Elements like logos, color palettes, specific user experiences, etc. are very essential when creating branding. These branding components together create a brand identity, which is later used by designers to create convincing designs that connect a brand with its customers. So, today we will be discussing the elements of branding and how to use them effectively.
Branding Brief
Regardless of whether you know what branding is and can identify it, sometimes it can be quite difficult to understand what exactly branding involves. A brand is how the world perceives a company. Branding is the design choices and other steps someone consciously takes to shape that perception, and brand identity is the collection of design elements you use in your branding.
Importance of Branding
In a crowded, competitive world, branding is not just important but also necessary. Because you are up against millions of other brands that are thriving for your consumers’ attention, time, and money, you can’t afford to not stand out.
The key factors that branding communicates to your customers are: who you are, what you offer, why your business is better than competitors, and why you are the best solution for the target audience.
Top 8 Branding Elements That Every Business Requires
When creating a cohesive brand identity, you cannot ignore a few elements. These elements clearly express who you are as a brand, and what you stand for and offer. Look at any company’s branding and you will realize that all these elements work together to complete the branding. Sometimes they are subtle and, in some cases, a few might be missing, but you will see each element on this list present and working with the others to communicate the brand.
1. Logo
A logo is used, almost on every asset that a brand owns: business cards, websites, merchandise, social media pages, branded templates you use, and all the advertising and marketing materials. A logo is the most important element in a brand. You will never see a brand without a logo. A logo is the face of a company and its personality. It can be easily recognized by people. It’s the first interaction you have with the brand; the picture that sticks to your mind and conjures up memories (great, terrible, or apathetic) about the brand when you see it again on a shelf. That’s why your logo should represent what your brand is all about and encapsulate the essence of your brand identity.
2. Color Palette
One of the key ingredients in any brand’s identity is color. That’s because colors have properties — to be exact, they express key values and personality traits. I will cover color psychology and how to choose effective colors for a brand later. You don’t have to stick to a single color — the color palette expresses your brand while giving it a unique look.
Fun Fact: “Some companies have trademarked their signature brand colors, here are a few examples of trademarked colors: Fiskars — orange, UPS — Brown, and Tiffany — Blue.”
3. Shapes
While working on a branding strategy, we should also think about shapes. Different shapes convey different brand values and other aspects of a company. Don’t just concentrate on the shapes used in your logo, but also on the shapes in web page backgrounds, layout design, packing, and even visiting cards and other stationery. As you think about your brand identity, think about which shapes align with your brand’s personality best.
The meaning of shapes in logos is another topic that I would discuss in future articles.
4. Taglines
Taglines are catchphrases or slogans that businesses use while advertising to convey short messages to their customers and help them better understand the product.
“Just Do It” by Nike
“Eat fresh” by Subway
These taglines are well-known all around the world. Such catchphrases are the flagship of brand messaging. Brand messaging is how a business communicates its brand’s unique offer. Sometimes they are obvious, like Subway’s “Eat Fresh” slogan. This slogan differentiates them from other fast food brands and portrays them as a healthy alternative. Other brands, like Nike, use a more abstract tagline for their customers. “Just do it” can have several meanings, but the company’s intention was clear: they wanted their customers to just start doing — stop hesitating and take action. Taglines generally tell people what to expect from you rather than what you do.
5. Tone of Voice & Vocabulary
If you ever visited a Starbucks, you can relate to the example. You can order the smallest of the three standard sizes at Starbucks, but the name of the size is “Tall.” Recently, they have introduced two more sizes in the smaller section, which are called Demi and Short. That’s because Starbucks evolved its unique brand vocabulary to distinguish its products and services from other companies. Even though they didn’t coin the phrases they use for the extraordinary drink sizes, they were the first to apply them in this particular way. This isn’t the only unconventional naming convention that Starbucks is known for. They are also known for misspelling customers’ names on drink glasses, sometimes hilariously inaccurately. And while Starbucks officially didn’t recognize any deliberate efforts to misspell customer names, they did recognize writing names on mugs was a fun part of their branding. Individual Baristas, however, have different interpretations of misspellings.
A precise vocabulary is a part of a brand’s tone of voice. A brand’s tone of voice is the voice you read in all of the products and services by the brand, like the emails you receive, their website’s content, and the language used by the brand on their social media. Your tone of voice is one of the only ways to shape — and reshape — how the world perceives your brand.
6. Fonts
The fonts a brand uses are another important element of branding. The font used by brands for sending emails or creating websites is not randomly chosen — it’s cautiously selected to communicate the brand’s character and values. Much like precise colors correlate to different feelings and traits, so do fonts’ components.
See how powerful a font is at speaking a brand’s character?
7. Imagery
Imagery consists of all of the styles of images we use for branding, marketing, and advertising. These are not a logo or the particular portions of content material published; it’s the selection of images and stock pictures you use, the style of the graphics on your site and different brand assets, and your common brand aesthetic.
Think of gradients and patterned backgrounds, packaging, or banners — you don’t want concrete imagery to represent a brand clearly; you could effortlessly achieve this with abstract imagery through your shape and color choices. Brand imagery works intently with other elements of branding, like color and shape.
8. Positioning
Positioning is the area of interest in the marketplace that a brand fills. When we decide your brand’s personality, there is more to the picture than just deciding on what the company offers. It also includes how it will fit among other brands in its space. Whether you charged more, roughly the same, or less than your competitors, What makes your offer more appealing than your competitors’?
A brand’s positioning has a right-away effect on its branding. For example, an affordable brand that aims to represent that they’re the economical choice would possibly select bright, value-communicating hues like yellow and orange and craft a brand voice that’s simple, friendly, and optimistic.
In contrast, a luxurious brand would possibly use darker colors and a mysterious brand voice to position itself as a luxurious option.
Brand positioning isn’t simply carving out an area within the marketplace, though. It additionally entails interaction with other brands, each from within the same industry and brands from different industries. This is where positioning intersects with emblem imagery: the brands you associate with (which includes influencers) shape how the world perceives you.
Build a stunning brand from the elements mentioned above:
As you may see, constructing a brand means way more than simply designing a logo! Your brand identity is a 3-dimensional body of design choices, assets, and unique branding elements that work together to offer your brand’s unique appearance and feel. If you’re in the method of making a brand identity, don’t rush the method or skip out on designing any of its elements. Work with a skilled brand identity designer to bring it to life.
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