What is our Branding Process?

Branding is what people say about you when you’re not in the room.

In a past blog, I explained the difference between Branding, Identity and Logos. Understanding  branding is important when you are trying to develop yourself in the marketplace. Knowing the difference between Identity and branding is what sets you apart. Customizing a logo that depicts your identity and brand is what makes you shine. To read the article click here.

Know that when you begin to set out on your journey to brand yourself there is a process you should follow. Like in life, there are many different ways to approach this. This blog is intended to help guide you on proven ways we have found to be helpful.

First, let’s review our steps:

1. The Creative Brief
2. The Branding Process
3. Creating Your Identity
4. The Logo Design

The Creative Brief

This step is one of the most important steps in the entire process. This is where we ask tons of questions and get a solid idea for what you expect from you goals. Then we go through the discovery process and find out  more about your organization from the inside out. We ask specific questions that help us determine the direction of your project. Then we use what we found to review with you. At that point, we determine our plan of action and describe the scope of the project with an outline, we determine deliverables and timelines, then we begin working on executing our plans.

Check out our Creative Brief Form Here

The Branding Process Explained

Before I talk about The Branding Process, let’s define what Branding is exactly. Branding is the process of naming, designing or other feature that distinguishes one business from those of others.

Branding is:

• Your Mission
• What Sets You Apart
• The Personality of Your Business
• Your Story
• The Emotion Your Business Evokes
• Your Core Values

Branding is NOT:

• Your Logo
• Your Tagline
• Your Slogan
• Your Icon
• Your Product or Service

During The Branding Process it is a good idea to start with an inspiration board full of images, colors, fonts, etc. that a group can look at. From this session you will begin to get the perception that the brand is leaning towards. This will help in your design and concepts for the full branding effort. Next, we create a selection of fonts and logo variations for review. Once you determine what the best set is, we complete the The Branding Process by creating a Style Guide for use on all collateral related to the brand. Finally, we begin to carry out the designs in collateral, on social media, and interactive designs.

The Branding Process Step-by-Step

Brand Mapping – Benefits: Gives business its sense of purpose.

1. Brand Audit – Understand existing customer perceptions
2. Brand Position – Create a place in hearts and minds of relevant potential customers
3. Brand essence – Describes your core values as they relate to the brand

Brand Implementation – Benefits: Determines what sets the company apart from others.

1. Brand Elements – Visual and verbal components of what identify the brand
2. Brand Marketing – Utilizing marketing activities to build positive brand associations
3. Brand Communication – Setting the tone to inform, persuade and remind customers about the brand

Brand Training – Benefits: Gives purposeful direction to the employees and staff

1. Corporate Training – Provides conceptual brand training and guidelines usage
2. Internal Branding – Aligns employees and staff with brand and what it personifies

Creating Your Identity

Once you’ve determined your branding strategy, it is important to create your identity. Are you fun and quirky, or are you more serious and to-the-point? Do you want a fun script font or something more sans serif? Do you want your graphics to speak to a creative mind or something more toned-down? Establishing your Identity as a brand really hits home about your brand’s persona. Building your persona = creating your identity. Plain and simple.

Design that Logo!

The logo design process is the fun part. We take what we’ve found in discovery, direction we’ve reviewed from our branding efforts and give it a personality we came up during our Identity process. Here, we begin with sketches of what your logo could look like and develop concepts. Next, we review with you our concepts and get feedback. Then, back to the drawing board to wrap up design and execute final files. We create your logo branding in every version you’d need and deliver the goods. Easy peasy.