08 July 2024

What is Brand Identity and Why it is Important for Your Business

Today I'm going to write an article about Brand Identity. I take my first sip of coffee and open Facebook to check my feed. For work, of course. I'm checking my networking groups and all that jazz. My thumb moves in a quick upward motion and the feed scrolls up, fast.

15 minutes later, my coffee is getting cold, nothing has caught my attention, and I've wasted quarter of an hour scrolling through what feels like 100s of images, (at least 70% ads) and few meaningful posts. Sounds familiar?

Did you know that the average individual spends 2 hours and 24 minutes daily on social media, scrolling? Is your brand identity strong enough to capture their attention, and memorable enough to keep it?

Today, we live in a fast-paced online world. Our online life mimics the real world and vice versa. Our days and our social feeds are full of brands fighting over a few seconds of our attention. The images are bright and change rapidly, and our attention is shifting from one thing to the next at record speed. Luckily, visual information, such as mages, is interpreted by the brain 60000 times faster than text. Understanding visual brand identity has been crucial for business success for many years. But in a world like the one we live in today, it’s vital to set ourselves apart from others. We can do this by creating a powerful brand that stands out from the crowd.

Here we mean our personal brands as well as the identity of our company. If you have no distinct brand image - something which speaks for what you are and do, you risk getting lost in the vast sea of information that people consume daily.

And if you start wondering what brand identity is at all and how to go about it, don’t worry! I am here to here to help and in this article, we are going to dive deep into the details and answer all your questions regarding brand identity and its importance for your business.

Let’s get started!

Table of Contents:

Introduction: Definition of Brand Identity and why it is so important
Components of a Strong Brand Identity
The Role of Brand Identity for Your Business
How to Create a Brand Identity and Brand Identity Design
Brand Guidelines
Conclusion
FAQ

Introduction

Definition of brand identity

“Branding is not just about getting your target market to choose you over the competition, but about getting your prospects to see you as the only solution to their problem. A good brand must deliver a clear message, confirm the brand’s credibility in the marketplace, emotionally connect target prospects with a product or service, motivate the buyer, and create user loyalty.”

Philip Kotler

Brand identity encompasses many important elements like your logo, slogan, mission, look and feel, colour palette, imagery, typography, and language/tone of voice. Most small businesses start by creating a logo, picking a few fonts and colours the brand owner likes and call it a day. However, we can’t say that in this mixture only your company logo or the mission statement is important. All of the above-mentioned key elements matter. Each of the elements alone is only a part of the whole picture but only together do they constitute a strong brand style that can fulfil its role.

Why is your brand identity so important?

Establishing a great brand image (or identity) is crucial for your business because it is your way to catch your audience’s attention and set yourself apart from everyone else who struggles for their attention. For that reason, it is very important to have a clear idea of who your audience is and how you want to present your company to them. A well-thought-out brand identity ensures that your presentation and your audience's perception align.

Think what a vague logo does alone if there is no clear style and consistency in communication to your audience. Or, what if you spent hours and money building that perfect slogan - one you like very much but you did not get to know your audience so your used don't relate? The final result? A product no one knows about and wants to buy - only because you missed the important step of building a strong and well-considered brand identity.

But we at Digibees Studio promise to help, and this is the goal of this article!

Once you understand what brand identity is and why it is so important, we'll discuss in more detail each of the components you need to create a memorable brand.

Components of a Strong Brand Identity

First, we should clarify what stands behind the different concepts: brand, branding, and brand identity.

Your Brand is what your customers think of you and what is the one association they make when they hear or see you.

Branding includes all steps and actions you take to build an image that resonates in consumers’ minds - in other words how they become aware of you and what reputation you have.

Brand identity (image): a collection of all tangible elements you use in your branding and how people see, identify and remember you - name, logo, colours, voice, etc.

For the sake of having a complete understanding of the importance of each element for your business, we classify below not only the tangible elements but intangible ones, as well as the emotional and strategic ones, because their role is significant.

The Elements of Your Brand

Components of brand identity

Visual elements

These are the tangible elements as follows:

Company name:

Your business name is a key part of your brand essence and one of the most essential ones. Without it, you are not recognisable and people can’t identify you. Make sure your name is chosen carefully because it’s the most important association people make when they think and identify your product or service. A strong company name should be distinctive, memorable, and easy to spell and pronounce. You don’t want to sound confusing yet you don't want to sound too generic either. Naming your business is a bit like naming your baby, you'll know when the name is right.

Company Logo:

The role of the logo in brand recognition and visual identity is essential. It is the logo that helps your customers differentiate and visually identify your company from your competitors. As I mentioned earlier, this happens very fast and it's a subconscious process.

For this reason, the design of the logo is a very important process - on one hand it should represent visually who you are and at the same time it needs to comply with your whole identity and the image you present to the world.

Brand Colours:

The importance of colour psychology for brand association is unquestionable. Many studies prove the strong connection between colours and psychology in marketing. Different colours evoke different emotions and experiences and can have a very strong influence on the way people perceive you.

“Different colour palettes evoke different emotions and can create a range of experiences for the viewer. For example, warm colours like reds, oranges and yellows can promote feelings of energy and positivity, while cool blues and greens can induce a sense of clarity, calm and relaxation.”

Wellbeing in the Salon Industry Through Art, Paola Minekov

Typography:

Typography or your brand's primary and secondary fonts reflects your brand personality and readability. You may think that typography may not have the same immediate impact or be as noticeable as the company name, logo and colours, but in reality, you can build your whole brand based on typography, fonts are visual signage so they shouldn’t be underestimated. Your fonts are a large part of the whole and well-composed picture.

Emotional elements

As the name suggests, these are the intangible elements like:

Brand personality:

Brand personality refers to the psychological side and traits associated with your company, product and service. With a well-established personality, your customers will identify with your business and recognise it through all competitors on the market more easily.

Values:

Your company values, mission and goals are the heart of your business and aligning them with customer expectations and social trends is a key factor to success and stability. You won’t be your customers' long-term choice if they feel the slightest discrepancy between what you say to be your values and what you show in your brand image, behaviour and identity. You should build trust and stability and this happens only when there is consistency between the company’s vision and values and the brand identity they represent to their customers.

Strategic elements

Brand identity normally works two-way - it’s not only about how customers perceive it but also how successfully you position your brand on the market.

These strategic elements are part of the intangible side of your brand identity:

Customer perception:

Brand identity influences the customer's awareness of your business and their loyalty. Whether customers will become loyal to your brand depends on many factors and your brand identity can help a lot. Making a good first impression and creating a positive feeling in your potential customers is difficult but worth it because first impressions matter. A second chance is often not an option in the fierce business world where each minute a new, better and more attractive product is struggling to grab your customer’s attention.

Brand positioning:

Find your competitive advantage and what makes you different from your competitors by developing a strong brand strategy. Positioning your brand on the market won’t happen overnight (OK, a few lucky ones wake up with a dream come true and your business might go viral overnight too!) but the harsh reality is that most business owners must put all their efforts into positioning their brand the right way.

The Role of Brand Identity for Your Business

Because it’s so crucial I'll say it again: brand identity proves to be working and effective when it fulfils the following key objectives:

Establishing uniqueness and recognition: your brand identity needs to be memorable and distinct to distinguish you from the competitors;

Building emotional connections: only a strong and consistent brand identity can foster trust and loyalty. People prefer to be emotionally connected with a product and brand, so show them something different from the competitors, tell them a story, and make them feel you speak only to them;

Enhancing brand loyalty: a well-defined brand identity encourages prosperity and advocacy. When people like your brand, they will become loyal and what is more - they can become your ambassadors! What is better than strengthening your position on the market through the most powerful instrument - people’s recommendations?

How to Create a Brand Identity and Brand Identity Design

After clarifying the value of having a strong brand for your business, the next logical step is to create this identity. Constructing a memorable brand identity from the ground up is a challenging endeavour. Whether you're developing a new brand, crafting a new identity following a merger, or rebranding an existing company, the process requires considerable time, financial resources, and extensive research.

You can find more details and step-by-step guidelines on how to build a strong brand identity from scratch in our article: "How to Build a Successful Brand Identity for Your Business: Step-by-Step".

Brand Guidelines

The brand guidelines outline all the dos and don'ts of your brand.

Once you have created your brand identity, it is time to document the process, decisions, details, designs, etc. The reasons for this are varied but first and foremost it will guarantee that your company adheres to its own newly created branding "rules". You can give your brand guidelines to the designers, social media managers, printers and marketers you work with so they too can make sure that anything they publish about your brand stays on point.

Conclusion

Key takeaways

Think of the brand identity as your biggest asset. It is the essence of your business and speaks for you more than any marketing campaign or advertisement. How people see, perceive, and recognise you is ultimately determining whether they become your customers. The way you choose to present yourself and the way people decide to perceive you is the key to enhancing recognition and loyalty toward your product or service.

“A brand for a company is like a reputation for a person. You earn a reputation by trying to do hard things well.”

Jeff Bezos

Earning your reputation is not an easy task but the first and most important step is to create and maintain a cohesive and impactful brand presence. In our next article, you will go into more detail and outline guidance on how to build your successful brand identity step by step.

So, stay tuned!

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Brand Identity?

Brand identity describes the way your business and company are presented on the market via a combination of brand elements like visual (logo, name, language, colours, etc.), strategic (customer perceptions, brand positioning) and emotional (brand personality, company values). How customers see your business, the associations they have when they hear about it, and their opinions are all part of your brand image.

Why is Brand Identity important?

A company's brand identity is your key asset which sets you apart from the competitors and makes your brand recognisable and memorable. You need to present your unique product or service in such a way that people know and choose you instead of other similar products. Your efforts should be focused not only on creating a great product but also on creating a strong brand character as well.

What are the elements of a Brand Identity?

Brand identity isn't only your motto, your logo or the colours you picked for your business cards. A cohesive brand incorporates much more: starting from the tangible elements like logo, brand name, language, and colour palette and going through the intangible ones like brand positioning, the way customers see your values, etc.

Why does my business need to build a Brand Identity?

To understand that brand identity is a must-have for your business is half the work done. Identity makes your company resonate with customers and it is an opportunity for you to be distinguished, remembered and successful in what you do. Otherwise, you are lost and even having a perfect product or service can't help you survive because you will be just аnother struggling for customer's attention.

Is Brand Identity a marketing technique?

Yes, brand identity is a marketing instrument which contributes to a successful digital marketing presence, but it is far more than a technique for achieving your marketing goals. Your Brand is not only part of your marketing materials and designs - it's more than how you designed your logo or the fonts you chose for your websites or Facebook ads. It is a set of various elements which together bring your brand to life and make a difference for your company.