When you are coming up with new ways to brand yourself or you are working with a company that is struggling to brand themselves, you may start to have questions about how you can successfully brand or rebrand without ruffling too many feathers. There are plenty of companies that have committed faux paus when it comes to branding, logo design, and even just setting a tone for your company.
So how can you do it? Here are our top tips for branding:
1. Time the Change
If you or a company is changing brands, it has to be timed correctly within the market. Things are always changing and shifting, so you have to anticipate the appropriate opening.
For companies that don’t have a branding strategy yet, you have more time to play with. Set a timeline but don’t be afraid to change it up and seize the opportunity when it arises.
2. Empower the Brand
Your client has to understand exactly what you are doing when you are re-branding or branding them. The best way to do this is to learn how to suggest things to them so that they think they came up with the idea. The company is more likely to get behind it if it comes from someone on their side than if it comes from you.
3. Be Flexible
Brand expansion, brand extension, and changes within the company happen all the time, even while you are working on the web design. If something happens, go with the flow and learn how to adapt quickly.
4. Measure the Brand’s Impact
Before you start working on a project, collect information about the target audience, who clicks their website, and how the website functions.
Then collect it after you have finished working on it. You will be able to measure the success so that you can change how you approach projects.
5. Avoid Clichés
Avoid conforming or looking at what other people have done. Instead, cut through what everyone else is doing and create something that looks just like your company and your company alone. That is what a truly successful branding strategy looks like.
6. Do Your Homework
You cannot build a brand blind. You cannot work on the web design for a company blind. You have to look at other brands to see what they’ve done, how they have branded themselves in the past, and what you can do.
7. Mix it up
Don’t do the same thing for every brand you work with. As a web designer, you are more than likely to find things that work for certain industries but you have to keep pressing to do something new and exciting.
8. Clarity Before Creativity
Make sure the message is clear before you add anything extra to the branding. At the end of the day, you want branding tools to work for years, not just a few months until the next fad appears.
Rebranding and branding a company or even yourself can be difficult. These new tips will help you to strive to be your best and think beyond what you were capable of doing before.