How to Develop a Brand Identity That’s All Your Own, by Grace Lau



There are a lot of brands out there. Difficult to say exactly how many but Nielsen lists over 500,000. There are actually likely to be a whole lot more than this.

With so many brands already in existence, surely it’s impossible to create a unique identity, i.e. a profile that another brand hasn’t already grabbed for itself. You’d think.

But actually, it’s perfectly possible to develop a brand identity that’s completely different from any other. Here’s how. 

Nielsen

Brand Identity – What’s This Mean?

Put simply, brand identity is what makes the brand immediately recognizable by the consumer. It can consist of a number of elements, for instance, logo design, color scheme, font, tagline, company mission, music used in advertising, and the affiliates that the brand works with. 

The identity thus delivered is a composite of all these different aspects, all of which create a unique pattern. Not only can the customer then immediately identify the brand but there is also the reassurance of authenticity built-in. For instance, a customer buying a bottle of Coke need only see the unique shape to be sure it’s the real thing. 

Free to use image sourced from Unsplash

When done well, brand identity makes an impression that will last beyond the customer-brand encounter.

Let’s see how you can go about getting that brand identity for yourself:

1. Settle on a Brand Personality

You may have all the personality you think you need. Let’s say your brand delivers VoIP and it makes it its business to deliver new clients with a virtual number in super-fast time. You might conclude that this delivery speed is all you need to set you apart. The trouble is, lots of others think the same thing. So, you need to work on other aspects. 

You need to hit on a unique personality type that will characterize the brand. It’s worth generating some keywords that neatly encapsulate what the brand is. If it were a person, for instance, would your brand be cool and chic or perhaps authoritative and even a touch stately?

It’s always worth having a look around at the kind of personalities adopted by your competitors. Can you build on an aspect they’ve used? Or have they left a big gap where your brand can establish a unique presence? 

Free to use image sourced from Unsplash

Another tip is to ask yourself questions like why did you start the company and introduce the brand? Are there values there that can be leveraged into a brand identity? Maybe you started your VoIP company because of the Aircall issues you and others were experiencing. Perhaps you can use this, by emphasizing what made you different in this regard.

2. Pinpoint your Audience

Free to use image sourced from Unsplash

Brand is not just about the company and the product. If it’s going to thrive, it needs to gain traction with a demographic. You need to identify that demographic and fine-tune the brand to appeal sweetly to it. 

Feedback surveys and focus groups can throw up a lot of useful information which can be incorporated into brand identity design. However, depending on the brand type and your ambitions for it, be wary of jumping on probably short-lived trends that get identified in your research. 

Sure, they might position you right in the middle of Happening City, but before long, trends move on and you’re stuck in Yesterday Ville. What looks red hot one minute will look decidedly pale as time passes. 

So, instead of getting all excited about momentary fashions, think about what are the underlying drives for these. Fashions are all about excitement, change, and being fresh. Perhaps you can do something with those concepts rather than hitting on a tune that’s big today but will be so small tomorrow. 

Something else to consider is when it’s time to rebrand. Customer bases change as societies and economies evolve, so be aware of the need to assess matters from time to time, and look to update or redesign your current logo and brand identity. 

3. Logo and Color

This is the aspect that will, if all goes according to plan, achieve recognition across demographics and territories, with no further explanatory text needed.

So, it’s got a tough job. It needs to sum up the brand identity, and in a fashion that stands out from all the others. 

How you do this will come down to a number of factors. But let’s start by looking at an example. If you click on small business VoIP by Dialpad, you’ll see that the logo consists of the company name, in a striking lower case font and in a strong shade of blue. 

small business VoIP by Dialpad
Small business VoIP by Dialpad

Where the logo designer really earned their fee though is the inverted commas they’ve inserted in front of the company name. They achieve the golden combination of being distinctive and descriptive. 

The business is all about spoken communication. OK, the business is actually about more than that, but spoken communication is a great starting point. 

Another key factor is that the logo’s color is repeated throughout the website. 

small business VoIP by Dialpad

So, you need to hit on a logo that’s eye-catching and that reflects your brand personality. Not only this, it needs to work across all the many media it will exist in and have impact regardless of size. With this in mind, it’s a good idea to try to think simple.

But remember: it has to be unique. 

100 Beautiful Colour Swatches and Combinations by Canva
https://imjustcreative.com/100-beautiful-colour-swatches/2021/11/15

Phew. Not easy to come up with overnight. Thankfully, there are logo designers who can help with this very task. You’ll need to be clear on exactly what you want in terms of those keywords that define the brand identity and who it is that you’re primarily targeting. 

The designer should be able then to come up with some alternatives for you to choose the one that works for you. Get other eyes on it too. And if you’re not great with color, make sure you bring in help with that too. We’re not all Van Gogh, after all. Thankfully. 

Free to use image sourced from Pixabay

It might be worth bearing in mind when you try to develop a color palette that different colors tend to be associated with different qualities. Blue’s calming. Green’s reliable (and, these days, environmental). Red’s exciting. 

4. Fix That Font

Free to use image sourced from Unsplash

So much of what we read is not just about what’s written. Size and style of font can determine whether we bother to read something in the first place, and will affect our interpretation of what’s written.

Brand identity is revealed in no small way by the font that’s been chosen by the business. You need to find a font that will work right the way through your activities, from being emblazoned on a billboard to featuring at the top of a sample agent agreement

It’s the received wisdom that simplicity works best. If you’re designing your own font, think about impact and readability. Consumers tend not to favor too much fussiness in a font.

coca cola bottle-history-1899-1900-1915-1916-1957
History of the Coca-Cola Bottle

However, let’s look at the Coca-Cola design once again. In a way, the font shouldn’t work.

It’s quite extravagant and complicated, with its flourishes and ribbon curls.

Coca-Cola Chrome Logo - Famous Logos in Neon Chrome Designed by Martin Naumanna
Coca-Cola Chrome Logo – Famous Logos in Neon Chrome Designed by Martin Naumanna

But it does work.

It speaks of enjoyment and authenticity and is absolutely unique. 

So, what can we learn from this?

One factor we should bear in mind is that Coca-Cola came up with its font in a less crowded brand environment than that which exists today, as far back as 1890. So they perhaps didn’t have to work so hard with it to gain traction. 

Vintage-1890-coca-cola-red-logo-design
Vintage 1890 Coca-Cola Logo Design

This aside, the big lesson to learn is that there are no hard and fast rules with fonts. It may be best to adopt a suck-it-and-see approach.

Try a few different alternatives on your focus groups and see which seems to work best. Sometimes you can only learn from a completed product, just like with post-mortem meetings.

You can certainly experiment with mixing fonts, but don’t overdo it. A mix of two might work wonders. Any more and it might look like you’ve forgotten which one to use. 

Image sourced from catalyst.concentrix.com

5. See it Through

Once you have your brand identity established, you need to make sure it gets used everywhere your brand appears. Make sure that the color scheme in particular is adhered to on your website and in your packaging. 

Sifter Letterpress Business Cards and Logo designed The Logo SMith
Sifterapp Letterpress Business Cards Designed by Smithographic

Take a look at your business cards: do they chime in well with the brand identity? Send yourself an email. Do the template and signature adhere to brand identity guidelines? Conduct an audit of your associates. When you’re creating affiliate links are they with suitable kinds of people?

On the subject of guidelines, make sure that you issue a clear and definitive brand document that tells all employees what’s expected from them in terms of anything they design or any comms they put out.

SuperblyCo Guidelines

Everybody has to fall in line. If just one person refuses to comply you can end up with a pretty messy identity. 

Sure, you might encounter the odd maverick in the organization who likes to tread their own path. Sometimes this individuality is welcome in terms of creativity.

However, they’re going to have to get with the program, or perhaps they’d prefer to leave and start their own brand. This option’s always available. You need buy-in, so don’t be afraid to insist.

Conclusion

So, you’ve spent a lot of time and possibly money on getting that identity absolutely right. 

You’ll be wanting to see how widely used it is, in order to get an idea of how worthwhile the whole project was. One way of doing this is to take a look at market penetration. In order to do this, you can seek to monitor your brand’s media impact. Keep an eye on how it performs. It may be the case that a little tweaking here and there will help. 

Try to avoid too much meddling though. The best identities succeed because they are consistent and stand for something solid and meaningful. Do what you can to give your identity these qualities and you’ll be on your way. 


Guest Post byGrace Lau – Director of Growth Content, Dialpad

Grace Lau, Director of Growth Content at Dialpad.

Grace Lau is the Director of Growth Content at Dialpad.

Dialpad is an AI-powered cloud communication platform for better and easier team collaboration as well as proactive customer care. Grace has over 10 years of experience in content writing and strategy. Currently, Grace is responsible for leading branded and editorial content strategies, partnering with SEO and Ops teams to build and nurture content. She has also written for domains such as Leadfeeder and Agency Vista. proactive customer service.