Branding

Brand It and Make It Stick.

Your brand is your promise to the world. It reinforces what they can expect from your products and services, and it differentiates you from your competitors. Your brand describes your essence – who you are, what you want to be and how you want to be seen by others. An effective brand should tell the story of what you offer and stand for to have the most impact on the demographic you want to appeal to.

The cornerstone of your brand is your logo, followed by promotional materials, website, packaging and any other marketing vehicles – all of which include your logo and consistently communicate your brand.

Defining your brand can be a difficult but necessary task, which requires answers to some key questions:

• What’s your company’s mission?
• What are your products or services more desirable than your competitors?
• What do you think is the current perception of your company?
• What qualities do you want associated with your company?

After your brand is developed and solid, you’ll need to follow through. Here are some of the key points in the branding ‘guidebook’:

•  Create a logo that represents you well and use it consistently, including your color palette and fonts.
• Develop your brand messaging to communicate what you stand for.
• Integrate your brand into everything you do.
• Develop a tagline that is memorable, meaningful and concise. There should be no question as to what you do.
• Be true to your brand. Once you sell it, you need to be consistent or your message will be watered down and lost.