Image credit – www.8-30.pl

I have been reading up about brand consistency lately, and it appears there are some conflicting views on the topic. In one school of thought, a brand needs to remain flexible and somewhat inconsistent to give the impression of being human and imperfect. The other believes that a brand should be strictly gaurded and kept as consistent as possible to portray structure, professionalism and order.

I’ll have to admit to being more on the latter’s side of the argument, but as with many things in life and business, there are different shades of grey in every situation. Not everything should be stated absolutely and when you do, you close yourself to the possibility of there being merit in the other side’s way of thinking.

One thing I would say though, that is if you’re looking to start a business, or are in the early stages of doing so, a good, solid corporate identity is a very strong intellectual asset to have. An unmistakable logo and consistent branding across all your stationary and communication collateral speaks volumes about how professionally you are approaching your business, and depending on your target market, this has untold value to your business success.

Logo

Your logo is a topic I won’t go into much in this post, but suffice to say, it is an integral part of identifying your company and it’s carefully conceived nature will be a strong influencing factor in people’s impression of you and your business. The process and cost of designing a logo varies immensely, and as such, a recommendation is almost pointless. As an example, the Nike logo was designed by a student for $60 I believe, while some agencies are commissioned for millions of dollars for logos that look like a pre-school child designed them.

What it boils down to is that that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and design is a subjective topic. Take criticism from whence it comes…

CI (or Corporate Identity) Document

A CI Document -also known as a Brand Bible- illustrates your logo, the use thereof, the typfaces to be used in all your web and print communications. It dictates your corporate colour palette and paves the way for various consistency facilitating assets like style guides for your website to creating a simple newspaper or magazine advert.

The idea is that you can hand over a copy of your CI document to your designer (web or print) and they can effectively produce a composition that adheres to your brand guidelines. No mess, no fuss.

Corporate Stationery

When communicating with people these days, you use a number of different mediums. The previous norm for a corporate stationery set was a business card, letterhead, compliment slip and maybe a fax cover sheet. Nowadays however, I include an email signature, and often an email newsletter design.

Also remember things like invoicing, quotations and other accounts and admin related materials.

Web & Print Design

Often the people designing the logo, CI document and stationery aren’t the ones who are going to be designing newspaper and magazine adverts, and even less likely that they’ll be designing your website. With your CI document established, you can hand over to a professional of your choice and have your design created in the same aesthetic as everything else.

Appoint a Brand Guardian

A good option is to appoint a brand guardian. This would be an individual or company that would serve to approve or deny any design collateral before being published live. What I usually do for clients not in the realm of budgeting for an external brand guardian, is appoint someone in their company who knows the brand. someone that everything needs to be run by before being put into the public domain.

That is my view and overview summary of how to attain at least preliminary brand consistency, and you can take it to any level from there. This should be a good introduction to how it can be done, and you’re welcome to make contact with me if you want to discuss this further, or feel free to participate in the comments below.