How to Create a Simple Brand Style Guide for Your Small Business
Do you have trouble keeping your brand image and style consistent? Maybe you find yourself wasting a lot of valuable time searching for different colors, fonts, or images for a simple online post and each post ends up looking completely different from the previous one. There is a solution.
I’m going to show you how creating a simple brand style guide can increase the effectiveness and consistency of your brand while saving you a lot of time and effort in the process. Ultimately, your brand style guide will help to make your brand easy to recognize and familiar to your ideal clients.
I sometimes find that some small businesses don’t have a brand style guide. I understand it since creating a brand style guide can be quite an investment of money and time. The good news is that you can create a basic style guide with a one-page document. Think about how much easier it would be to create your marketing collateral and online posts with all of your essential brand information right there next to you on a single page.
Here is an example of a one-page document.
When your business grows you’ll easily be able to expand your style guide by adding more documents with details and guidelines.
Today, I am going to share a step-by-step process with you on how to create a simple brand style guide that will help you make your brand image consistent.
What is a brand style guide?
A brand style guide serves as a detailed guide for all of your brand visuals. It can be as short as a single page or as long as a book. It all depends on your needs. Your brand style guide contains detailed information about your brand including imagery, fonts, and color selection. Your style guide will be the key to keeping your brand consistent across a wide array of platforms.
How to create a simple brand style guide?
Putting together a brand style guide isn’t a difficult process, but it does require some time and attention to detail. While a style guide can contain a lot of your brand information, it can also be whittled down to just the essentials. I’m going to show you how to create a style guide with the visual elements that you will be using frequently as a small business owner. When you also hire a designer, a brand style guide will make her easier and faster to create brand consistency. Keep in mind that as you expand and grow, your style guide should too, as more people will need the guidelines for the proper use of your brand elements.
Build your brand foundation
Before you start working on your brand visuals, you need to have a solid understanding of your brand.
This includes:
Your ideal clients
Your brand core ( purpose, vision, mission, values, etc. )
Your brand personality ( voice, tone, etc. )
Your visual style
If you are not clear about your brand direction, my brand clarity workbook will help you get clarity on your brand.
Create your visual identity
Include 4 key visual elements to your brand style guide
1. Logo
A Primary logo
Your logo is one of the most important parts of your brand visuals. The final version of your logo is essential to your one-page brand style guide.
If space allows, you can add the following to the document:
Minimum size and proper proportions of the logo
Clear instructions of the space needed around the logo
Variations in colors, black & white, and reversed
Images of how you don’t want your logo to be
Over time you may change your logo slightly as many companies do. Make sure to keep the latest logo up-to-date in your style guide. Consider adding:
A Secondary, submark logo and ( or ) favicon
These are derived from your main logo. It’s typically smaller than your logo and is frequently used as a favicon or profile picture. A sub mark logo is particularly useful for companies with long business names.
2. Color palette
Your logo isn’t the only way people will recognize your company. When your colors are used consistently across platforms, your color palette will become associated with your business. That is why your brand colors are an essential part of your brand style guide.
There are several types of color modes commonly used by designers for different purposes.
Using the correct color mode and breakdown of colors is important for brand consistency.
Colors for web: RGB and HEX codes
Color match for print: PANTONE name and number
Colors for print: CMYK
You can convert color modes here.
Remember to keep your color palette simple by using just 1-2 primary colors along with another 2-3 secondary colors for a simple and clean look.
3. Fonts
Fonts are used in conjunction with images, to help create a particular feel for your brand. To maintain brand consistency, it’s important to be consistent with your typography.
Brand fonts are usually selected from two different fonts (serif and sans-serif) along with additional styling and sizing. If space allows, you can add the following to the document:
Font selections and style (capital letters, uppercase letters, or small case)
Alignment (right, left, or centered)
Tracking and kerning ratios to maintain a consistent style when font size changes
Remember to look for fonts that have family font styles when selecting fonts for your brand ( italics, bold, bold italics, light, light italics, etc. ). Font families will give you some flexibility to create different effects while maintaining font consistency.
4. Imagery and graphics
The imagery and graphics that you select should match the feel of your brand. Patterns, photography, and graphics are just as much a reflection of your style and voice as your writing is.
For example, black and white photographs will give you a very different feel than photographs with bright, vibrant colors. Likewise, having white as the primary color with soft lighting gives you a different feel as well. Always remember to keep in mind what you want your ideal clients to feel when they see your imagery.
Also, make sure your imagery works well with your brand’s fonts and colors.
Conclusion
If you include 4 key visual elements, you should have a solid overview of your brand style and voice, all on one page. You now have a quick reference guide at hand whenever you create new marketing collateral. You no longer have to rely on your memory for what color or font you used in your last post.
The more you adhere to your brand style guide in the creation of your marketing materials, the easier it will be for your ideal clients to recognize you. When your style and messaging are consistent, your brand becomes more trustworthy to your audience. And the more your audience trusts you, the more likely they are to keep purchasing products and services from your business.
Besides brand consistency, a style guide can be a huge time saver. There’s no backtracking and searching for what was used in the past.
Your one-page brand style guide provides you with a solid starting point with basic guidelines for creating consistent marketing collateral.
Anyone in the future who does work for your company (for example, designers, web developers, or marketers) will appreciate having all of your brand essentials in one spot.
As I mentioned before, this is just a basic style guide to start with. As your business grows, I strongly recommend adding more details to your style guide.
I hope this article will help you create a simple brand style guide to keep your brand consistent.
If you're seeking a professional brand designer to develop your brand style guide, let's connect. You can book a free discovery call or reach out directly to me.