Words, Words, Words!
Business branding, brand identity, brand, graphic design, logo design, pixels, gif and jpeg! When starting a business, your first step is branding. Determining a look that encompasses all that your company is–right to its core– is paramount. But with every new endeavor comes a learning curve. And branding properly has a steep learning curve. So what are the basics?
What is a Business Branding?
Business branding is an unspoken contract between a company and a customer. It essentially says: This is who we are, the ideals we are behind, and our promise to you to always bring you those things consistently. It assigns personality to your company. A consumer associates your business branding with feelings. It becomes the emotion that they connect with your company and products. It creates loyalty. And this is where you take your ideas and start to create an actual company with customers. Without knowing this “feel,” how could you expect your customers to connect emotionally to your offerings?
The Brand Identity
The brand identity is the feel of your business branding put into a look. Similar to your avatar on your favorite video game, you create a look with a branding identity. You may have brown eyes, but you’re always smiling. Your hair is in a ponytail, but it is curly and bouncy. Your outfit is green, but it’s not business casual, it’s cargo shorts and hiking boots. Likewise, your branding identity is a look. It’s the visual elements of your company: always the same color, the same typeface, the same proportions, the same angles of rotation. And hopefully, you’ve done a good job getting your personality into that look to some extent, which brings us to branding.
Creating The Brand
Branding is the process by which one employs the overarching elements and the nitty gritty of a company with your consistent look. This goal of this process is to become memorable, convey those thoughts, and attract the appropriate audience with a specific feeling. It’s making sure that the bubbly personality of your video game avatar shows through the outfit you’ve chosen, and it’s of monumental importance that it is done properly. Again, it is a process. It’s using every chance to flaunt your stuff using the exact look that you’ve created in your brand identity to portray your business branding to your customers.
The Business Branding, Brand Identity and Brand Trio
Together, Business Branding, Brand Identity and Brand are the three elements of the foundation on which customers will come to know your company. You start with Business Branding and determine the feel and concepts you want your customers to expect Then you create an image that goes far beyond a logo (to web design, marketing materials, packaging, social media images, etc.) to embody that concept you created in your business branding meetings. Then you combine them together to create a brand–A name for yourself that has a feel and a look and a way of being.
Just the Beginning of the Lesson
Wrapping your head around these ideas is not simple. And certainly not for beginners. You can read the ideas, but building actual elements to have a specific feel requires more. You need a creative mindset that can problem solve and see that a shape on a piece of paper carries a feel that goes beyond simple lines and colors.
Look for Branding Help
Consider using a branding design professional to help you fulfill your goals. Allow someone with knowledge and experience to understand your intent behind your brand, convert it to images (Brand identity) that convey that branding of your company that you painstakingly chose, and then take those concepts to the next level with complete campaigns to move your customers from one time users to loyal fans. We would be happy to discuss your brand with you. Just contact us and let us know how we can help!