When starting a business, branding is your visual identity and crucial to how people see your business. Your branding not only has to look great, but it has to stand out, be strategic, and help your business tell its story.
Here, we’ve selected four branding tips that can help your creative business thrive, and build for the long term.
Before you design, lay your foundation
A lot of people love decorating or designing the interiors of their home; it’s the fun part of any build or construction project. But when it comes to building a house, we would never start with interior design. We all know there has to be a strong foundation to make a house stand for years to come. The same must be said for creating your brand and branding for your creative business. It’s easy to go out and start creating names, designing logos, and doing the fun part of branding. But if you don’t have your foundation, the branding might look amazing, but it won’t support your business the way it should.
So here are some important questions you should ask yourself about your creative business, that are crucial to understanding and knowing before you begin:
- How do you define you?
- What do you do or what service do you provide?
- Why are you different from others in your industry?
- What are the unique value proposition that you offer to clients, consumers, or customers?
Establishing these answers will only make your business stronger and provide that solid foundation you need. If you answer all four of these questions clearly, it’s very easy to develop logos, slogans, mission statements, or anything associated with branding for your business. That branding will then be backed by the foundational truth of your business.
Keep it simple
Once you know the foundational questions of your business, your branding should be built to strengthen and support at least one of those statements in a clear, eye-catching, and simple way.
We live in a world that is filled with information and content. Exposure is harder than ever, and people’s attention spans are getting shorter. If your branding doesn’t either stand out or explain what your business is in under 30 seconds, many people will overlook it or swipe through.
On the flip side, your branding — and particularly your logo — should be simple in design as well. Of course, there are successful brands with more complex and detailed branding, but if you can simplify, it can help with retention and make your brand more memorable to your clients.
Keep your branding simple, keep it clear, and construct it to support your foundation and identity as a business. That effort will pay off in the long run.
Build your branding for multiple platforms
When you’re just starting out and building a new creative business, it’s important to think about the long term. Part of that long term version is to develop branding and a main logo that works on multiple marketing or social media platforms. This is especially helpful for when you expand how you advertise and promote your business.
Your logo and branding can look beautiful, simple, and strengthen your creative business. But if it isn’t adaptable or doesn’t work on multiple marketing or social media platforms to help your business grow, you need to reconsider your design.
Think about SEO
SEO — or Search Engine Optimization — is normally not the first thing you think about when developing your branding. In today’s online world of business, it’s crucial for your brand to stand out when searched for on the internet. SEO addresses how easily findable your business is on a search engine like Google. You can opt to pay for an SEO expert who can help your domain or website rank high. With training and development, or simply through strategic branding and naming your business, you can master SEO.
It’s important, when developing your brand and domain name, to keep it unique, short, and to the point. You don’t want to be in an overcrowded domain space, or have a domain that takes too long to type out.
Try to keep it concise, and only have a few competing domains for your brand to go against. Keeping things short and sweet will help your brand stand out immediately online. You’ll also set yourself up for success.
Finalized your branding? Next, follow our steps to building a professional media kit.
Feature photo by Alejandro Morelos on Unsplash
