Category: Brand Management

In a world brimming with options for virtually every product or service, how do you make your brand stand out? Brand consistency is one of the crucial elements in achieving this, but it is often overlooked or misunderstood. Branding is not just about a memorable logo or a catchy slogan; it’s an integrated strategy that involves several aspects, from tone to visuals to customer experience. But why is brand consistency so important for both emerging and established businesses?

What is Brand Consistency?

In essence, brand consistency means maintaining a coherent and unified presentation across all platforms and touchpoints where your business interacts with the public. This could include your website, social media, advertisements, products, customer service, and even the way your team communicates internally.

Why Does Brand Consistency Matter?

Recognition and Trust

One of the most important reasons for maintaining brand consistency is the role it plays in customer recognition and trust. When a consumer sees the same colors, typography, and images across your marketing materials, they are more likely to remember your brand. Over time, this builds trust and creates a sense of reliability around your products or services.

Competitive Edge

Consistent branding also helps you stand out in a crowded marketplace. When a customer is overwhelmed by choices, they are more likely to opt for a brand that they recognize and trust. Your unique brand elements make it easier for customers to spot you amid a sea of competitors.

Emotional Connection

Beyond the practical aspects, consistent branding also helps in forming an emotional connection with your audience. Humans are creatures of habit; we find comfort in the familiar. When a brand consistently delivers the same message and quality, it reassures the customer and strengthens emotional ties.

Streamlined Marketing Efforts

From a business perspective, brand consistency simplifies the decision-making process when it comes to marketing efforts. A well-established brand guide means that your team doesn’t have to reinvent the wheel every time they create a new campaign or update social media.

Adds Value

Consistent branding goes beyond mere recognition; it adds value to your business. Apple is a prime example of this. Their consistent branding efforts over decades have led to a perception of quality, innovation, and luxury, allowing them to charge premium prices for their products.

How to Achieve Brand Consistency?

Establish a Brand Guide

A brand guide serves as a blueprint that outlines the parameters of your brand’s visual and communicative elements. This includes specific color codes, typography, tone of voice, and even guidelines on imagery and photography. I’ve recently completed the design for four brands of the newly opened Hyatt Regency Blackfriars in London and the brand guide is a proper book – but as this is a brand with lots of different suppliers, it’s absolutely vital to ensure consistency in the use of the new brand identity.

Consistent Communication

The whole subject of brand consistency applies not just to external communication but also internal. Everyone on your team should be aware of and aligned with the brand’s mission, vision, and values. Internal workshops and good on-boarding sessions for new team members can help everyone start singing from the same hymn sheet – and knowing why…

Regular Audits

With changing marketing channels and trends, it’s essential to regularly audit your brand’s presence across all platforms to ensure consistency. A brand manager can focus solely on making sure publications, PR, internal and external messages follow the ‘holy brand grail’ – but for smaller businesses, again, internal workshops or training sessions and mini brand audits can be valuable resources to help create this consistency from the ground up.

Leverage Technology

Use digital asset management systems to store and manage your brand’s assets. This ensures that your team has access to up-to-date resources, reducing the likelihood of inconsistencies. There are lots of different software products to use – from brand asset libraries to template creator SaaS offerings; the choice is yours.

Be patient… consistency takes time.

Brand consistency is not a one-off task but an ongoing strategy that requires attention, effort, and investment. When executed correctly, it adds significant value to your business, making it more memorable, reliable, and engaging. As Jeff Bezos once said, “Your brand is what other people say about you when you’re not in the room.” Make sure they’re saying what you want them to say by investing in brand consistency.

I love working on brand strategy and design projects, and I’ve always seen the two as interconnected. For me, graphic, web or interior design are all tools to bring a company’s message to life in many different ways. Which is why I am on the lookout for the good, the bad and the ugly when it comes to business designs.

Take this one… a sponsored traffic island. Surely, this is a great opportunity for brands to have their company name and logo seen by all the passing traffic. What’s not to like – especially in the centre of Birmingham! It’s a great example of executing a company’s brand strategy and design project in real life – or that’s the theory at least.

Well… I would say well done, and even ignore the fact that the sign itself is not exactly inspiring or eye catching, but definitely not when it looks like this!

Your strategy and how you design are connected in many ways

You may think what’s that got to do with my brand management? I think it’s got everything to do with it – and whilst it may be a tiny example of a careless approach, it’s a good one for why it’s important to consider different effects of designs on your business and brand building efforts.

It may be that this company has paid to be on the sign on the roundabout, but it’s the council’s responsibility to keep it tidy, but anyone looking at it, whether they are in the brand strategy and design field or not, won’t care about who should have gotten the lawnmower and dustbins out. It just reflects badly on the brand. It also doesn’t help the reputation of the town council, but it’s not their name on the sign.

You wouldn’t expect the brand owners to manage the island themselves, but they could have picked up the phone to whoever sold them the spot and complained. And if that didn’t get a result, withdraw the sponsorship and ask them to take the sign down. I would imagine there must be some sort of clause in the contract that stipulates what sponsoring an island means – and when an island is no longer an island, but a pit.

Looking at it another way, there could be a branding opportunity for someone dealing with waste disposal. It would at least create some connection between the state of the surroundings and the brand advertising on site. You’d just hope there was then a campaign linked to it which meant they would actually sponsor the cleanup after a few weeks and document it on social media and their website.

It’s all connected – brand strategy and design execution

Working in a design studio in Sutton Coldfield means we naturally become involved in all sorts of marketing projects for local companies that are looking to scale up, reach more clients and improve their services. I remember creating wooden A-boards with protected, changeable information sheets for Lichfield Cathedral. They could have just used on the old, existing ones – but they understood that it all fits together, and having even those external bits of signage or advertising treated like an important part of your brand adds integrity.

Signage in particular is so often a missed opportunity. We all know the box standard fonts, with letters sizes to the max without any breathing space, on glaring plastic shop front panels without any character or brand style. Having been in the business of brand strategy and design for about two decades now, it saddens me to see that we still can’t manage to make high street signage for independent shops attractive.

Talking of Lichfield, here is another lovely little example of an execution that has gone just a bit fishy.

It’s a bit of a giggle, and it’s not the end of the world – but again, it’s a missed opportunity. What else could have been on those doors that actually results in a meaningful message when you slide it open? It could be such a fun detail of brand design and make the business stand out not just with their products…

In my mind it doesn’t matter how big or small you are as a company. It’s good practice to decide on your brand strategy and design accordingly. And it can be fun, creative and innovative even if you don’t have crazy corporate budgets, just by thinking and planning carefully.

As for sponsoring anything – make sure there is a link between what you are putting your name on and what it represents… you may be better off without it.

K.I.S.S. stands for Keep It Simple Stupid. It’s a a design principle noted by the U.S. Navy back in 1960. If you are a linguist, you may just need to ignore the obvious flaw in the abbreviation…

K.I.S.S. is a great principle that can be applied to many situations. (Nobody likes things complicated).

Looking at your brand strategy, for example. Make sure your brand message is really simple. So simple, that everyone in your audience can ‘get it’. That way you can reach everyone you intend to – and you don’t alienate people with industry jargon. (Nobody wants to feel stupid.)

If you don’t have a clear vision for your brand, your audience won’t stand a chance. (Not even if they are mind readers).

Just like a brand strategy, your brand identity shouldn’t be complicated, either. Clutter never helps – not in your home and especially not in your brand and marketing material. A clear and simple message doesn’t have to be boring, you an use beautiful typography and photography, textures and finishes (if you print) to let every little element of your marketing material tell your story.

Go ahead, give your brand a big K.I.S.S.!

Luxury Vacations UK had outgrown its existing brand we developed for the client over a decade ago. The timing was planned to coincide with a major re-work of the tour operator’s website, as well as their promotional tour guides and the introduction of branded tour videos.

The new brand identity combines the UK’s iconic symbols of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland together with a classic, luxurious colour palette and visual details to be used in the material.

The re-brand focused on the company’s main audience, visitors from the US, who have cultural expectations and perceptions of the UK as a destination. The brand features a contemporary and non-cliché translation of the company’s values, deeply connected to their highest standards for customer service, luxury accommodation and the tours designed to allow overseas visitors experiencing ‘the real UK’. Delivering engaging, professional and expert tours with chauffeur guides has always been at the heart of the business and shows in the personal writing style of the copy, as well as the eclectic photography showcasing the tours’ highlights.

Using gold foil and a bespoke colour for each of the constituent countries means the brand identity is versatile to branch out into sub brands for regional promotional campaigns whilst remaining a recognisable badge for high quality luxury guided tours in the UK.

The brand has been rolled out across the new website, marketing materials and videos.