Samui Design Ezine

Following our ‘brief introductory guide on how to evaluate the success of your existing brand’ published last month, here is a quick guide on how to establish and strengthen your brand.

As you might imagine, establishing a brand for your company is a little more complex than designing a simple logo and applying it to your letter headed paper. Below is a list of issues that you should consider when first establishing a new brand and secondly attempting to strengthen your new brand.

Establishing the Brand

As you begin to consider your company's new brand,

• think about how you would like to portray your company to your customers;
• be bold, be ambitious, think long term - but be honest. Your brand should reflect who you are or who you are aiming to be, providing your aspirations are realistic and achievable;
• try out different colours and images until you find the combination that works for you;
• take your time before making the final decision and run possible brands and logos by friends or colleagues to see what they think about it.

Strengthening the Brand

Creating a logo is only the first step in developing a new brand. You will need to make sure that your new brand gets as much exposure as possible:

• launch your new brand – shout it out loud: create opportunities for your customers to connect with your company's new brand;
• use your new brand consistently throughout all your marketing material: on your letterhead, in your advertising, on your website, on all your signage and uniforms etc… to create lasting impressions;
• make sure that all your employees are briefed not only on how to use the new logo but also on what the brand is all about, to ensure that they understand and relate to it and, in turn, accurately communicate its values to your customers.