Stylistic Uniformity
With the myriad of communications bombarding your customers, it’s increasingly important to get your message across as quickly and concisely as possible. In fact, the average person’s attention span is only 6 – 8 seconds!
Effective branding visually conveys your message in a manner that subconsciously communicates key elements of your message without words. Think of the best known brands and their stylistic communications…
- Apple’s clean, white, contemporary backgrounds, images and styling;
- Nike’s bold athleticism and swoosh;
- Coke’s cool, wet red, and silver; and
- IBM’s big blue.
In each case, the branding communicates volumes without printing or saying a word. And everything the respective company publishes embodies uniformity in styling so to ensure viewers immediately recognize their communication and register the desired message.
Application
Achieving this level of immediate brand recognition requires discipline and uniformity in the styling of all of your communications from your website and social media accounts to your presentations, videos, and podcasts to your stationary, letterhead, and business cards.
Key Elements
Immediate brand recognition occurs through consistent, repetition of messaging. Receivers of your messages should always ‘see’ the same styling such that, over time, they come to associate the uniqueness of your styling with your business and its characteristics. Key styling elements include:
Color
The specific color combinations used across all of your communications, platforms, and products should be the same. But how can you define an array of colors that both reflect your company and look good together? One simple method is to use the predefined color scheme used within your website’s theme. As is typically the case, these color combinations have been defined by professionals with an eye for what works together. Simply choose the scheme that aligns with your desired messaging and then apply those colors across all of your many internal and external communications mechanisms.
Fonts
Like colors, character fonts visually communicate the uniqueness of your brand. Be careful to choose a font that is web and printer friendly; taking the lead from your website theme often works well.
Images
Images illicit feelings among viewers and photographers each tend to exhibit a unique approach to the stylizing of their images. Images may be contemporary, rustic, real-life, illustrated, etcetera. Choose and image style that conveys the desired feeling about your business and consistently use those types of images.
Depth
Visual depth represents another styling variation. Flat (lacking depth) is a cooler, contemporary styling whereas shadowed (deep) imaging is a warmer, conservative styling. Whichever approach you choose, apply it consistently across all of your communications mechanisms.
Other Features
There are many other opportunities to reinforce your messaging through consistent styling including:
- Logo (styling application and consistent use)
- Taglines
- Trademarking
- Bullets (both type and color)
- Icons (consistent application/use and color)
- Indenting
- Framing (images and text)
