Crafting Your Visual Brand
If you’ve ever prepared for a job interview or a sales presentation, then you know just how important a first impression is. Your appearance, how you carry yourself, and even something as minute as the strength in your handshake are all factors that can determine the trajectory and success of your interaction.
When it comes down to it, your first impression is all about putting your best foot forward and showing your audience through every means possible that you are the most qualified.
Not shockingly, the same can be said about your visual brand.
Your visual brand, more often than not, is a potential customer’s first impression of your company. Whether it be your logo on your social media profile or the colors and fonts you use across your website, your visual branding is what attracts and reels your ideal customer in to learn more about your business.
It’s that important - which is why you need to be strategic in crafting a visual identity that is relevant to your business and will engage your ideal audience specifically. Every small and intentional choice can make the biggest difference in how your audience perceives you and whether or not they believe you have the ability to make their problems into solutions.
Whether you’re just starting out or looking to refresh your branding, here are a couple tips on how to build and optimize your visual identity:
Building your font family As weird as it may sound, the font(s) you use across your website, advertisements, and more set a tone for your business. Certain fonts can evoke different emotions in the reader, convey different meanings from a message, and overall contributes to your brand personality - which means it can change how effective your messaging is to your audience. (If you still haven’t quite pinpointed how you want your brand to feel, check out our last blog post!)
The first step in identifying fonts that will suit your brand personality is breaking down the type of fonts you will need, such as for headers, subheaders, and copy. Check out the example below to see what we mean.
The next step is to start finding fonts that fit these categories. A great place to start is checking out font generators such as Fontjoy, where you can see your business name or random text shown in a variety of font combinations. You can also check out sites like Creative Market to see more unique types that you won’t find in your default fonts on your computer.
Once you have a good feel for what you like, start piecing it all together and identify the fonts you want to use consistently across your platforms.
Note: If your logo includes lettering, these fonts will likely play into it. Either way, make sure that both your logo and your chosen fonts tie well together and enhance what you are trying to communicate.
Crafting your brand colors Your brand colors are an essential part of building a consistent and reputable visual brand. Just like fonts, your choice of brand colors will shape how your audience perceives your business and will contribute to your overall brand personality.
Are you a kid’s toy company focused on sustainability? Your colors may include green with a few bright colors thrown in the mix to inspire an earthy, youthful tone.
Are you a freelance coding specialist? You may use colors (and images) that are associated with technical knowledge and reliability, such as grays, blues, and dark purples.
If this doesn’t feel as intuitive to you, consider making a mood board on Pinterest and start collecting color schemes and images that you feel represent your brand. (If you need further explanation on this, check out our video on how to create your brand’s mood board).
Once you’ve developed an understanding of what colors you want to use, you can use websites like Coolors to start playing around with colors you like and adding new ones into the mix to finalize your branding suite.
Keep in mind that you should have about 4 to 5 colors in your arsenal and they should be considered either an accent, dark, or light color. A light color is used primarily for backgrounds, a dark color for contrast, and accents for emphasis. Try checking out Colormind for more insight into what we mean.
Developing a consistent and meaningful visual brand may take a bit of time, but the results will be well-worth the time and (financial) investment.
If you want to learn more about how to strategically brand yourself and your business, stay tuned for next week’s blog where we talk about where you should be putting your branding and what social media platform is worth your time.