The start of next week will mark the official move to a single Barclays brand for the majority of its divisions, including the firm’s wealth management arm.

The start of next week will mark the official move to a single Barclays brand for the majority of its divisions, including the firm’s wealth management arm, which will henceforth be known only by its parent’s name.

As eagle-eyed readers of WealthBriefing will no doubt notice, all advertisements for the firm’s wealth business will from Monday feature only the name Barclays. The business will be known as the wealth and investment management division of Barclays going forward.

Barclays Corporate and Barclays Capital will be known as the corporate and investment banking division of Barclays.

The changes, which were first mentioned by group chief executive Bob Diamond at the group’s earnings announcement at the end of last year, are intended to be an outward sign of a closer integration of Barclays’ various business lines.

Barclaycard and Absa will however retain their distinct brands, as they are seen as having unique strengths in their respective markets.

Barclays joins several wealth management houses which have moved to “refresh” their brands in recent times. Royal Bank of Scotland last year brought all of its wealth management operations – bar Edinburgh-based Adam & Co – under the name Coutts, for example.

That firms need to periodically rejuvenate their brands was borne out by a recent reader survey carried out among the subscribers to WealthBriefing, WealthBriefingAsia and Family Wealth Report. The vast majority of the respondents to the survey (87 per cent) agreed with the idea that building a strong brand is far from the end of the story, and that brands should be periodically refreshed in order to stay strong.

This issue is discussed at length in a forthcoming research report by ClearView Financial Media, entitled Reaching Out To The High Net Worth: Branding And Marketing Strategy Across The Global Wealth Management Industry. The senior wealth management executives and marketing luminaries involved on the report all asserted that rebranding is not a sign of weakness but should instead be seen as an essential process of periodic renewal.

Please contact hugo@clearviewpublishing.com about getting a copy of the report.