The English Oxford dictionary defines Branding as “the kind, grade, or make of a product or service, as indicated by a stamp, trademark, or the like”
Branding is the art of actively shaping your brand. With creativity, skill and strategy, a brand can establish an identity that sets itself apart from the competition and sparks a connection with its audience and ultimately your customers.
Branding is what gives your business an identity and ultimately a reputation. Because of the importance of branding, businesses and organisations should build a strong brand right from the start which they can consistently maintain as they grow.
If you are still unsure on the benefits to having a great brand, take a look at the below….
Steps to branding
Who are you as a brand? If you don’t know then neither will your audience.
Everything starts from your keywords, create a collection of keywords that will define your brand and business. This will help shape your company voice and tone. This will also help as you grow your business in targeting customers and developing other marketing projects.
Once you have established your keywords it is time to work on the visual aspect of your brand. This all stems from those initial keywords. The first step is to look at the colours you would like within your brand. Colours can elicit specific emotions and affect us in many different ways as they have the ability to create specific moods. Colour sets the mood of brand expression. Emotions are powerful and have the ability to drive decision making. Brands want to cultivate strong emotional connections with their customers and this can’t be done with just a logo; colours are needed to cultivate these emotions.
When picking your brand colours there are a number of things to be considered. First, you need to think of your target audience. Who is your target audience, what do they care about, what mood do they need to be in to engage with your products and brand? What colour best anchors the meaning of your value proposition to your target market and distinguishes you from the competition?
| Colour | Colour Meaning | Affect Branding Colours can have on People |
| Red | Passion, excitement, love danger, and anger | Signifies importance and commands attention. Makes you feel passionate and energized |
| Orange | Playfulness, vitality, happiness, and friendliness | It is invigorating and evokes energy. Aggressive but balanced. Makes your feel energized and enthusiastic |
| Yellow | Happiness, youth, energetic, comforting and optimism | Makes you feel happy and spontaneous. Can be attention-grabbing or affordable. Associated with laughter, hope and sunshine |
| Green | Stability, health, wealth, prosperity, calming, relaxing and growth | Has a connection to nature. Makes you feel optimistic and refreshed. Depicts growth, security and inspires possibility |
| Light Blue | Tranquility, trust, openness, calmness, spirituality, and innocence | Has a calming effect. Makes you feel safe and relaxed |
| Dark Blue | Professionalism, security, and formality | It is mature and trustworthy. Too much can make you feel cold and disengaged |
| Purple | Royalty, mystery, creativity, and luxury | It is wise and imaginative. Makes you feel creative. Lighter shades are used to soothe or calm |
| Pink | Femininity, romance, sensitivity, tenderness, sweet, cute, charming, youth, and innocence | It ranges from modern to luxurious. Makes you feel playful and romantic |
| Brown | Rugged, aged, stability, support, warm, practical, dependable and earthy | Has an old-fashioned/vintage look or mood Makes you feel down to earth |
| White | Cleanliness, virtue, pure, health and simplicity | It can range from affordable to high-end. Means minimalism and simplicity |
| Gray | Subdued, classic, responsible, dependable, serious, mysterious, and mature | Stands for neutrality. Feels serious and professional |
| Black | Powerful, elegance, sophisticated, edgy, professionalism, simplicity, luxurious, and modern | Makes your feel sophisticated, classic and serious. Can also refer to mourning or sadness |
How important is a logo within your brand?
Time for a small quiz, how many of the below logos do you recognise?
How many did you get?
If you got more than one then this was helped due to recognising the brand. A logo must be instantly recognisable, accurately reflect something about your brand, help differentiate you from your competition, and sit comfortably within your marketplace.
Your logo is likely to be one of the first interactions people have with your company and it’s your opportunity to make a solid first impression, show you deliver a quality service, and visually express your purpose.
You can find out more about the importance of your logo in the guide to branding below.
Quick Guide to branding
Download our free Quick Guide to Branding to know where you need to start, how to develop it, and how to keep it consistent.
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