OH SHIT, WE NEED A BRAND AUDIT!?
A practical brand audit checklist to help you understand what’s working, what needs attention and where to go next with your brand.
A couple of years ago, I developed the brand identity for Alice CPA, an audit firm in New York City. One of the insights behind the brand was the feeling startup founders faced when they realised they needed a financial audit before securing venture capital funding. And for what is already a stressful time, is then met with a compounding moment of needing someone to come in to go through the details of their business. “Oh shit, we need an audit” summed up that feeling pretty well.
So we conceptualised this idea onto packs of toilet paper as a somewhat appropriate, not overly practical, but nonetheless an empathetic response to that particular feeling that can be humorously relatable. We also developed touchpoints like a calming scented candle and branded matches to help relieve the stress of an audit. It gave Alice a way to acknowledge the nerves with a bit of humour and make the process feel more approachable before it had even started.
Now, a brand audit serves a different purpose, but I reckon the word “audit” can bring on a similar reaction. You’ve put time, money and a fair chunk of yourself into building your business. Having someone examine how it looks, what it says, how your team represents it and what customers actually think can feel a little uncomfortable. Especially if you already suspect some things aren’t working but have swept it under the rug for another day to deal with, and/or you’re up against stiff competition and not sure how your brand compares or how it can compete.
But that uncertainty is exactly what a brand audit helps address. It assesses how your brand is performing, how people perceive it and how well it supports the business you’re building. You get an outsider perspective and objective assessment to understand what’s working, what needs protecting, what’s missing and what deserves attention. Because you might be worrying about your logo when the bigger issue is that customers don’t understand your offering. Or you’re considering changing everything when there’s already valuable recognition you should keep.
The aim is to leave with clarity and a practical direction to move forward. Now what I wanted to do for this article is collate a bit of a checklist you can reference and put your brand up to the lens to assess. So the following ten-point brand audit checklist gives you a way to start, either yourself or as a heads up before working with a brand professional like myself.
The idea is that for each item, record what you know, the evidence behind it and anything you still need to investigate. Mark anything that doesn’t apply to your business accordingly. “We don’t know” is still a useful answer at this stage. And hopefully as a result you’ll be able to self-identify what’s working, what you need to find out more about and what needs work. Any step forward is progress to get past that “Oh shit, an audit” and turn it into, “Oh yeah, this is what we’re gonna do to help our brand win”.
1. Start with the business and where it’s heading
Before assessing the branding, get clear on the business it needs to support. Sometimes we become so rooted in the day-to-day that we lose sight of the bigger picture and the trajectory you’re heading in, and it all depends on your current circumstances. An established business opening a second location has different requirements from a product brand trying to secure its first supermarket stockist. Your ambitions, capacity and current challenges give the audit its context. Without that, you can end up judging everything on whether you personally like it, which is a subjective slippery slope away from the objective task at hand.
Here’s your checklist:
🔲 We’ve documented our current business priorities and challenges.
🔲 We’re clear on what we want to achieve over the next one to three years.
🔲 We’ve identified planned changes to our products, services, customers, locations or price positioning.
🔲 We’ve considered whether our current brand can support those ambitions.
Look for a mismatch between where you’re heading and how you’re currently perceived. If you want to attract larger commercial clients but everything about your presentation suggests small residential jobs, that’s worth investigating. So is a brand name or structure that could become limiting as your offering expands. Something that worked when you started might need to evolve as the business grows.
2. Check whether there’s a usable brand strategy
Some businesses have a strategy in a presentation nobody has opened for three years. Others have a reasonably clear direction that exists entirely in the owner’s head. The audit needs to establish what’s actually guiding decisions, whether it still makes sense and whether anyone is using it. A list of values and a revenue target won’t cover the whole thing.
Here’s your checklist:
🔲We have a clear view of the market needs our business serves.
🔲 We’ve identified the customers or market segments we intend to reach and why they’re viable.
🔲 We’ve defined what we want our brand to be remembered and chosen for.
🔲 We have objectives, priorities, responsibilities and a realistic budget for putting the strategy into practice.
The useful test is whether the strategy helps you make decisions. Your team should be able to use it when developing an offer, briefing a designer, planning marketing or deciding which opportunities to pursue. If it’s too vague to guide any of that, there’s a gap. Getting the direction out of someone’s head and into a form the team can understand might be one of the most useful outcomes of the audit. Additionally this particular part of your brand is never set and forget or a means to an end as it’s an ever evolving and cyclical process you should engage in periodically so that you’re adapting to changes within the business and in the market.
3. Understand where you stand against competitors
Get specific about the alternatives customers actually consider. These might include the business down the road, a national brand, an online provider or simply doing the job themselves. Review how those alternatives are positioned, what they offer and how they’re encountered. Don’t just line up everyone’s logos and decide yours needs a different colour.
Here’s your checklist:
🔲 We know which alternatives customers consider alongside us.
🔲 We’ve compared their offers, pricing, messaging, presentation and customer experience with ours.
🔲 We understand where we’re stronger, where we’re similar and where we’re falling short.
🔲 We’ve identified which claims and visual cues are common across the category and which help people recognise us over a competitor.
You’re looking for a credible position your business can support. “Quality service” is something almost everyone claims. The audit should investigate what customers value about your particular approach, alongside the distinctive elements that make your brand easier to recognise. With my client example of Alice CPA, the result of understanding how founders felt about the process gave us something specific to respond to through the brand, beyond simply communicating that the firm conducts “quality service” audits.
4. Review what customer research is actually telling you
This is where you check the assumptions behind the first three sections. Speak with recent customers, repeat customers, potential customers and people who chose someone else. Explore what they expected before buying, what influenced their decision and what they experienced afterwards. I covered this in my previous article about knowing why customers choose your brand, because it’s a pretty important part of shaping the strategy.
Here’s your checklist:
🔲 We have recent feedback from a useful mix of customers and potential customers.
🔲 We understand their needs, buying situations, hesitations and reasons for choosing.
🔲 We’ve compared their feedback with available sales, enquiry, conversion and repeat-purchase data.
🔲 We’ve recorded contradictions, unanswered questions and limitations in the research.
Check when the research was done, who participated and whether they reflect the market you’re trying to understand. Five enthusiastic regulars can offer useful insights, but they can’t speak for everyone, especially as there’s counterintuitive evidence in marketing that shows heavy buyers of a category tend to be the least ‘loyal’ to one brand. Equally, sales figures might show a problem without telling you what caused it. Give people room to say something you weren’t expecting, then investigate the patterns rather than reacting to one uncomfortable comment.
5. Assess awareness, recognition and recall
Being pleased with your branding doesn’t tell you whether anyone remembers it. This part of the audit looks at whether people know your brand, recognise its identifying features and think of it in relevant buying situations. Those are different things, and it helps to assess them separately.
Here’s your checklist:
🔲 We’ve explored which brands come to mind before prompting people with our name.
🔲 We’ve checked whether people recognise our name and correctly associate our visual or verbal assets with us.
🔲 We understand what people associate with our brand, including unwanted or outdated perceptions.
🔲 We’ve investigated the needs and occasions that bring our brand to mind.
It can be a tricky task when you’re a smaller brand compared to the big brands we can instantly think of as category defining brands. And it takes time to build these associations for your brand to come to mind when needed. Even so, ask about recall before showing people your branding, otherwise you’ve given them the answer. You can then explore recognition using assets such as packaging, colours, signage or a familiar phrase. For category entry points, investigate situations like needing a snack after school or considering selling the family home. The aim is to understand when your brand enters the picture (if it’s not currently, then still identifying when it can) and where it’s being overlooked. However, one thing to keep in mind is that you’re not looking to have people guess what it is you do just from the look of your branding, or the name of your brand. You’re better off knowing if the brand was easy to recall after only seeing it for the first time, even at the end of a short survey.
6. Check how easy you are to find and buy from
A customer can remember your brand and still buy elsewhere because you weren’t available, accessible or easy to deal with. Review the places your customers look, the channels they buy through and the steps required to complete a purchase or enquiry. This connects what you’ve learned about their needs with your actual presence in the market.
Here’s your checklist:
🔲 We’re present in the locations and channels relevant to our customers’ buying situations.
🔲 Our website, listings, contact details, opening hours or stockist information are accurate.
🔲 Our offering, pricing information and next steps are clear enough for customers to act.
🔲 We’ve checked for friction in enquiries, bookings, checkout, stock availability and follow-up.
Walk through it yourself. Try finding your business, understanding the offer and making an inquiry on the phone. For a product brand, check the shelf and online buying experience. You might discover that the problem you thought required a rebrand is partly an availability or purchasing problem. That gives you something specific to fix before committing to a bigger project.
7. Review the name, visual identity and messaging
Gather examples of your website, packaging, proposals, signage, advertising, emails and social content. Assess whether they feel connected, communicate clearly and support your positioning. Then look at the individual elements and how they perform in everyday use. A logo might look impressive on a presentation slide but become an indecipherable blob on a social profile. A name might have a clever backstory but be difficult for customers to pronounce, spell, remember or recommend to someone else.
Here’s your checklist:
🔲 Our name is easy enough to say, spell, remember and search for, without being confused with another business.
🔲 We’ve checked whether the name’s length or meaning creates problems across signage, packaging, conversation or future expansion.
🔲 Our logo remains recognisable at small sizes and doesn’t rely on intricate details that disappear in everyday use.
🔲 Our colours, typography and other brand assets help people identify us across different applications.
🔲 Our packaging gets noticed in its actual retail environment and makes the brand, product and variant easy to identify.
🔲 Our messaging explains what we offer and why it matters in language customers understand.
🔲 Our materials are readable, accessible and supported by usable guidelines and templates.
Test these things where customers actually encounter them. Put the packaging alongside competing products on a shelf. View the signage from across the street. Hear someone unfamiliar with the name say it aloud. For packaging, check whether people notice it, understand what it contains and can find it again. Getting attention is useful, but customers still need to recognise what they’re buying. And separate personal taste from performance: you might be bored of a colour that’s helping people find you, or attached to a complicated logo that nobody can recall because there’s too much going on.
8. Look at the experience behind the presentation
Your branding creates expectations that the business then needs to meet. Review the experience from the first interaction through to delivery, support and repeat business. Include the awkward bits, like delays, complaints and refunds, because the way your team handles those situations forms part of the impression people take away.
Here’s your checklist:
🔲 The experience customers receive supports the promises made in our marketing.
🔲 We’ve reviewed feedback across the main stages of the customer journey.
🔲 We understand recurring complaints, points of confusion and reasons customers leave.
🔲 We know which parts of the experience people value and recommend to others.
If your brand promises personal attention but customers constantly chase a response, that’s a brand issue with an operational cause. Updating the website copy alone won’t resolve it. The audit should connect the promise with what needs to happen inside the business to deliver it. For a brand presenting itself as approachable and reassuring, that should be reflected in clear explanations, helpful communication and a process customers can understand.
9. Check team alignment, recruitment and long-term commitment
Your brand also shapes how people see you as an employer. It can influence who applies, what they expect from working with you and whether the experience gives them a reason to stay. Speak with people across the business about how they understand the brand, whether they’re proud to represent it and whether they can see a future there. Compare that with the picture you present through job ads, interviews and onboarding.
Here’s your checklist:
🔲 Our team can explain who we serve, what we offer and what we want to be known for.
🔲 Our recruitment communicates the work, expectations and employee experience clearly enough to attract suitable people.
🔲 We understand why candidates accept or decline our offers and why employees stay or leave.
🔲 Our onboarding, management and everyday behaviour reflect the values we communicate.
🔲 People have the training, resources, recognition and opportunities to develop over time.
🔲 We’ve explored what makes the team proud of the brand, what frustrates them and whether they’d recommend working here.
Look for gaps between the employer you say you are and the experience people actually have. If you promote career development but nobody knows how they can progress, that needs attention. If suitable candidates consistently overlook you, investigate what they know and believe about the business before assuming the job ad needs a rewrite. Pay, workload, leadership and working conditions matter too, so the audit may uncover issues that require changes within the business. Give people a way to speak honestly, including privately where needed, so you get a useful picture of what working there feels like.
10. Turn the findings into priorities and measures
An audit needs to finish with decisions you can act on. Bring the findings together and distinguish between things supported by evidence, reasonable possibilities and areas that need more research. Then prioritise according to their impact on customers and business goals, alongside the effort and budget required. A long list of problems without an order of priority is only gonna leave you feeling more overwhelmed.
Here’s your checklist:
🔲 We’ve identified the brand strengths and assets we should retain.
🔲 We’ve prioritised the gaps affecting customer choice, experience or future growth.
🔲 Each agreed action has an owner, timeframe and realistic allocation of resources.
🔲 We’ve established relevant baseline measures and a date to review progress.
Those measures could include awareness, correct recognition of brand assets, enquiry quality, conversion, repeat purchasing or team understanding. Choose measures that relate to the issue you’re addressing and recognise that pricing, distribution, service and market conditions also affect performance. You’re gonna need that context when assessing whether the changes are helping. Finish with a manageable plan that makes clear what to do now, what to investigate next and what can wait.
If you reach the end with a few unchecked boxes, take a breath. You’ve now got a clearer picture of where your brand needs attention. Some of those gaps might need more research. Others might call for clearer messaging, better packaging, team development or an easier buying experience. A larger rebrand could be justified, but that decision should come from what you’ve discovered.
You might also have found strengths you’ve been overlooking. A name customers remember, a team people trust or a colour that makes your product easy to spot. Those things matter, and knowing what to keep gives you more confidence in deciding what to change, especially when strategy is often identifying what not to do as much as what to do.
That was the thinking behind making an audit feel more approachable with Alice CPA, and it’s how I’d encourage you to approach your own brand audit. Acknowledge the uncomfortable bits, have a proper look and use what you learn to move forward. You don’t need to fix everything at once, but you do need to know where your effort is gonna make a difference.
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So if “oh shit, we need a brand audit” is sounding familiar, say g’day. Let’s clear up the uncertainty and give your brand a shot at better branding for better business success. Toilet paper optional.
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