Having a business presence is an essential part of any development process, and branding is vital for establishing your business in the market you want to be in. Your brand identity is you as a business—how you want people to remember you and what you want them to think about you. It isn’t just about your corporate values or your mission and vision statements. How you express your brand on the outside is also part of your visual identity.
How To Create Your Brand’s Visual Identity?
Below are some ways you might want to consider when thinking about how you want your customers to remember your brand.
1. Incorporate Your Logo Into Any Marketing Materials
An essential aspect of your brand identity is you as a business, and the most visually defining part of you as a company is your logo. Your logo shouldn’t only need to be visible on your website or in your printed materials. It should also be seen on uniforms and even on custom apparel you use in business events and more.
With technology, it’s now possible to have your logo printed almost on anything, regardless of how colorful it is. You can choose from many companies if you want your logo to be printed on any marketing materials. You may want to visit https://www.shopstrange.net/ for more information.
But what type of logo do you choose? There are three different types of logo designs you might want to consider before making your final decision.
– Typographic logos are a simple logotype using text for the brand’s name or symbol and nothing else. Coca-Cola is a good example.
– Wordmarks are logos with words as the primary feature type in the logo. The UPS wordmark is an example of this.
– Iconic logos use any combination of text and imagery to create a symbol representing the brand. Apple is an example of an iconic logo.
Some find it unnecessary to create a three-dimensional logo because if it’s too complex to look good on a small scale, it might probably look bad on a large scale. So, keep in mind that the simpler, the better.
2. Choose A Color That Fits Your Company’s Identity
Choosing a color for your company you’ll use consistently is an essential part of your visual identity. Colors you choose to develop your brand’s image should motivate, evoke memory, and put an idea into your customers’ minds about the type of business you are. You can hire a company to do this for you. Alternatively, it’s possible to choose colors that’d reflect your personality and business taste.
– Know What Colors Mean
The psychological effects of color are authentic, and your brand’s colors will subconsciously impact what people think about you.
Green represents nature and growth and is the color of balance. It’s also a calming and refreshing shade with healing qualities. Green is the best color to use if you want people to feel like your brand is environmentally friendly.
Blue is the most popular and widely used color. It’s a symbol of trust, influence, and authority. It also represents strength and determination.
Red is a vibrant color. It’s perfect for a brand that wants to be seen as trustworthy with excitement. It has a powerful effect on the psyche and is a color of excitement and energy.
Black is the color of mystery and elegance. It also represents sophistication and power.
White represents purity and innocence. It represents clarity and practicality. It’s the extreme opposite of black and is a color of peace and calm.
Yellow is an attention-grabbing color and is perfect for fun and energetic brands. It’s also the color of hope, happiness, and optimism.
Orange is the color of creativity, pleasure, and playfulness. It represents enthusiasm, health, and happiness.
– Determine What Color Your Brand Represents
Now that you already have an idea of what colors mean, you need to use them strategically. Identify what color your brand represents based on your brand values and what you want your customers to feel every time they use your services. The easiest way to identify what color you should use is by thinking about the personality of your brand, what it believes in, and how it approaches its customers.
For example, if you’re a brand that believes in love and compassion for all people, then you want people to feel good every time they engage with you. The best colors to use are warm and inviting such as red, yellow, and orange. If you’re a more conservative brand, then blue, black and white may be the right colors for you.
3. Choose An Appropriate Typeface For Your Brand
Typography also plays a significant part in creating a company’s visual identity. It helps create your visual language and it defines who you are as a brand. Different typefaces communicate different messages, so you should design them to match your business’s personality. For example, a horror film’s typography should be scary and menacing while a technology business may be sleeker and more modern. Fonts that are bold or basic can give an impression of an aggressive or friendly company.
Here are some typeface personalities:
– Serif type: Traditional, classical, reliable. For brands that convey a sense of respectability and age-long class.
– Sans-serif type: Modern, elegant, and clean. For brands that convey a sense of innovation and modernity.
– Script type: Fun, friendly, and informal. It’s suitable for brands that want to appeal to people with free-spirited personalities.
– Slab-serif type: Strong, authoritative, and influential. For brands that convey the sense of authority in leadership and innovation.
– Handwritten type: Informal, casual, and friendly. It’s ideal for brands that want to project a personal or distinctive identity in their brand messaging.
– Decorative type: Whimsical, friendly, and fun. For brands that want to project the image of youthful exuberance with a sense of humor.
Typography affects people’s choices too, so if you want to persuade people to use your brand, choosing the right typeface is essential.
4. Choose The Right Images To Post On Social Media
Social media became an essential tool to promote business brands, get more customers, and generate leads. However, since most social media platforms are free to use, it doesn’t mean you should post random photos or images on your business’s social media accounts.
When you post anything on your business’s social media accounts, you represent your brand to the world. So, make sure you post images and graphics that portray who you are as a brand. You may post photos of your business’s staff engaging with new customers, having fun in the office, or simply doing the job well. The types of images you post on your social media accounts can affect how people perceive your brand.
Thus, the images you post should also convey your business’s products and services to its clients. Showcase the photos of your staff working hard to achieve the goals set for them. If you’re in the food industry, post photos of your staff making delicious meals, or even better, let customers showcase their dining experience in your restaurants. When you post the right image on social media, it’ll increase your followers and subscribers to get more customers.
5. Incorporate Graphic Design Elements Across Marketing Materials
You may use graphic elements such as shapes, textures, diagrams, and icons to create a visual identity that’s easily recognizable among the audience.
– Shapes can add variety to your marketing materials. You may use it to highlight important information depending on the shapes you use. A perfect example of this is the United Nations logo where the circular shape (world map) represents the countries of the world coming together to create something greater than themselves.
– You can use texture to give your marketing materials a three-dimensional effect and convey emotion. Using texture will make your audience feel what you want them to feel about your brand. The most common textures are paper, wood grain, fabric, stone, and metallic.
– Use diagrams to demonstrate how a product or service works in a simple but effective manner. It can help customers and clients understand how to do something or how a product can be used.
– Icons offer visual symbols that represent your brand’s core values. It can help customers identify your brand quickly even before they check your business’s logo.
How you incorporate graphic design elements in your marketing materials can either make it better or worse. You can make it better by using simple shapes and textures to highlight important information. On the other hand, you may make it worse if you use too many elements.
The right graphic design elements used in your marketing materials will help your audience perceive the message you’re trying to convey. When people see a familiar design, they’ll instantly notice it, remember it, and associate it with your brand.
Final Words
Your company’s visual identity is the first thing people see in your brand. It should be cohesive across all marketing materials, and it needs to work hand-in-hand with your logo design. The color you choose for your business should reflect its personality in a way that sets it apart from other brands in the same industry or niche market. And while typeface selection might not seem much at first, there are many fonts out there that can make a huge difference when used correctly on social media graphics or eCommerce product pages.
As long as you follow these five ways to create a compelling visual identity for your branding strategy, it’ll be easy to show potential customers what makes your company stand out from competitors!