Branding is essential to a business because of the overall impact it makes on your company. Your branding is what helps you distinguish yourself from competitors and allows consumers to know what to expect from you as a company. It can change the way people perceive your brand, increase awareness, and help to drive new business. In this blog, one of our graphic designers, Rob, discusses branding and why it is so important for businesses.

What is Branding?

Branding is essentially assigning a name, logo, or some sort of design, to a company that makes them easily identifiable to consumers. However, branding is much more than just the aesthetics of a logo and a name, branding allows you to make an impression in consumers heads about what to expect from your company. For example, when you see the Apple logo, you expect it to be of high quality. A reputation is built over time through many areas such as advertising, partnerships, in-store experience, customer service, and brand identity.

An iPhone facing down on a desk.

Why is branding important in marketing?

Customers/Employees

Branding is so important in marketing because of how it can drastically change the reputation of your company. The first touchpoint that many potential customers have to your company is through your logo. That is why it is so important to have a clean simple logo, that anyone can clearly remember after just a couple of seconds of seeing it.

Not only does good branding attract customers, but it also attracts employees, it gives them a sense of pride and excitement if they are able to believe in the company, which then turns over to great customer service.

Standing out from the crowd

In this age, there are more brands in every sector than ever before, the choice is almost endless, which means you need a way to stand out in a crowded market. It all starts with a clear idea, of who you are, what you provide as a product/service, who are you targeting, and how are you different? From there, you should have a clear idea of who your company is and you can then start building your brand around that idea, with the intent in each step forward to make your customers as satisfied as possible, which overtime give them a reason to constantly purchase from you without thinking about going elsewhere.

Creating Opportunities

Through each customer touchpoint, such as a logo, website, advert, or social media, if branded correctly, will build a strong reputation, which equals a high business value as you will be firmly established in your sector. This opens a wide range of opportunities, such as partnerships with other big companies, as your reputation makes you far more appealing and trustworthy to work with.

An example of effective brand marketing

One of the best examples of how effective brand marketing can be is Nike. From the very start, they had a clear vision, to enhance performance for athletes. This vision is carried throughout their whole brand, from the tagline ‘Just Do It’, to their name which is the Greek mythology goddess of victory. Their logo designed around the shape of the goddess’s wing, which they called the Nike Swoosh, represents speed, power, and motion.

A red nike cap with the logo in white text

From starting in 1964, they have continued their aim of innovation to this day. You can see it in every part of their branding. When you see a Nike advert on tv, is it a group of athletes laying by the beach modelling? No, their adverts focus on showing how much work you have to put in as an athlete it shows them being pushed to their limits, proving that you need to push yourself to perform to your very best. They encapsulated our emotion through every touchpoint and this, therefore, makes them memorable to us. This has over time made them the biggest sports brand in the world, which as of 2019, had a brand value of $32.5 billion.

What I do and why I do it

As a graphic designer, branding has always been my favourite type of design to tackle. For a company to come to you and ask you to take what they stand for, what they do, and how they envision themselves and mould it all into a symbol is challenging, but so rewarding when you can eventually see your creation on a website, printed in a magazine, or on a t-shirt. It’s a great feeling. As well as being able to look back at their old logo and see how much of a difference you have made to help them achieve their goal.

The Liverpool Albert Dock.

In terms of branding, a client either comes to us with a logo and an overall brand design that they want to change/improve or no logo at all and with no previous design direction. My process when designing a logo is to first gather as much information on the client as I can, such as their target market, the sector that they are in, history, etc. I then start to gather a range of information that will help me generate and develop initial ideas. Then I start sketching as many rough ideas as I can, so I have a wide range to choose from, and from those sketches, I pick about four that I think will work well and start to make them digital.

The process of making a logo digital is my favourite part, as at that point you can finally see your idea as a polished piece of design. This is where you can then start playing with colours and start creating mock-ups, which gives you a great idea of how the logo will look in the real world and make it almost feel real. With every branding brief we do, we create a logo presentation, that consists of four logo options, which is broken down into the multiple ways that they could be used, as well as slides showing website mock-ups, business cards, posters, etc. which shows the client how not just the logo will look, but how the overall brand will look and be seen by your clients.

Need help with your branding?

Do you need help with branding your business? Whether you’re just looking to refresh or redesign your existing branding, are starting from scratch, or want a complete brand overhaul, our graphic design team can help give your business a new lease of life. To find out how we can take your brand to the next level, visit our branding service page. Alternatively, contact us to arrange a consultation, and we’ll assign you a dedicated brand manager who will make your vision a reality.