Whip Your Brand Into Shape: 5 Essential Components For Your Branding Guidelines
Your brand is your business. It’s the first thing customers think of when they see you. It’s what sets you apart from your competitors. It’s the essence of who you are.
Branding isn’t something you should take lightly. One wrong move could undo months of hard work! When it’s time to get serious about your brand, you need to create branding guidelines.
Even if you’re running a business where it’s just you behind the wheel, branding guidelines are a must. Branding guidelines, which are also called a brand style guide, helps you:
Be consistent. A consistent image is essential to solidifying your brand. Refer to your brand guidelines to make sure everything you put out is correct.
Avoid design mistakes. Don’t let your intern crank out a red logo if your colors are teal and white!
Stay focused. A style guide helps you keep the focus on your mission and values as you grow.
If you haven’t written down your branding guidelines, today’s the day to do it!
Make sure your guidelines include these 5 components to keep your brand on track.
1. Brand Strategy
How is your brand different from everybody else? What are your beliefs? What’s your mission or vision?
Include a few opening paragraphs explaining the ethos behind your business. This should give an overview of your company’s history, who you serve, and how you’re different. You can even put together an elevator pitch that highlights why customers choose to work with you.
2: Tone
If you’re handing off your social posts or blogs to an employee, you want to make sure that they capture the right personality. Your style guidelines should help vendors, contractors, or employees with:
Grammar rules. When do you use title case and when do you not?
Punctuation. Do you use the Oxford comma?
Word choice. Are there any “forbidden” words or phrases? What should you say instead?
Personality. Are you more professional and formal or laid-back and casual?
3: Logo
Logo branding guidelines will help you use your logo in the correct way. After all, you don’t want to accidentally use a low-resolution logo for print collateral. Logo guidelines should list all of your logo versions including when to use them, their appropriate sizing, and where to find the logo files.
4: Colors
Sure, “red” sounds like a simple color, but what shade of red are we talking about here? Big brands like Target always use the same tone of red—your brand needs to be just as precise.
Your branding guidelines should spell out which colors to use in your branding. That means dropping in hex codes, Pantone codes, and even samples or swatches.
5: Fonts
What typefaces do you use on your social posts, website, and emails? There’s a big difference between the Comic Sans and the popular Helvetica font. Your branding guidelines need to spell out which fonts you use, where you use them, and which combinations (if any) you’re using.
P.S. Make sure both you and your team download the appropriate fonts to your devices You can download popular fonts from Font Squirrel.
The bottom line
Branding often seems invisible because it’s stitched into everything you do at your business. From marketing to sales to product design, branding plays a huge role in how the world sees your biz. Make sure to include these 5 components in your branding guidelines to keep your business on track.