At the risk of sounding cliché, it’s a new year and new you, but while many are tasking themselves with personal goals and objectives, they are also taking a deep dive into their professional ones. Well the same is true for brands; a new year means a new opportunity to take a fresh look at your brand standards – from typeface to tone to the tools leveraged to tell your story.
A Brand Standards Guide is the keeper of all things your brand. It puts rules in place – not to limit creativity but rather to keep a brand identity consistent and recognizable so that consumers make a connection between the logo, the product and the brand promise. Beyond being a set of rules, a Brand Standards Guide is a tool that is used by designers, copywriters and anyone else who uses the various elements of a brand to create collateral that tells a succinct and cohesive story.
So what’s in Brand Standards Guide, you ask? There are a few key elements that must be included:
Color Palette: primary, secondary and any complementary colors
Typography: the one or two typefaces that showcase the look and feel of your brand
Tone: the voice of your brand whether it’s more corporate, or whimsical; does it use all caps or lowercase
Various Uses: appropriate orientation whether it is horizontal or vertical and if any accompanying taglines or elements should be included along with it
So if we’ve got your wheels turning and your creative juices flowing, it may be time to reevaluate your brand standards to make sure your brand is, as they say, on brand. If you need help figuring it out, the PCIOIpowerhouse will help power up your brand. By the way, Happy {Brand} New Year!
