In our last post, we talked about the importance of a logo for establishing your brand identity. Let’s zoom out now and look at the bigger picture.

What is branding?

Branding is basically your business’ complete identity. Branding gives meaning to your business and your products and services by creating and shaping your brand in customers’ minds. The purpose of branding is to establish trust within your consumers and create loyalty. Your brand gives your customers a way to remember you and helps set you apart from competitors.

Too small to brand?

Branding isn’t just for multi-million-dollar companies with big budgets. In fact, branding for small business is essential to help a company stand out in the market.

Branding your business helps you stay top-of-mind with your customers and makes you memorable. It also helps show people how your product or service is unique.

Building trust

People want more than just a big promise or a catchy slogan. They want to buy from companies and individuals they know and trust. A brand identity brings your business to life and makes it unique.

Your brand should have a unique appearance. This includes your logo, color scheme, fonts and other images that comprise your business’ appearance.

Your brand should also have a unique voice. This voice could be authoritative, friendly, casual, or formal, depending on your products or services.

Visual identity

You want all your business’ visual elements to align with the brand identity you want to create.

These are examples of visual brand assets:

• Logo
• Website
• Social media covers
• Blog post images
• Business cards
• Uniforms and apparel
• Packaging

Color influences sales decisions and conversions. What emotions does each color evoke?

• RED – Excitement, bold, passion
• ORANGE – Confidence, energy, adventurous
• YELLOW – Impulsive, happy, creativity
• GREEN – Health, growth, friendly
• BLUE – Trust, dependability, social
• PURPLE – Wisdom, wealth dignified

Choose a color to suite your business and identify your brand.

Your voice

You want to customize your tone and message to fit your target customer. What you say is important, but how you say it can be crucial to your success. Your voice can be formal and sophisticated or warm and casual.

Here’s an example of a formal voice: “Helping you make smart financial choices.”

But if your audience prefers a more casual voice, you might say: “Making your dreams come true!”

Be consistent

Your messaging should stay consistent to relate to current customers and to make a good first impression on new customers. Even if you’ve been repeating the same messages again and again, it will be new for a lot of people who are seeing it for the first time.

Your branding partners

Branding your small business can help you stand out, get noticed, and get more sales. Focusing on your target market will help you determine your visual identity and voice.

Farmhouse Creative offers complete branding services, and we’re always happy explore options. Feel free to contact us.