Two well-known online brands are living their last days. According to a post on Mashable today, Google is rebranding both its blogging tool, Blogger, and its photo uploading and sharing site, Picasa. The rebranding is expected to launch in approximately six weeks.
It’s always troublesome for loyal customers to accept a rebranding, but Google’s business plan in recent years (particularly with the new Google+ social efforts) demonstrates that the Google brand is set to take over the world.
Okay, I’m exaggerating, but I do have a point. Google is about brand centralization. Sub-brands will be assimilated into the brand family, and that’s an intelligent move by the Google leadership team. Google is no longer just a search company, and it’s time the sub-brands joined the family. I’m actually surprised this type of rebranding didn’t happen earlier.
However, are there sub-brands in the Google family that are strong enough to hang onto their own brand names? What about YouTube? Only time will tell.
Google has rolled out a number of products in recent years that failed while products like Blogger and Picasa (that until now didn’t have the Google brand name attached to them openly) stayed on the periphery. Google’s new focus on social initiatives is changing things and social destinations like Blogger and Picasa need to come into the fold.
What do you think of Google’s expected rebranding of Blogger and Picasa? Leave a comment and share your thoughts.
Susan Gunelius is the author of 10 marketing, social media, branding, copywriting, and technology books, and she is President & CEO of KeySplash Creative, Inc., a marketing communications company. She also owns Women on Business, an award-wining blog for business women. She is a featured columnist for Entrepreneur.com and Forbes.com, and her marketing-related articles have appeared on websites such as MSNBC.com, BusinessWeek.com, TodayShow.com, and more.
She has over 20 years of experience in the marketing field having spent the first decade of her career directing marketing programs for some of the largest companies in the world, including divisions of AT&T and HSBC. Today, her clients include large and small companies around the world and household brands like Citigroup, Cox Communications, Intuit, and more. Susan is frequently interviewed about marketing and branding by television, radio, print, and online media organizations, and she speaks about these topics at events around the world. You can connect with her on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Google+.
