Regardless of whether you own or operate a business, or what kind of business you have, one of the best investments of your time, money, and other resources, is your brand. It’s a fact that until recently has been ignored by all but the most astute of marketers. And even by those who will tell you that they are conscious of their brand and its potential for helping their business grow and maintain its viability as a marketplace contender. There is often little attention paid to the finer points of brand management. This includes, but is not limited to the consistency of the consistency of its presentation.
Consistency. Consistency. Consistency.
It’s been said in many different ways, but it’s all the same: the most important element of branding is consistency, consistency, and consistency. Or said another way, it matters little if you have a brand identity if you have a different look to that brand every time a client or customer sees it. As your visual identity is created to effectively identify you and make you stand out from the multitudes, all of your work is for naught if you neglect how the visuals of your brand are presented.
The good news in this is that not only is it easy to create a visual brand, but it is just as easy to maintain it. How? With graphic overlays. Simply put, by creating a style guide and establishing boundaries and understandings with a consensus to follow it, you give your internal clients all of the tools they need to carry out an effective branding program, with the support of customizable graphic overlays.
Finding Your Voice
It might seem so elementary, especially to those who have never been responsible for maintaining a brand’s identity, but certain tools such as graphic overlays can contribute to a huge degree in the maintenance of a brand. Otherwise, as it might be easy to say that certain factors will be maintained in the presentation of a brand, but carrying it out is an entirely different and difficult matter. For example, even among some of the strongest brands in the world, there are slip-ups: incorrect typefaces, different shades of color, unbalanced design elements, and much more. Fortunately, with graphic overlays, these issues can be virtually eliminated.
Marching to the Beat of a Different Drummer
It’s been said that some people march to the beat of a different drummer. That might be fine in encouraging people to be different, but when it comes to brand identification, it can prove disastrous. And when you consider the amounts of time and money that are spent developing these identities it is easy to understand the concerns with even slight variances of these designs. Furthermore, with graphic overlays that are distributed for use among all users, it should be of little trouble in keeping a brand’s identity uniform.
Keeping the font of a brand is one element that is often missed, especially in these times of dramatic expansion of social media and other branches of the media. This is true even if there is little emphasis on any particular given part of a brand such as with typefaces, logo, and others.
By using graphic overlays, you can let your company choices be your guide, whether the final selection be larger logos, different fonts of type or practically anything else.
Changing Your Brand
Maintaining the success of your brand is only one part of the equation that is made easier by the use of a graphic overlay. Did you ever try to change your logo or other elements of your brand and for some time afterward have to continually correct the use others made of your brand. These kinds of problems are also virtually eliminated when you use graphic overlays to make sure that everyone is on the same page when a brand, regardless of the extent, is changed.
Just as is the case with so many other parts of the branding game, when you employ the services of a professional and experienced firm in the creation and maintenance of your brand, you can virtually assure yourself that any transition will be a smooth one.
