Branding beyond logo design
When we talk to small businesses, it seems there is still confusion as to what branding is. They say, ‘we’ve got our branding sorted’ and what they mean is, ‘we have a logo’. In this article delve beyond logo design and look at how you can improve your branding.
So first, like many other articles on branding, we’ll start at the beginning:
What is a brand?
To quote branding expert Marty Neumeier “a brand is a person’s gut feeling about a product, service or organisation”
Basically, when a person experiences, interacts or sees a product, service or organisation, they get a gut feeling about it. This gut feeling is decided through many factors. Visuals, sounds, language, reputation, colours, photography, packaging, price, fonts and even smells. Every little element makes up a position in the minds of customers.
What is a logo?
A logo is a symbol made up of shapes, colours and letters that identify a business. A good logo instils the values of the business within its mark and becomes iconic and instantly recognisable to its intended audience.
What is branding?
It’s said that ‘a brand is not what you say about your business, it’s what others say about it’ (Marty Neumeier – The Brand Gap). If that is the case, how do you influence what others say about your business? This is where the term ‘branding’ comes in.
Branding is that art of creating a business’s visual identity, characteristics and persona. A combination of company values encapsulated in every aspect of what it does. Its services, delivery, language, marketing, price point, how it sounds, how it makes people feel and the impact it has. It’s the combined effort of every considered element playing together in a symphony for an intended audience.
How can I improve my branding?
Here is a short list of things to consider if you want to improve your branding:
Are your visual elements consistent?
The font choice, colours palette, logo placement and photography style need to be consistent. Review your marketing materials, website, social media feed, business cards. Are they on point and playing like a symphony? Or are they all playing a different tune? Take time to fix this and pay a designer to do this for you. It’s their job to do design, not yours!
Does your branding reflect your price?
It’s easy to think you can charge premium prices for your products or services. It may well be that you are the best at what you do in your locality. If your branding looks cheap, can you expect a customer to pay an expensive price? Probably not.
Premium price point businesses pay a premium price for their branding. They want to attract high net worth individuals because they are the intended audience. That’s why the entire experience is different when purchasing and wearing Tiffany products vs a cheaper alternative.
What does your branding say about your price point? Too cheap? Ask someone to give you honest feedback on your branded elements and inform them of your price, see if they match.
Brand your business for your audience, not for you
It’s not what you might like, it’s what the customers like. If you brand your business the way you like it, you will only attract people like you. If you brand your business for the customers you want to attract using the right visuals, language and colours etc, you are more likely to get the results you desire.
We recently made an entire video about this subject, check out the video below:
Using the right language
Are you consistent with the language you use? Is what you put out a reflection of you personally or the values of the business? If you know the ‘tone of voice’ of your business this should be an easy question to answer. If you haven’t defined this from the outset, you might find it trickier.
Your audience expects you to be consistent in how you do things. It might be as simple as choosing between being a helpful and informative brand vs being a comedic entertaining brand. Don’t be all things to all people as this breaks your audience’s understanding of what your brand stands for.
In conclusion
When you combine all these elements (consistency, visuals, price, audience, language) over time, it adds up to create a robust brand. When your brand represents the values of your business, you will achieve the intended gut feeling you were looking for from your target audience.
Got a project in mind?
Kind people who improve the world hire us to take care of their design because it’s time to level up! If you have a project, want to create a buzz for your business and are serious about having professionally designed brand identity, learning how to grow your brand, or require a website and marketing literature to communicate with your audience, get in touch!