How To Create a Brand Identity

Why is brand identity so important?

As the embodiment of almost everything your business is and does, a brand identity can inspire customers and increase a sense of loyalty for your brand. Your brand is more than just its logo. It's the personality of your business and your promise to your customers.

"One of the most important things to consider when building a brand identity is how your messaging will resonate with your target audience." - James Zabik

A brand identity is made up of what your brand says, what your values are, how you communicate your product, and what you want people to feel when they interact with your company. Ultimately, your product leaves an impression on your customers long after you've made the sale. Brand identity is the process of shaping that impression.

5 Steps to Creating Your Brand Identity

1. Market Research

There are 5 steps to completing marketing research. The first is to know your audience. It is imperative to learn what your audience wants from your business and who will benefit the most from your product. The next is to learn your value proposition and who your competition is. You must learn what makes your business unique and what can you offer that others can't. Every great business has a clear mission statement that describes your vision and its goals. Many people take this for granted but, the personality of your business matters. Using certain colors, fonts, and imagery will help to easily identify your business. Then enhance that vision with your tone of voice. Do you want to portray your business as one with a lot of swag, classy, or ritzy and glamourous? The last step you want to complete in your marketing research is a SWOT Analysis. We all know it and we all hate it but, it is very beneficial to better understand your brand. This analysis will help you find the characteristics of the brand that you want, and need, to portray. SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats and help aid you in identifying these key factors when positioning your business for success.

2. Design a Logo and Template

As mentioned earlier, your logo is not the end all be all to your brand identity but, it is a vital element in the process as it is the most recognizable part of your brand. We all can identify certain brands by their logos, even if there are no words to identify them by. For instance, take the infamous Nike swoosh. Whether it stands alone or is accompanied by their famous slogan, "Just do it," we can readily recognize the logo if spotted anywhere. That is the goal when brainstorming the ideas for your logo. Something clean, universal, and recognizable to all.

COLOR & TYPE

Having a recognizable color palette is also a way to enhance your identity. Take for example, here at Social Misfits, our palette scheme is green, black, and white, These colors make us easily identifiable online and allows us to stand out amongst the crowd.

TEMPLATES

Templates allow for cohesion when sending out letters, typing up emails, and handing out business cards to new potential clients. Having that cohesiveness throughout each method of communication allows for a clean flow from one realm to the next and gives a more professional feeling to those viewing your business cards, emails, letters, or website. Consistency is key in creating a harmonious brand identity.

3. Connect & Embrace Social Media

In the world of today, it is important to be able to utilize social media. Whether it is Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, or Twitter, social media has quickly become the best place for marketing and advertising. We'll get into how to market your brand on social media later, but for now... We'll give you some basics.

SPEAK GEEK

There is a fine line between meshing the brand's personality and the personality we have to integrate into our social media accounts. For more serious brands and businesses they find it hard to be both the funny and educational personality that most social media viewers long for while maintaining the seriousness of the brand itself. Although the line is fine, it CAN be done. It is imperative to learn the language the matches the brand of your personality. Here at Social Misfits, we dare to be different. So, our brand allows us the room to break the rigidness and social conformities of what "professional" is supposed to be. It's literally in our name!

CONNECTION

Find a way to create a story that connects with your audiences and consumers. If the people can identify with the company and its story, they are more compelled to use you as a resource because they feel connected to the company.

ADVERTISING

Whether traditionally or digitally, this is the most efficient way of introducing your brand to the world. Now, don't get me wrong, we love a good word-of-mouth advertising, but it doesn't reach the millions of lives that you can touch and help. It's okay to start that way, but as your business grows and your desire to expand your business grows, so should your advertising methods and we're here to help you with that!

4. Do's & Don'ts To Brand Identity

We know, we've given you a lot of material in this first blog. Trust us, it gets slightly easier from here. Creating your brand can be both fun and exciting but it can also be overwhelming and daunting as well. Once you follow all the steps to create a strong brand identity, make sure you're not guilty of bad habits that could put all your hard work in jeopardy.

DON'T CONFUSE YOUR CUSTOMERS

The quickest way to lose your customer base is to confuse them. Your consumers like stability and that is something that is needed for them to creating lifelong relationships with you. Your business relationships and partnerships are just like romantic ones. When that man or woman changes too much to the point where they are unrecognizable, we leave. The same rules apply for your customers or fans if you're in entertainment. The rule of thumb when communicating with potential and existing customer. Keep everything concise and know that just because it makes sense to you, doesn't mean it makes sense to your customers. Ensure that the visual matches with your messaging at all times and know what you want to say and articulate it in a way that's universally understandable.

WHATEVER YOU DO, DO NOT COPY THE COMPETITION

We know it's tempting! You may see and ad on tv or a concept on Instagram and think that what was done is some of the most ingenious work you've seen in a long time. Do not and I repeat, DO NOT, copy it. You may use it for inspiration to come up with something bigger and better but, do not be a copy cat. Think back to when you were in school and your arch nemesis took credit for your idea and presented it to the teacher and got all the praise, You remember how that made you feel? Alright then, let's make the vow, right now, not to do that to others. Repeat after me... "I will not be a copy cat!" We know that it's enticing to take ideas, especially when it's from a company selling the same products who already has some skin in the game because you know what they're doing works, but don't steal it.

SCALE, DON'T SACRIFICE

It is so easy to lose yourself and the initial goals, personality, values, and mission of the brand once you begin to grow. We see it as consumers every day how our favorite small businesses begin to grow and they are no longer the same. The quality goes down and a lot of times, it seems as they don't have the same time, patience, or care that they once did. Whatever you do, please resist the urge to conform to what's trendy. Trends fades, what we want to create is a brand DNA that can stand the test of time.

5. MONITOR & MAINTAIN YOUR BRAND IDENTITY

Don't panic. Since you are first starting out, the first thing that you come up with for your brand identity will not be the final thing that you settle on. Take identifying your brand and vision seriously but, know that change is inevitable. The goal in the beginning is to be able to come up with something that can be elevated in the future. To know if you're headed in the right direction, you have to monitor key performance metrics and there are many ways to do so. You can use Google Analytics, which will provide you with information on searchability of your brand, interactions, etc. on Google. You may also use surveys and social media analytics as well. While monitoring, you will be able to identify what works for you company and what doesn't. Simply put, you test, learn, and modify.

"In a world of social clones, dare to be different.

Be a social misfit."

-Carli Rae'