Brand guidelines are a collection of rules on how you should use the company’s logo, fonts, and colour palettes. It shows how the company presents itself and are there to make sure the branding is consistent throughout all mediums.
Using brand guidelines will create strong and consistent branding and will help users recognise and recall your brand better in the future, which in turn increases the brand value.
A brand guidelines document will demonstrate that your company is reliable and prepared for growth. The guidelines can create a unique identity for your business, helping it to #standout.
What should a brand guidelines document consist of?
Logo layout
Several pages should display the logo in various forms, such as size, colour and setting. Additionally, you should also include how not to use the logo, e.g. no stretching or distorting, this can be done with imagery.
Colour Palette
Your brand colours with CMYK, RGB, and hex codes ensure consistency across print, web and social media.
Typography
Include the fonts, families, font sizes and hierarchy your brand uses. (You can also include kerning to further ensure brand consistency etc)
Extras that can be included are
Imagery – Image styles/icons/brand assets that your brand uses.
Tone of voice – How you want your brand to be perceived/the personality of your brand.
Merchandise – You can even show how you layout your merchandise/what merchandise you use throughout your brand.
Does it benefit my brand to have a guidelines document?
Having set standard rules, you can outline what your colleagues/creatives can and cannot do with the branding elements. An example of this would be our company, Indigo Ross. Indigo Ross’ logo can only be used in the company colours, it cannot be changed to blue, yellow, green or any other colour that is not included in the Indigo Ross brand.
Brand guidelines work together with your marketing initiatives, ensuring your companies messaging is consistent with the brand standards. This makes your brand/business more recognisable in the market and also builds brands awareness.
So, who should be using your brand guidelines?
Anyone who uses/touches your brand (people such as employees and creatives). This will mean they will become familiar with your brand standards and can refer to them if and when they like. This will ensure the branding has a long successful life.
If you are looking for branding/ are looking for someone to create brand guidelines for your already existing brand – we can help. Get in touch with us today to find out more.