Frequently Asked Questions
What is a brand, and what is branding?
Your brand is how people perceive you – not just in a marketing sense, but in a total sense. It’s what people think and feel when they see your business, and is influenced by every experience people have with you. From customer service, to purchasing experiences, to social media posts, every action taken by your company is connected back to your brand and contributes to it.
Branding (or a brand/visual identity) is then the visual representation of your brand and makes up the elements people see in marketing – logos, colours, typefaces, and a brand voice. This identity plays a central role in shaping the perception of your brand, allowing you to define the experience you convey to customers. It enables your company to control how you tell your story, instead of others telling the story for you.
Being consistent in using this brand identity then creates a unified persona for audiences to engage with and get to know. And by giving a foundation for consistency across all marketing (from graphic design, to copywriting, to photography, to videography), this drives the perception of the brand in general.
A brand identity, then, is how you communicate the story and the values of your brand visually. It takes the DNA of your company, and consistently communicates it to the world. It’s a crucial part of the overall brand, but not the entire thing. The overall brand is influenced by more than just the visual identity, touching every interaction a company can have (from staff training, to events, to customer support, to internal communications).
Why is branding important?
Quality branding brings some incredible advantages, and we wanted to highlight some of the most important.
Firstly, it elevates your image and changes how people perceive you for the better. Thoughtful, considered branding adds credibility, legitimacy, and trustworthiness to a business because people can sense the care that has been put into how that brand presents itself.
This also means that great branding is your chance at the best possible first impression. People make many assumptions about a business on appearance alone, and investing time and effort into branding is something customers will notice, and it will inspire trust and confidence from the very first interaction.
A brand identity, then, is how you communicate the story and the values of your brand visually. It takes the DNA of your company, and consistently communicates it to the world. It’s a crucial part of the overall brand, but not the entire thing. The overall brand is influenced by more than just the visual identity, touching every interaction a company can have (from staff training, to events, to customer support, to internal communications).
The more effort you put into how you present yourself, the better the assumptions people will make.
Secondly, branding enables clear and consistent communication every time your business speaks. It allows every piece of marketing to be recognisable and on-message, and this helps people to remember you. A consistent voice and message brings clarity to what you do, and helps people understand what you can offer them. Inconsistency brings confusion, which puts people off from wanting to engage with you.
Importantly, this consistency also enables better relationships with audiences. By creating a single, unified identity through branding, customers will start to feel like they know your company. If you communicate consistently, it’s so much easier for customers to have a connection with you because there is a single ‘personality’ for them to build a relationship with.
These relationships are then what drive customer loyalty. And once you establish those relationships, people trust you, listen to you, and keep coming back for more.
So, in summary, branding means better first impressions, more memorable marketing, and deeper connections with people. Therefore, investing in branding is crucial to long-term growth. It gets customers through the door, and keeps them there.
What are the key elements in a brand identity?
Generally, there are 4 key elements to a brand identity – a logo, colour palette, typeface(s), and brand voice. Each of these elements should be carefully matched to give cohesive branding. There is often a misconception that a logo is the brand identity, but the reality is it’s only part of it.
In terms of how to make these elements match, this all comes down to making sure they all pull in the same direction. In our own process, we first work to thoroughly understand the story, values, culture, and vision of a brand, then create an identity where each of the visual elements is inspired by that background.
Giving every part of an identity purpose and a common root enables cohesive branding with depth and substance. By choosing elements that complement each other, it ensures branding that works and that lasts, and also that makes sense.
When there is clarity and direction to a brand identity, it engages people and makes them listen. A lack of clarity and cohesion, on the other hand, leads to confusion and branding that doesn’t entice people.
How do I make a brand identity? How do I create a brand?
The key part in establishing a brand identity is defining the visual elements within your branding – a logo, colour palette, typeface(s), and brand voice. Each of these elements should be carefully created and matched to give a cohesive brand image.
But to get this cohesion, before you create these elements you should understand the story you are trying to tell, and the brand experience you are trying to communicate. No part of a brand identity should be chosen simply because it ‘looks nice’ or ‘feels good’. There must be purpose behind every choice.
So, understand the story, values, culture, and vision of your brand, then create a brand identity that is inspired by this background. Every part of the identity should pull in the same direction and share a common inspiration.
Once the core brand identity is established, you then need to build discipline around how that identity is used in every piece of communication that comes from your brand.
This is achieved in a brand guideline, or brand manual, that explains how your business should be represented in marketing and any communication materials. A good brand guideline will clearly lay out your visual identity and your tone of voice, so that anyone working on behalf of your brand can maintain consistency across all marketing (from graphic design, to copywriting, to photography, to videography).
By consistently executing on a brand guideline, your business can establish a unique and recognisable ‘personality’, and a brand image that people know and understand.
Learn more in our article on creating a brand identity.
Is a logo a brand?
In short, no – a logo alone does not create a brand. A logo is just part of a brand identity, and a brand identity is part of a brand.
A brand is everything that someone thinks and feels when they interact with a business. It is influenced not just by marketing, but by every interaction people have with that company.
A brand identity is then the visual representation of that brand, conveyed through a careful choice of logo, colour, and typeface(s).
Simply having a good logo is not enough to create good branding. Instead, that logo needs to be cohesively designed along with the colours, fonts, and voice that a brand uses.
Effective and impactful branding is holistic, and tells a consistent story in all of its visual elements.
What is the difference between marketing and branding?
Branding is the foundation to marketing. Establishing a clear brand identity defines how every piece of marketing should look and sound.
Essentially, branding sets out the story a company wants to tell and the rules around how it communicates, and then marketing is used to deliver this message consistently. Marketing is the vessel which brings a brand experience into the world.
How and where should I be marketing my business?
This depends on your business type and your goals, which will define your marketing strategy.
Well, to an extent. For almost any business, a website or a landing page is a necessity. To increase organic (i.e. unpaid) traffic to that website, that site should also be Search Engine Optimised (more on that later…). A website is crucial for clearly communicating your business and your goals, pushing traffic down your sales/conversion funnel, and providing that all-important first impression to many of your site visitors.
A clear social media presence is also critical, as a place for people to engage with your brand and keep up to date with your offering. Properly managed social media channels can massively increase awareness and consideration in your brand, and push people further down the sales funnel, with zero advertising budget. It also offers numerous ways to target a specific audience, to ensure you are speaking to people who are likely to be interested in what you have to say.
Beyond this, marketing needs generally vary. From explainer videos, to printed brochures, to email campaigns, other communication pieces and their priority depends on your industry and your aims.
What’s the difference between content marketing and advertising?
Advertising is trying to sell to customers something directly, with a call-to-action attached, whereas content marketing is trying to help customers, answer questions, and develop brand loyalty as a means of generating revenue.
Content marketing is a way of tying customers to your brand, and getting them to buy into your company consistently by becoming a reliable source of information and product that customers want to return to. This can form a crucial part of a brand/marketing strategy.