I’m a really lucky guy. My wife you see has terrific taste, perhaps not with whom he chose to mate with, but when it comes to fashion, interior design and other girly stuff, she’s brilliant. My good fortune is not having to think about where things go, or what to buy, or even how to dress myself. Subsequently, our home earns praise (was once even featured in Country Collections), and my surroundings are in a word – cosy. And I didn’t have to spend a nano-second of fretting about things. Oh, and she’s “Swedish.” Ha!
Left to my own devices, the garden would look like a cross between the Sahara and a Shetland pony bordello. I would leave the house clothed in nothing more than a tastefully placed banana peel, if there were not laws against such things. I enthusiastically admit I don’t have much in the way of “taste” (except in who I chose to mate with!), so I thank my lucky stars that I have someone around who knows all that “taste” stuff, and I get the benefits.
But I can recognise good taste, I can spot good or bad design from a mile away. And in the world of B2B branding, more often than not, you see examples of third world style, trying to sell new world technology. The real issue is, those who live with poor corporate design can’t recognise the disaster they preside over, and don’t know how to fix it or even if they should.
To hang things onto “taste” is a risky business, because you avoid the real issues that good design must address with B2B branding. Branding should never be a matter of taste; it has to be a matter of function. Before a truckload of designers out there prepare to Photoshop my image with a dwarf and a cheese platter for global publication – let me explain.
If you begin B2B design for an industrial brand or what is better known as a corporate profile, with the position of what “I like” or “he likes” you open a Pandora box of nonsense. Personal taste is completely irrelevant, and creating design assets for a technology or innovation based company with preferred styles, means you are off course before you have taken a step.
You know you have reached this point when you start-up “fashion shows” to decide what look and feel you want. When your decision-making about design is based upon gaining a lolly shop of choices, to pick and choose as you would a shirt, based upon personal taste, you have crossed the bridge of silliness and heading the town of “baseless ideas.” You’re asking for big trouble when you get a committee together, to dissect, poke holes in and garnish opinion in the hope of gaining “buy-in”, when what you really opening up is an expensive and time consuming exercise in raising more doubt than making a decision to benefit the business. As far as decision making goes, you need a benevolent dictator, who can take accountability for the brand.
There are a number of crucial questions you have to raise. Perhaps most important is, “sod my own preferences, what does the customer want?” And when looking for the answer, throw into the mix these questions, “how does this compare to the competition? Do we have a brand strategy to follow? How can we increase the perceived value of the brand? And lastly, “Are we determined to stick with our decision for design, the look and feel of the company to become a true corporate profile?”
You also have to give thought to the value of great design. B2B brands create no value when the look and feel of the company is not nurtured. The business case for caring about your corporate profile is that you’ll attract the right type of customer, employee, investor, channel partner and generate the right type of perception for the business. The value of this varies greatly between companies and industries. But even if you can’t see the immediate value, don’t you want to cover all your bases and do all things well?
When you establish a corporate profile it must be strong enough to maintain the core value of the brand, but flexible enough for ideas to flourish. So therefore you can conceptualize centrally and implement locally through your normal sales channels.
There are a few milestones that I strongly recommend are followed, in order to make the process as easy and pain free as possible. You’ll need to have people with skills and understanding of B2B branding strategy, design and creative ideas. So therefore briefing is vital – better the brief, less the pain if those you have to help are competent.
For the sake of the exercise I’ll assume that you have a brand strategy, and are ready to put some skin onto a sound structure. What follows are the typical steps to take, so that you gain a quality result, without wanting to blow your brains or anyone else’s brains out.
Step 1 – Mood Board
A mood board is a first interpretation of the brand and brief, using colours, visual and text. It’s an exercise that establishes that everyone is on the same page.
Typically a mood board is just one A3 page, presenting the key assets required for building a corporate profile. This allows everyone to agree to a “mood” or a taste of what is to come. For example, you would have an image, and ask the question, “Does this style of image suit the brand?” If so, then when it comes to actually sourcing images, this will be the benchmark.
You would have a pallet of colours, and again, are these the right combination of colours? Same with fonts and so forth. Once established and agreed to, then you want to see how to use these assets.
Step 2 – Style guide
A.K.A – Corporate visual identity, program, brand manual etc. Whatever the tag – the result is the same, to establish rules for branding and examples of real-life, so that everyone knows the rules, how to use and benefit by them.
There are priorities that need to be addressed, because you must be draconian in some areas and loose as a goose in others. The point is to make sure that brand core values are implemented, but that there is freedom to enjoy strong creativity, that matches the needs for the brand. So the components of a style guide are:
Logo: Its dimensions, colours, use and variations (if any). This is then set in stone. No messing about!
Fonts: These are very important. Strong brands can be recognised just by a font. And different fonts have very different personalities, such as,
GNM Engineering – brilliant ideas (Verdana)
GNM Engineering – brilliant ideas (Palatino)
GNM Engineering – brilliant ideas (Baskerville)
GNM Engineering – brilliant ideas (Bank Gothic)
Colours: Select a range of colours and again, stick with them. It might be one or it might be 5. But it is vital to stay with a primary colour/s and if desired some supporting colours. You need to be aware of how these colours translate with PMS, RGB, Web and other production methods such as signage. It can be difficult to get exact matches for different production methods.
Images: An image library is a worthwhile pursuit, to generate around 50 or so images that can then be used for internal and external communications. However, here you can be a bit lax, because you would not want to prevent a great idea going ahead, just because you need to use an image sourced elsewhere. Also the way you present diagrams, graphs and other illustrations should follow a set format.
Creative concept: Great brands often have a great idea pushing them along. Creative concepts can change and evolve over time, but each one must be working to the brand strategy. Within your style guide, present what your creative concept is and the assets that go with it.
Copy style: When you articulate the company and write about the company, what sort of copy style is to be used? I like to see style guides authored in the way that will reflect the real world use of language.
Application to corporate communications: Present the templates for business cards, letterheads, signage, email signatures and so forth.
Application to marketing communication campaigns: What will an advert look like, or an exhibition, website, Direct mail and so forth. This is not to say that all advertising forever and a day, must look like this – but take this moment to present some inspiration!
Once you have established a corporate profile, you must make it someone’s responsibility to police it, and be the authority on what is and isn’t allowed. This person must have accountability and authority to make sure that the brand is built, and built well.
And leaves personal taste out of it.
Cheers,
Kimon