language in decks, proposals, or conversations that doesn’t exist anywhere in your external brand.
- You’ve added new capabilities or redefined your audience, but your messaging hasn’t changed.
- Internally, people are interpreting the brand in different ways because there’s no clear throughline.
So what do you do?
Start by treating brand like a translation project—not a reinvention.
Your strategy is the source material. The brand expresses it.
Here’s where we usually start:
- Revisit your story: Can you clearly articulate your why, your who, and your offer—in plain language?
- Audit your messaging: What’s still working? What’s outdated? What’s missing?
- Pressure-test your brand voice: Is it still accurate? Does it flex across audiences and channels?
- Look at the brand system: Do the visuals still support where you’re going? Or are they just… there?
- Align the tools: Site, decks, docs, content, campaigns—does it all connect back to the same core?
When the inside and the outside don’t match, people feel it.
So if your org has done the hard work of evolving your strategy, don’t stop there.
Bring your brand with you.
Make sure your story—visually, verbally, experientially—reflects where you’re going. Not just where you’ve been.
