branding, design
Brand Strategy, The Basics of your Brand Identity
13 October 2021
When you think of your favourite brand, it’s easy to remember the brand colours, their logo, what they stand for, and their personality. All of that is not created by chance, it’s the result of a lot of the hard work and skill that went into creating a brand strategy.
The strategy is essentially all of the work that goes into creating that image in your head. It is the planning and strategising behind every decision about colours, fonts, images, logos, and other brand assets, all of which helps to make a brand recognisable and memorable.
That’s why, when we create branding and graphic design for any company, we start with strategy. We start by learning everything there is to know about your brand, from your goals and values, to your audiences and the messages you want to get across.
Only then we begin our design process. Here’s a little more about the basics of a brand strategy, what we need to know, and how we use that knowledge to create beautiful, effective branding for your business.
Basics of a Brand Strategy
The process of our Brand Strategy is an exciting journey of discovering who you are and what you do. And there are a number of steps we take before designing any of your branding elements. But overall, we describe this process in three main stages:
1. Define the basics of your Brand
To begin, we have to understand the very basics of your brand, even if it’s not something you’ve ever considered.
Your brand is about not just who you are as a business, but why. When we understand exactly why you have taken the approach you have and why you offer the products and services you do, we can better represent those decisions through your branding.
We will need to identify your core values, define your mission and vision, and define your brand personality. All of these areas will influence every design choice we make, from colours, to fonts, to the style and tone of your branding, all in order to reflect your business as a whole.
2. Define your message
Defining your message is important. You’ll need to determine who you want to talk to (your audience), and the voice your brand uses to communicate with them – you could also say that’s your company personality.
Do you want your audience to think of you as a professional, no-nonsense brand? Or would you rather come across as friendly and helpful? Or are you simply trying to focus on helping the environment?
During this stage, you’ll need to define your value proposition (what you offer to your audience), and the message you want to communicate. You’ll also need a tagline, which will help to reinforce your messaging.
Without this stage, it will be harder to focus your communications. From your emails and social media posts to website content and brochure messaging, all of it will need to tell the same story or you risk confusing your customers. Defining and clarifying your message will help to keep everything streamlined and clear across the board.
“Design is the silent ambassador
of your brand.” — Paul Rand
3. Design your Brand Identity
Once we have a clear idea of the basics of your brand and your audience and message, we will start designing your brand identity.
This includes a logo, which is the emblem of your brand and should encapsulate everything that makes your brand unique.
It also includes colour psychology, which is a subtle but meaningful aspect of design that uses the intrinsic properties of colours to help reinforce certain messages.
We’ll choose the best fonts for your brand. These further reinforce your brand voice even through something as simple as the shape of letters on a page.
We’ll even put together imagery and illustrations that you can use across your website and other platforms to ensure every part of your brand fits together like pieces of a puzzle. These images and graphics will incorporate your brand colours and personality in a natural, beautiful style that solidifies your messaging.
Finally, we will create Brand Guidelines for your business. This is a formal document outlining everything from your logo to your fonts and imagery, so that you and anyone you work with in future can continue to follow these brand guidelines to keep your messaging clear and focused.
Get better branding
Are you ready to have professional, beautiful branding for your business? CREATIVA will take the time to get to know your brand so we can accurately capture your values, vision, messaging, and mission in stunning brand elements that you can use across your platforms.
Get in touch with CREATIVA today to find out more.