Creative Corporate and Marketing Communication: PBL 3

Visual brand identity.

Problem.

How to create visual brand identity?

1. What are the elements of visual brand identity?

If you want to make a lasting impression on your target audience, making the right decisions when it comes to visual brand identity is crucial. Here are the five most important visual brand elements that should be considered:

1. Choose the right brand name

Even though naming isn’t technically part of the visual design process of brand identity, the brand name should still be considered a visual element. A strong brand name shouldn’t just sound right and be easy to pronounce; it should look right too.

2. Create a consistent visual style

All of the brand elements should follow a consistent visual style throughout. If, for example, a decision is made to design a brand identity that is visually romantic and endearing, then this style should be applied to all visual elements. Exceptions can be made for advertising campaigns, but the overall brand identity should always be uniform.

3. Develop a compelling logo

The logo is the flagship image of any brand. Logos can quickly speak volumes about your business, your mission and what services you offer. An enterprise without a logo has no chance of making an impact on its target audience. The logo is the most essential and valuable visual element of your brand, so keep this in mind when allocating your branding budget and hiring professionals.

4. Pay attention to color

Colors influence our emotions and help us distinguish between competing brands. Having acknowledged this, considerable research should be carried out before deciding on a final brand color or palette. Cadbury’s, the UK based confectionery producer, considers their own brand color so important to their identity that they went as far as copyrighting their "Cadbury Purple," or Pantone 2685C as it is more commonly known.

5. Select appropriate typography

Typography concerns the style and appearance of any lettering or fonts used as part of your visual brand identity. These characteristics can have a significant influence over people’s purchasing decisions and help to further emphasize the message of your brand. Typeface and font choice can affect whether the right message is being communicated and these should conform to the overall visual brand style.

Resource: https://www.waveapps.com/blog/visual-brand-identity-design/

2. What is the process of creating visual brand identity?

Phase 1: Research, Vision & Design Brief

This phase should be as thorough as needed — depending on the depth of research and size of the company. It's the most crucial part of the overall process, and should result in a design brief that guides the rest of the project.

Answer the questions:

How is the brand perceived against competitors in the market for products and services you're looking to provide?

What is the positioning statement of your brand?

What is the heritage of your product type?

Who is your audience? Are they digitally savvy?

What values & beliefs should the brand have about the business and it's mission in the world?

What benefits do you want customers to associate with your brand?

What is the vision of the brand that you want to create?

Phase 2: Logo, Identity, & Guidelines

After the research phase is complete and a design brief has been created, it's time to start designing the logo and identity system.

The Logo

There are many ways to start designing a logo, but most often times you'll see designers begin by sketching out dozens if not hundreds of iterations on paper. The process of getting concepts down on paper and then iterating on those ideas can unlock new directions to explore and final solutions that you wouldn't have normally arrived at when starting on the computer. After selecting your best sketched concepts, you should start iterating on them digitally.

Firefox logo.
example-firefoxlogo

The Identity System

The identity system usually starts after the logo is complete. The purpose of the identity system is to form a systematic visual language around the logo — one that compliments the design thinking of the logo and offers a family of useful, flexible elements that will help to design marketing and business collateral.

Examples:
1. Fortaleza 2020 by Guivillar

identitysystem-1-fortaleza

2. Handsome Coffee Roasters by Ptarmak

identitysystem-1-handsomecoffee

The Style Guidelines

The style guidelines contain and prescribe the logo usage rules, typeface system, color palette, layout guidelines, and more. They exist so that others can create design collateral and marketing materials that will have a cohesive look and voice.

Phase 3: Monitoring & Rebranding

Lastly, after a new brand identity has launched, it's important to monitor and care for it, as it's a living and breathing thing that interacts with your customers. Honestly, that's a loaded statement as there are many ways to properly care for a brand. Regardless, over time, if your target audience shifts, the market evolves, or the brand's products and services change, it may be time for a rebrand. The main challenge with rebranding is trying to maintain familiarity and consistency so that your customers will remember you.

Resource: https://creativemarket.com/blog/2013/07/23/designing-a-brand-identity

3. Examples of strong brands in Russia.

1. Gazprom is global energy company, owns the biggest gaz pipe line system.

2. Norilsk Nickel is a world's largest producer of nickel and palladium. It's one of the world’s leading producers of platinum and copper.

3. Mobile operator. Services: broadband internet connections, telefony, and digital video broadcasting.

3. Strongest telecommunication brand; largest mobile operator.

4. Megafon is also mobile operator. First in Russia that introduced 4G network and made nanoSIM for iPhone5.

5. Russian railways.

6. Sberbank Rossii is a government-owned bank headquarterd in Moscow. As of 2012 it was the largest bank in Russia and Eastern Europe, and the third largest in Europe.