How to Create a Strong Brand Identity
Experienced web designers with a steady client base carefully curate their brand identity to reflect their target audience, scope of work, and unique approach to design. The most successful web designers have a thoughtful, well-designed brand that’s unique to their style and services offered.
What is brand identity?
Brand identity is based on what a business is and how it’s perceived. It's the combination of brand, branding efforts, and customer experience. Brand identity has a tangible effect on your business’ bottom line.
Brand vs. branding
Brand and branding are two distinct terms that are often used interchangeably but have two different meanings. Brand is the way customers perceive a business. It’s influenced by a customer’s experience with products or services and the business’ branding efforts, such as its website, advertising, and social media presence. Branding refers to the work that businesses do to shape their brand.
Why brand identity matters
Brand identity influences whether or not a client wants to do business with you. If a brand identity resonates with someone, they default to thinking positively about you. Conversely, if a client doesn't resonate with your brand identity, they may take their business elsewhere.
The halo effect
A strong brand identity can produce a halo effect. This term is used when one positive engagement with a client makes the client look favorably on a brand as a whole. Web designers can create a halo effect with fast response times, quality projects, and client engagement.
The horn effect
This is the opposite of the halo effect. It’s when a negative interaction suddenly tarnishes a brand’s other products and services. Even a negative social interaction between an employee and a client can have a significant impact on your brand.
Honing your brand identity
Before embarking on any branding efforts, it’s helpful to understand who your brand is. Doing so will give people a consistent experience with your brand, increasing credibility and trust.
Brand Purpose
Mission
Every business exists for a reason. When it was founded, what was its purpose and how will you fulfill it? The answer to these questions will form the pillars that shape your brand’s mission, yielding a set of values to steer a brand towards halos instead of horns.
Positioning
Brand positioning is the part of the market and mindshare your brand targets. To effectively position your brand, understand your competition and why your offering stands out. If the market looks like it no longer needs your brand, how can you pivot without losing trust?
Values
Brand values should guide every decision that a business makes. When defining your brand values, consider what actions your business can take to better the world your target audience engages with.
Voice
Brand voice is the way you communicate with your clients. This extends into product descriptions on your website, email campaigns, and personal interactions with clients. Choose the right words and make sure how you convey your message aligns with your brand image.
Brand identity exercises
The following exercises on how to build a brand identity can help you get to the core of the brand’s story and position.
Tell the origin story
Go back to the beginning and think about why you started your business in the first place. Think about the vision that inspired you to found a business. What did it mean for clients? What would it do for the world? What did it mean to you to bring your business into the world?
Brand crossroads
The values of your business are your center. Making decisions rooted in these values earns the admiration of your key audience. To define these values, think about key decisions that made your brand what it is. These could range from types of industries you serve to your communication practices, philanthropic donations, and other decisions that speak to your brand. Use these decisions to generate three to five adjectives that describe your brand. These can be used to quickly weigh whether or not a decision is in line with a brand’s values.
Know your strengths
Knowing your differentiators will give you an edge in your market. Do you offer a niche service? Do you work with groups or industries that require special knowledge? What sets you apart will be the cornerstone of your brand’s identity.
Start at the end
Think about how you want your ideal client to describe your brand. Imagine the thoughts that cross their minds when they see your website. Starting at the desired outcome can help a brand know how it can close the gap between who it is and who it wants to be.
Design
The content and visuals of brand collateral should be manifestations of a brand’s identity. Check out these considerations for creating content that aligns with your brand identity.
Key collateral
Logo
This is your brand identity, distilled into one symbol. It should embody your brand’s values and be simple and memorable. Stay away from trendy imagery and create something timeless and unique to you.
Website
A website should convey every aspect of a brand’s identity. Consider both the appearance of the website and the way the design makes your client feel. Is it intuitive to navigate? Is it clear what services you offer? As web designers, you’re pros at this, and it’s something you can offer to clients.
Content
Typography
You can use typography to have a positive influence on your client before they even begin reading the text. When they see a page, font choice and layout can make an impression before anything else.
Information Architecture
The way you structure information on a page will either help people accomplish what they’re trying to do or drive them to another site. While there are some universal principles of information architecture, much will depend on who’s visiting your site.
Visuals
Color
Color can help unify your page and create a sense of cognitive and emotional consistency. Choose up to four colors within your logo’s palette. Generally, try to use a lighter shade for background, a darker shade for text, a neutral shade to add depth, and something that contrasts to grab attention. When choosing colors, think about what you want your client to feel when they think of your brand.
Shapes/Graphics
When you consider the clients’ emotional reaction to your brand, it’s hard to ignore the power of graphics and shapes. Because photography, graphics, and illustrations elicit emotional reactions, choose images that represent your brand.
Style Guide
As you’re making design decisions, document the reasoning behind them. Create a style guide to help your clients or employees carry this identity through in updates or future assets.
Managing your brand identity on Squarespace
Brand identity has a continuous lifecycle and exists on many channels. Let’s discuss how Squarespace streamlines production and keeps everything in one place.
Web Design
Templates
When you build yours or your client’s website, you have over 100 templates to choose from. Beginning with Squarespace 7.1, each design supports every feature and style, so you can try a variety of layouts without switching templates. You can quickly layout a site out to see how the content and visuals work together.
Read more about Squarespace 7.1.
Imagery
Adding images is simple and fast with Squarespace’s built-in tools. Squarespace strives to make every aspect of it’s platform accessible to designers, so you don’t need to be an expert in image editing software or crop an image outside of Squarespace—you can use the built-in editor. You can also license Getty Images for just $10 an image, or add free stock photography to your site via Squarespace’s partnership with Unsplash.
Email Campaigns
Finding the tools to gather emails, deploy campaigns, track results, and optimize performance can be overwhelming. With Email Campaigns, you have everything you need to launch a successful and customized campaign, right within your Squarespace site. Customizable layouts can spark curiosity in your clients and potentially entice them to seek more information.
Social
Squarespace helps you integrate social media into your site with social sharing. This includes pulling social content onto your site, pushing site content onto social platforms, and making it easy for clients to share your content.
Conclusion
Brand identity is essential to your business’ success. It takes an ongoing effort to maintain that identity, especially as client touchpoints increase.
Squarespace’s suite of tools will give you the competitive edge you need to create and manage an effective brand identity. Whether you’re creating your own brand identity or helping your clients establish theirs, your Squarespace toolkit is there to set you both up for success.
Want more?
Check out Squarespace Circle, Squarespace’s program for professional designers. Along with exclusive content, discounts, and other perks, Circle brings professionals together from all across the globe to exchange advice while connecting with new clients and collaborators.
