What is branding?
Think of a brand like a person. It has a personality, values, an aesthetic, and purpose. A brand is a foundation for your business, directing how your business performs and connects with its audience.
Why does it matter?
Branding is such a big part of your business journey because it takes a look at your business’s complete identity. Many designers and developers you work with throughout your business journey will ask you for your branding blueprint (guidelines and deck are other names you’ll hear). This blueprint allows them to really hone in on what designs, functions, tools, etc. your business should be using.
An easy way to understand this connection between the blueprint and your operations is to think this:
Let’s say your blueprint includes your brand values and one of them is ethical sourcing for components of your products. Knowing and living this value would mean that in your business operations you would need to ensure you are ethically sourcing your products. If you aren’t able to fully source that way, then letting your customers know where you are in your journey to fully ethically source will be important as that builds trust with your customers while also holding yourself accountable for your value.
Another easy example is your visual aesthetic. If your brand blueprint includes dark, earthy tones, it wouldn’t make sense for your brand to start using pastel colors or hire a photographer that uses a light and airy editing style.
It’s easy to see how impactful and purposeful this brand blueprint is for your business. The blueprint might not go over items like trademarking your business name and logo, or which software to use for accounting and other operational procedures, but it does indeed guide the type of people and companies your brand should work with in your business journey.
At Raine & Rose we help you design your brand’s foundation along with a strategy that allows you to maximize on your brand’s purpose.
