What is a Brand Guide.

And why you need one

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And why you need one 〰️

A brand guide is a document that outlines a business’s visual identity, along with rules and guidelines for communicating with your community and potential leads. For example, brand guides set rules for official logo usage, font type and colour, typography, tone, and the brand’s mission statement, positioning, identity, and values. You can use a brand guide internally or in collaboration with vendors or partners to ensure the proper representation of the brand’s image across every channel and all marketing materials.

Here’s an overview of what you need in your Brand Guide.

What is the purpose of a Brand Guide?

A Brand Guide helps to maintain brand consistency. The most crucial purpose of a brand guide is to keep the brand image consistent for the public. For example, the brand guide can ensure that your logo is the same shape across all marketing materials and stays within your brand’s particular colour palette. Brand consistency is vital for your company to build instant brand recognition and enhance brand loyalty—a dedicated consumer base that will advocate for your brand.

It ensures brand quality. Most brand guidelines include best practices and things to avoid. For example, your brand book can ban the use of drop shadows or high-contrast colours behind the logo. These guidelines ensure that your brand’s communication (whether a marketing email, direct mail, business cards or social posts) will look polished and professional.

It encourages deliberate decisions. Constant rebranding can negatively impact a company’s ability to build and maintain a dedicated customer base. By implementing a guide, you can narrow your brand design to a particular look and feel. You’ll need to carefully consider any changes you want to make, encouraging you to make deliberate and informed decisions whenever you redesign your brand identity.

What to include in your Brand Guide.

Mission and values: Most organizations include their mission and core values as brand guides. Including this statement introduces new readers to the brand story and helps reflect your mission in the design choices outlined in the guide.

Logos: You’ll need to include your company logo in the brand guide, but it’s unnecessary to include every iteration. Most companies have a few different logo variations, depending on the situation. For instance, a large and detailed logo for bigger treatments (think billboards or full-spread ads), a smaller logo for minor treatments (smaller ads or documents), and a tiny logo for special situations (like digital apps). Include spacing and alignment requirements in your brand guide. In addition to your brand assets, including a few best practices for your logo treatment can help designers understand how to make all of your brand’s communications readable and professional.

Colour Palette: Every brand should have a small set of colours they use when developing a visual treatment. When including the colour scheme in your brand book, list the hex codes, RGB numbers, CMYK details, or Pantone names to ensure they’re easy to find. It’s also a good idea to break the colours into specific palettes. For instance, the brand guide can dictate the use of primary colours across all materials and secondary colours as accents.

Typefaces: Many brand guides will include a list of font styles and families that the brand uses, including helpful style guidelines, like the ideal sizing and spacing. Laying out your typography removes the guesswork for designers, ensuring that all your communications look consistent and clean.

Iconography: Does your company use specific doodles that match the brand’s tone, or are there particular types of photography that you prefer? Include a section in your brand guidelines on imagery; what to use and avoid to ensure that all of your graphic designers’ images feel consistent and on-brand.

Tone: When making your brand guide, including the tone of your organization’s visual identity and copy. Ensure the brand guide’s design matches your company’s visual tone for visual tone. For example, if you’re a whimsical e-commerce company, design the brand guide with visuals that match your identity. For brand voice, define your ideal messaging tone in a few words (Is your brand friendly? Scientific? Humorous?). Include examples of communications that you think perfectly match your desired tone.

Inspiring Design is a Branding and Web Design business, supporting Small businesses since 2016. As a Branding and Web Design service, you can receive one-on-one support on how to create and implement your branding and marketing across your chosen sales channels,

Book a consultation with us today to discuss your Branding needs, and get support to design your Branding, complete with a Tailored Brand Guide.

or you can Download our Brand Guideline Template today to use as you please.

Written by: Natasha Tahiwi || Published by Inspiring Design & Co.