Just as your personal identity makes you uniquely you, your brand identity is the special sauce of your business that sets you apart from everyone else. And your brand identity design? It’s what shapes your company.
But what exactly is brand identity? What does it have to do with design? And how do you build a strong brand identity that takes your business to the next level?
How to Develop a Strong Brand Identity
Know who you are
Before you know what tangible elements you want to form your brand identity, you need to know who you are as a brand.
Who you are as a brand is made up of a few key elements:
Your mission (what is your “why?”)
Your values (what beliefs drive your company?)
Your brand personality (if your brand were a person, what kind of personality would it have?)
Your unique positioning (how do you differentiate yourself from the competition?)
Your brand voice (if your brand were a person, how would they communicate?)
These elements are what define your brand, and before you begin building your brand identity, it’s important that you have a clear understanding of each one.
If you’re having trouble figuring out who architects mailing lists exactly you are, don’t worry. Sometimes, all you need is a little brainstorming to help you clarify who you are as a brand.
Ask yourself:
Why did we start this business?
What are the beliefs and values that are important to us as a company?
What do we do better than anyone else?
What makes us special?
If we could describe our brand in three words, what would they be?
What are the three words we want our customers to use to describe us?
Once you’ve defined who you are as a brand, it’s time to build the identity that will bring your brand to life and showcase who you are to the people who matter most: your customers.
Design: the basis of your brand identity
Just as Adidas created the brand identity of its young school athlete persona, your design is what will build your company's brand identity.
Your design assets are the tangible elements that will determine how your brand is perceived. Things like your logo, your packaging, your web design, your social media graphics, your business cards, and the uniforms your employees wear.
In other words, nailing your design = nailing your brand identity = building a successful business that is an accurate representation of who you are as a brand.
So how exactly do you create your design and build a brand identity that will take your business to the next level?
Developing your brand design
Before you can start creating your design assets, you need to start from scratch and nail down the basics of your design framework: the building blocks of your brand identity.
The building blocks you'll want to determine before creating your design features include:
Typography
Typography refers to – you guessed it – the font (or typeface) you choose for your branding materials. There are four main types of typography:
Typography
Serif fonts (like Times New Roman or Garamond) have what looks like an anchor (or to some people, little feet) at the end of each letter. This classic typeface is great if you want your brand to feel trustworthy, traditional, and a little old-school.
If “serif” is the foot, “sans serif” is without the foot. Sans serif fonts (like Helvetica or Franklin Gothic) are letters that have smooth edges and lack the anchor or “feet” of their serif counterparts. Sans serif fonts give a more modern, sleek feel to brands.
Script typography emulates cursive handwriting. These fonts (like Allura or Pacifico) can be a great way to add a luxurious or feminine feel to your brand.
Display fonts are kind of in a league of their own. Each display font has a specialized element, whether it’s an unusual shape to the letters, outlines, shading, or a more artistic/hand-drawn border (think Metallica’s Lightning Bolt font). Want to make a bold statement and create a brand identity that people won’t soon forget? A display font is a great way to do that.
The typography you choose will say a lot about your brand, so choose wisely.
Color palette
Next up is color. People – your potential customers included – have psychological attachments to different colors, and using colors strategically in your brand’s color palette can have a serious impact on how your brand is perceived by your audience.