Stop Trying to be Someone Else

Welcome to this week’s edition of Cyber Motion, tailored for cybersecurity business leaders. In this newsletter, you’ll find practical strategies, cutting-edge insights, and fresh thinking designed to help your security-focused brand break through a crowded market. My goal is to equip you with the tools and ideas needed to thrive amid shifting threats, buyer skepticism, and evolving industry standards.

– Tobias

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Remember Face/Off? Nicolas Cage and John Travolta literally swapping faces in a 1997 action thriller that asked: what if you could become someone else by just… changing your face? It was absurd, expensive, and involved way more surgery than anyone needed. Most companies approach rebranding the same way. The results are just as messy.

You can't go a quarter without some company somewhere announcing a rebrand. And cybersecurity companies are far from immune to this trend. New logo. New colors. New messaging. New website. Sometimes even a new name. The leadership team celebrates the "bold new direction." The marketing team scrambles to update every asset. And six months later, no one can remember why they did it.

Here's what usually happens: revenue is flat, pipeline isn't moving, and someone in the C-suite decides the problem is the brand. Not the product positioning. Not the sales process. Not the fact that your ICP shifted two years ago and no one updated the messaging. It must be the logo.

So you hire an agency. You spend six months and $200K on a rebrand. You unveil it with a press release no one reads. And then you realize: you're the same company, just wearing someone else's face.

I'm not saying rebranding is always wrong. There are legitimate reasons to do it:

You've had a fundamental business model shift. If you were a point solution and you're now a platform, or you've moved from on-prem to cloud, or you've pivoted from SMB to enterprise—that's a real change. Your brand should reflect it.

You've outgrown your origin story. If you started as "the affordable alternative" and now you're the category leader, your brand may be holding you back. If prospects still think of you as the scrappy startup when you're doing $50M ARR, that's a problem worth solving.

Your name or visual identity is actively harmful. If your name is impossible to spell, your logo looks like clip art, or your brand colors make people think you sell vitamins instead of cybersecurity—yes, fix it.

You've merged or been acquired. Two companies becoming one? You probably need a new brand. (Though even here, the best acquirers often keep the better brand and retire the weaker one rather than creating something new.)

But here's the thing: most companies considering a rebrand don't fall into any of these categories. They're just bored. Or nervous. Or they've hired a new CMO who wants to "make their mark."

The real damage isn't the money or the time. It's the opportunity cost. While you're debating Pantone swatches and whether your new tagline should be seven words or eight, your competitors are shipping product, closing deals, and building brand equity.

Rebranding is a reset. Every piece of brand awareness you've built gets diluted or erased. Every time someone saw your logo, read your content, or heard your name? That equity starts over. You're starting over. And in a crowded market where mindshare is everything, that's a gift to your competition.

Worse, most rebrands don't actually solve the underlying problem. If your messaging was vague before, it'll be vague after. Just in a different font. If your positioning was weak, a new color palette won't fix it. You've changed your face, but you're still the same person underneath.

Instead of Face/Off-style surgery, try this: Fix the specific thing that's broken.

Problem: Your messaging doesn't resonate with your ICP.

Solution: Rewrite your messaging framework. Update your website copy. Refresh your pitch deck. Keep everything else.

Problem: Your visual identity feels dated.

Solution: Modernize your logo and brand guidelines. Don't throw out brand recognition you've spent years building—evolve it.

Problem: Your name doesn't reflect what you do.

Solution: This is the one place where a big change might make sense. But even then, test it first. Can you lead with a descriptor or tagline that clarifies your positioning without changing your name?

Problem: Your brand isn't differentiated.

Solution: This isn't a design problem—it's a strategy problem. You need sharper positioning, not a rebrand.

The companies that win in cybersecurity aren't the ones with the most rebrands. They're the ones with the clearest, most consistent positioning. They make small, deliberate tweaks over time. They evolve without erasing. They don't confuse motion with progress.

If you're thinking about a rebrand, ask yourself:

If you're still convinced you need a rebrand after answering those questions, go for it. But if you're looking for a reason to avoid expensive, disruptive, Face/Off-style identity surgery, consider this your permission slip.

Keep your face. Fix your positioning.

What's your take? Have you been through a rebrand that was worth it—or one that wasn't? Hit reply. I'd love to hear the stories (good and bad).

Stay sharp,
Tobias