Consistency in branding is key for any business, organization or entity.
What does this mean?
Branding is the collection of output points such as logos, color choices, fonts, images, consistency in voice, etc.
Why’s this important?
People know what they see and hear. If a consumer sees your logo and it’s purple and gold for instance, and the next time they see your logo it’s red and blue, then the third time it’s another set of colors, people won’t recognize it as the same brand.
On average, it takes exposure to something seven times to stick. If for instance your blue and red logo is seen seven times but the purple and gold logo is only seen three times, they’re going to remember the blue and red logo due to exposure.
Because of this, it’s more beneficial to have cohesive branding. Let’s dive in.
COLOR CHOICES
Different colors give people different feelings, emotions and reactions. When choosing your colors for your brand, you want it to reflect on what you are / do. For instance, the branding of someone dealing with ecosystem research may have more earthy, natural tones in their branding for graphics, logos and more. Someone that does racing may have bright bold colors that would stand out on a car. Something scary? Reds and greens and other dark colors.
When choosing these you also want to make sure they go together. What works for a football team won’t work for a construction business.
FONTS
Choosing fonts can be hard, while some fonts are an obvious hard pass. Unless you’re a children’s clown or something similar in nature, Comic Sans is good for nearly no business as it’s the “joke” font of the graphics world. Knowing things like this may save your reputation.
Another key fact to note is using the same family of fonts. For instance, if your logo is sans serif, you more than likely want to continue to use sans serif fonts in your graphics, publications, etc.
VOICE
Voice is important because it’s how you talk to people. If you have a fun brand – something like a coffee shop that caters to the alternative people and personas, a trampoline park, a theme park, or an interactive “rude” dinner service. These aren’t the only “fun” brand themes, however; these types of businesses – those in entertainment, are more likely to get away with using sarcasm, underlying joking tones, and more entertaining verbiage.
For instance; someone in the trampoline industry may use something like “Jump into fall with dropping prices!” on social media. It’s cutesy but gets the message across that prices are dropping and it’s punny because of the joke about “jumping” (you know, like one does on a trampoline).
However; if a lawyer was to use a more joking / cutesy tone; it wouldn’t be well perceived by most because law is a more “serious” profession.
IMAGES
Using the same style of images as far as color, tones, storytelling ability and composition will elevate your brand. Why’s this?
If you had a photo shoot with a photographer, you’d want all of the photos in the same location to have the same feel, correct? Photos for a brand aren’t much different.
If you’re a fun organization or business, you more than likely want to have bold colors, lighter / brighter tones and a less serious overarching theme.
If you’re a more serious business, you might use more dark images or neutral tones, so things don’t stand out as much and everything kind of blends.
PUTTING IT TOGETHER
Now that you have the basics, putting everything together is going to allow you to have a more cohesive brand and image. Using the things that you’ve learned above, piece together your brand by how you’d like to be perceived – more fun? More serious? More caring? Compassionate? The images, fonts and colors you use reflect these tones and more.
Unsure of how to proceed even after reading this guide? That’s ok – branding isn’t for everyone. We need people who do numbers, too. Hit us up – we’d love to consult you on branding for your business or organization.
