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Consistency in style is key when creating a brand that evokes trust and loyalty in consumers
As a business owner, you understand how important it is to be memorable, recognisable and remain at the forefront of your customers’ minds. Setting yourself apart from your competitors through your branding is one way to do that! Without that element of differentiation, they quite could easily flock to your competitors.
So, creating great branding is easy-peasy, right? Not quite.
There are some blurred lines around ‘branding’. It’s not something that can be lumped together quite that easily. We need to break it down and dig a little deeper.
When building your brand, there are 3 elements we need to think about:
The Brand: this is how people perceive your business.
The Branding/Visual Branding: these are the actions you take to create the image of your business.
The Brand identity: the whole collection of tangible brand elements that create one brand image.
In this blog, I want to explore Visual Branding because this is the bedrock of how your business appears to the outside world. Visual branding consists of design elements such as colours, materials, fonts, shapes, imagery and functionality. It’s what visually communicates a company’s values and personality. The aim of a good visual branding is to make that all-important connection between the brand and consumer through the colours, shapes, fonts and photography that are used throughout all of the company’s visual elements such as logo, website, business cards, social profiles, merchandise and more.
We all know the old adage ‘that first impressions last’ and it’s still as true today as it’s ever been. Potential customers see your visual branding before they see anything further of your business and if they like what they see, they will want to explore and learn more.
Similarly, existing customers like to feel comfortable. By having a streamlined and consistent visual identity gives them emotional reassurance that they are dealing with the right brand. If there is no correlation between your business card style, website design or consistency in social media icons, how can they be sure that they are dealing with the right business? Does the trust diminish?
Successful visual branding creates a memorable experience for the customer and visual branding is one of the most effective ways you can communicate with your customers.
Here at Electric Footprint, my visual branding is embedded in everything I do and in every piece of marketing material I produce. My footprint logo, my blue and white colour palette, my ‘Rachel Wicks’ avatars are visible in my business card, website, social media platforms and all resources I produce.
I’ve recently bitten the bullet and gone for a refresh in my imagery by having new headshots and work action shots taken, which still complements my visual branding but adds an air of authenticity in my day to day running of my business and the continued strength of my brand.
People’s thought process is based on what they see. If what they see is dis-jointed, childish or messy – that is how they will perceive your business to be. Your visual branding needs to mirror your business ethos, aims, brand promise, personality, and purpose.
As a small business, you can still learn a lot from the brand giants; your visual branding needs to be:
Attractive: people want to engage and be educated (Apple)
Consistent: makes people trust you and become loyal customers (Starbucks)
Unique: people choose you over your competitors because you are top of your game (Nike)
Memorable: people remember your visual branding and come back again (Amazon)
If you want to discover how to improve your visual branding, let’s book a free discovery call and streamline your online style in your socials.
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