How to brand your business
No matter the size of your business, creating a brand can help gain more customers! Here’s a guide to help you get started branding your business.
What is branding?
Your brand is your business identity. Typically, when people think of a brand, they think of your business name and logo. But your brand is more than this!
Branding helps you stand out in your market. It’s how people feel when they engage with your business. From your website to your store or product, your brand shows how your company represents itself.
How to start branding your business
Building your brand is a process. To start creating a brand strategy and figuring out your brand, here are some key questions to ask:
- Who are your target audience? What will appeal to them?
- What makes your business unique?
- What your company stands for, and what it doesn’t
- Which values do you want your business to have?
Researching your competitors is an important part of the branding process. You shouldn’t copy your competitors (the aim is to stand out!) but be aware of what they’re doing and whether it’s successful.
Creating a visual identity
When you’re clear on what your brand is it’s time to decide how it will look! Creating a visual identity for your brand will usually include these assets.
It’s a great idea to work with a designer (unless you are one!) to help you produce a professional visual identity.
Brand guidelines
Your brand guidelines are the small details that bring your brand together. Thinking about this from an overall perspective instead of jumping straight in and designing a logo will make sure your brand will work across all platforms.
Brand guidelines include:
- Colour palette
- Fonts
- Image style
- What you should and shouldn’t do to represent your brand
Logo
Design your logo first. This is one of the most important aspects of your brand! It’s what customers will see first, and remember. Make sure your logo works across all formats, like your website, products, social media and any other materials.
Other assets
Your design needs to feel consistent across your business. Think about any other places that need to incorporate your brand identity, and decide how they will look. This could include:
- Website and product imagery
- Store
- Products
- Packaging
- Stationary including business cards
- Email signatures
- Visual merchandise
Tone of voice guidelines
Your brand isn’t just visual. It’s also how customers interact with your business. So, you also need to decide how your brand talks to your customers!
Tone of voice guidelines set how you speak as a brand. Like your brand guidelines, your tone of voice makes sure your brand experience is consistent across all channels. Whether it’s visiting your website, receiving email marketing, checking out your social channels or visiting your store, your customers should have a similar experience.
Can you be funny? Do you need to be serious? Use the answers to the questions you used to figure out your brand to guide your tone of voice. When you create your guidelines, use examples of what is and isn’t appropriate.
If you aren’t doing your marketing yourself, providing your brand and tone of voice guidelines is important to make sure your brand is represented the way you want.
