Branding is a word commonly referred to by advertisers and marketeers, but what does it actually mean?
Well, quite a lot as it turns out. As a business your brand is your most powerful tool, it's your identity, a representation of who you are and how you connect with your customers. Branding in Business goes way beyond just a logo, it’s your business culture and something which is reflected across all touchpoints - how you communicate with your customers, how you speak online and even the colours and symbols you use in your brand architecture - your logo.
The use of colour and design are a crucial part of creating an effective and cohesive brand identity. It allows you to showcase meaning and message without the use of words and once established it can also offer instantaneous recognition for your customers, with the potential for driving brand loyalty.
The struggles businesses can go through in logo redesign
Whilst we all want an eye-catching logo that sticks in people’s minds, becoming a fondly identifiable feature of the brand, it’s not uncommon for businesses to ‘try too hard’ with their logo design, making it too ostentatious that it results in negative brand connotations being conveyed.
As we will come on to in the next section of our complete guide to company branding through use of colours and symbols, the most effective of logos are simple and subtle yet speak a thousand words, well maybe not a thousand but you catch our drift.
For example, throwing in a ‘swoosh’ for good measures, may over ‘clutter’ the logo, confusing the message and generating a ‘messy’ look. For some brands the ‘swoosh’ in an inherent feature of their logo/branding, Nike’s proactive-looking black swoosh immediately springs to mind, denoting the message that if you wear Nike, you’ll be ‘going places’ – fast!
If you are intent on using a ‘swoosh’ ensure it brings something to the message of the logo and the brand itself and isn’t just there in an attempt to make the logo look trendy.
Avoid logo trends
Logos, like practically everything else for that matter, goes through trends and it is easy for businesses redesigning or perhaps designing a logo for the first time, to get caught up in the latest design gimmick.
The best logos are timeless, unique and void of gimmicks, after all the aim is for your logo to be with your brand for a very long time, so why get caught up in colour and symbol trends and fluctuations?
What great brands do
Take a look at these examples of how great brands use symbols, colour and design to elevate their identity.
The FedEx brand identity is modest, yet instantly recognisable, using bright, bold colours. Take a closer look at the white space between the ‘E’ and the ‘x’ and you’ll see a white arrow pointing to the right, signifying a forward motion, moving forward - which is exactly the essence of this business.
This simple logo tells us so much about the business, without over complicating or turning to wordy explanations. The arrow points from A to Z - signifying that their business sells everything from A to Z. The arrow is also a smile, evoking emotions and meaning to the company, this is a fun, friendly and helpful business.
Consistency
When it comes to branding, consistency is key and the best brands never waver on conveying a consistent branding image and consequently a consistent message. For example, have you ever known the brands mentioned above – Amazon and FedEx – changing their logo, the colours associated with their brand and the symbols they use? If they were to change such features, much of the trust, credibility and familiarity built up with these brands over the years would be lost.
The science behind the brand
The use of colour and symbols can dramatically impact the effectiveness of your brand identity. Research suggests that 60% of the time people will decide if they are attracted or not to a message based on the colour alone, and the use of this colour can increase your brand recognition by up to 80%.*
Studies have shown that colour can in fact manipulate the emotional connections for the consumer with colours associated with certain feelings and sentiments.
The image above shows an example of the emotional connections in colour.
Trust: blue (34%), white (21%) green (11%)
Cheapness: orange (26%), yellow (22%) brown (13%)
High quality: black (43%), blue (20%)
Fear: red (41%) black (38%)
Fun: orange (28%), yellow (26%) purple (17%)
Faber Birren, colour research and author of ‘Colour Psychology and Therapy’ discovered a correlation between colour and the nervous system - with red acting as stimulant and blue a relaxant. Birren also noticed a link with the use of colour and the passage of time. He concluded that bright colours promote physical activity, but make time seem slower. Whilst cooler and softer colours are better for mental activity, and make the time seem to fly by.
As well as incorporating a specific colour to resonate a certain feeling or emotion when people associate with a brand, it is important a brand has a consistent colour scheme behind their image, because, as mentioned above, consistency is a key feature of the science behind branding.
For example, Facebook’s founder Mark Zuckerberg claims he chose blue as the colour of Facebook because he is red-green colour blind. Whilst this might be true, the billions of Facebook users around the world instantly recognise Facebook for its fundamentally blue colour scheme – blue being a colour we can trust. If Facebook suddenly changed its principle colour to another tone such as red, orange or pink, moving away from its brand consistency would likely to ruffle a few Facebook users’ feathers!
Shapes and symbols
Like the FedEx and Amazon examples, logo shapes aren’t chosen merely by chance. They are a representation of a brand and designed to evoke meaning and emotional attachments.
Our subconscious mind responds differently to different logo shapes and symbols. Straight lines, circles, curves and jagged edges all imply different meanings and so a skilled logo designer can use shape to articulate particular qualities about a brand.
Take for example the Nike swoosh, the combination of the curve of the swoosh with the sharp ending promotes a strong suggestion of movement, much like the ethos of that brand.
Circular shapes tend to promote positive emotional messages, whilst straight edged shapes suggest stability and balance. Triangles have a strong association with power, science and religion. Straight lines and precise logos also impart strength and professionalism, whereas ovals and ellipses can often imply more creative feelings.
The wrong shapes and symbols can have a negative impact on branding, again often on a subconscious level. For example, a logo or emblem that comprises of an arrow pointing downwards would do little in promoting an up-beat, forward-thinking message about a brand. In short, it would probably put customers off!
So why is this so important to your brand?
Remember your brand is your identity, so before you tell the designer your favourite colour is red, so you want a red circular logo for your business, take a moment to think about its impact and what that says about your business and your brand.
Image is everything, could you image Nike without the swoosh? Royal Mail without red letter boxes? Identity and consistency is everything to the success of your brand.
Achieving brand consistency through effective logos and other marketing designs is crucial in anchoring a brand’s message and is an essential component in a brand’s overall marketing strategy.
Next time we’ll discover how designing a logo doesn’t necessarily need to be expensive…
This Blog was a guest post by Simon McCaskill.
About the author:
Simon McCaskill is a digital marketing specialist and the bear behind ‘Bear and Fly’. Simon also works for Google as part of their dedicated digital outreach team.
Digital marketing can be confusing and frustrating and it shouldn’t be. Bear and Fly’s approach is all about working with you, the client, taking you step by step through the processes so you feel more comfortable in how you are marketing your business online.
@bearflydigital linkedin.com/in/simonmccaskill http://bearandfly.com/
