What Should Go Into Your Brand Guidelines?

We all know that logos can define a company’s image. When I mention “McDonald’s”, most people get the image of the golden arches in their head. However, just having a logo isn’t enough to establish an identity for your brand. When you think about well-established brand names, it’s quite apparent that they have elements that are consistent across their collaterals, outlets, and media. If you’re starting your own company or looking to do a rebranding exercise, you’ll need a set of brand guidelines to achieve this consistency, giving your brand a “voice” if you may.

Here are the absolute essentials that you should have in your brand guidelines.

Logo and Usage Guidelines

First and foremost, people will associate your brand with your logo. Therefore, the first section of any brand guidelines should talk about your logo and how to use it. A good set of brand guidelines should have the following guides for using your logo:

• Color Variations: Just because your logo looks cool on a white background doesn’t mean it works when placed against something dark. At the very least, there should be a colored version, a black version, and a white version of your logo.
• Logo Clearspace: Your logo will lose its identity if it’s crowded out by other design elements. Your designer should be able to tell you how much space to leave around your logo at all times.
• Do’s and Don’ts: Your designer should show you examples how not to use your logo e.g. upside down, warped, wrong color etc.

Corporate Colors

This is a big one, because it will influence how your collaterals will look years and years down the road. Ideally, your corporate colors should come from your logo, as well as having one or two complementary colors to go with them. Think about the tone you want your company wants to have, and make sure that the designer picked the right colors to portray that tone. For example, pink doesn’t really work for a tech company, and dark blue probably doesn’t work for a cotton candy chain. Here are some loose guidelines as to what each color stands for and the feelings they evoke:

• Red: Energy, Strength, Power, Desire.
• Orange: Joy, Enthusiasm, Sunshine, Determination.
• Yellow: Warmth, Intellect, Energy, Happiness.
• Green: Nature, Growth, Freshness, Safety.
• Blue: Depth, Stability, Intelligence, Masculinity.
• Purple: Royalty, Luxury, Children, Femininity.

Corporate Fonts

Like colors, the Fonts you choose to use most frequently lends a distinct voice to your brand. At the most basic level, you should have two corporate fonts: One for title text and one for body text. You can always google font pairings to see what works well together and fits your brand. There are no hard and fast rules regarding the choice of fonts – Just pick something legible and you feel will resonate with your audience. Or, you know, you can always just trust your designer’s choices.

Brand Voice and Tone

Frequently, when you engage a designer to do your brand guidelines, the focus will tend to be on visuals. I would put forward a strong argument that it is just as important to get a copywriter to establish the tone of writing that your brand messages will carry in the future. Are you going to be a friendly company that welcomes your customers with open arms? Or one that takes the high ground, knowing that people come to you because you’re the best in the field? Having a well-established tone of voice for your company in your brand guidelines go a long way. Here are some sample tones that you can employ for your brand:

• Friendly
• Intelligent
• Energetic
• Passionate
• Romantic
• Knowledgeable
• Technical
• Childish

Collaterals

Finally, it would be good to see all of the above come together in some sample collaterals. It can be something as simple as a namecard and a letterhead. The most important thing here is to visually assure yourself that the logo, corporate colors, font, and voice all come together to form an appealing and cohesive entity. Another tip would be to make sure that your brand identity works well with stock photos as well, unless you’re very sure that all your future collaterals will not bear photography of any kind.