Your brand identity should give customers an instant snapshot of your brand values and ethos. It needs to resonate with your core market while also appealing to other ‘floating’ demographics you may want to attract.
But creating a brand identity, according to mark-making.com, is about more than simply sprucing up your website and redesigning your logo. Here are four tips to help you craft a brand identity that bangs.
What Goes into Building a Brand?
Brand identity will be just one part of your brand building strategy, which should break down into three distinct parts:
- Brand Strategy – This includes brand discovery, competitor research, target audience, brand voice, brand message and story
- Brand Identity – This includes logo, colours and typeface, website design, content, advertising, and packaging
- Brand Marketing – SEO and content marketing, social media marketing, email marketing, PPC
Four Steps to Building a Brand Identity
Here are four things to consider when crafting your brand identity:
1. Determine your target market
Although you might want your brand to appeal to as many people as possible, you can’t be everything to everyone – it’s important to clearly define your target market else you’ll risk sending mixed messages that mean you don’t really appeal to anyone.
To determine your target market, consider the following questions:
- What are you offering?
- Who are your competitors?
- Why should customers choose you over your competitors?
- What personality traits do you want your brand to have (e.g. serious, informative, playful, etc.)
2. Define your mission statement
It’s important to have a clear idea of what your business is passionate about and what it values most, and this needs to be clearly and concisely conveyed in your mission statement.
This will give your business a clear vision that defines the reason it exists, and should be used to inform everything you do. It should underpin your logo, tagline, tone of voice and all customer and staff facing correspondence.
3. Design a great logo and tagline
The ultimate goal for most businesses is to get people into their store or onto their website, where they’ll then buy something. Customers will be so pleased with the whole experience that they come back time and again, and tell all their contacts to do the same.
But you need an eye-catching proposition to get them there in the first place, and that’s where your logo and tagline come into their own. When creating a logo and tagline, be sure to use colours, typography and a tone of voice that represents your brand and appeals to your target market, and try to make sure it ticks all the following boxes:
- Timeless
- Simple
- Memorable
- Versatile
- Appropriate
4. Be consistent across all your messaging
Whether customers need to visit your website or drop into your store, you need to make sure all branding and messaging is consistent so that they know exactly where they are at all times, without having to think about it.
This means all website copy, store signages, email literature, adverts, mailouts, and all other marketing materials should conform to the same coloured branding, in the same typeface, and with the same tone of voice.
Nail those four key principles, and you’ll be well on your way to building a strong brand identity.
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