How a Brand Board Helps Your Small Business Stay Consistent
As a small business owner, you want your brand to be recognizable, professional, and memorable. But keeping your brand consistent can be challenging, especially when using different platforms and marketing materials. I’ve found that the most effective way for small businesses to keep their brand consistent is by using a brand board.
A brand board is a simple yet powerful tool that keeps all your brand’s essential elements in one place. It ensures that your business will appear consistent across all marketing channels including your website, social media, printed materials, and more.
In this post, we’ll explore what a brand board is, how it can help, and why it’s essential for your small business.
What is a Brand Board?
A brand board is typically a one-page visual guide that brings all your brand’s key design elements together. Think of it as a snapshot of your brand that serves as a quick reference guide for maintaining a consistent look and feel for your brand.
A brand board usually includes the following:
Logo – The primary logo and any variations (e.g., secondary logo, submark)
Color palette – A selection of colors that define your brand’s aesthetic
Typography – The fonts used for headlines, body text, and other contexts
Icons or graphics – Any additional design elements that add to your brand’s look
Brand voice or tagline – A short statement that captures your brand’s personality
Brand imagery & textures – Photos, patterns, or illustrations that reflect your brand’s style
A brand board is a document that guides all your branding efforts and decisions. Whether you're designing a website, creating a social media post, or working with a graphic designer, it helps to keep your business visually aligned.
The Benefits of a Brand Board
A brand board is more than just a pretty reference sheet—it’s a strategic tool that makes branding easier and more effective.
Here’s why it’s beneficial:
• Consistency across all marketing materials
Brand consistency is key to building recognition and trust with your audience. A brand board ensures that all your materials—business cards, social media graphics, presentations, and websites—maintain the same visual style. When a brand presents consistently across all channels, it builds credibility and professionalism among viewers.
• Stronger brand recognition
A consistent visual style helps your audience quickly recognize your brand. When your colors, typography, and design elements are used consistently, customers will begin to associate them with your business, increasing brand recall and trust.
• Easier collaboration with designers and content creators
A brand board provides clear guidelines for anyone working with your brand, including graphic designers, web developers, content creators, and marketers. For example, instead of writing numerous emails to go over font choices or colors, they can simply refer to the brand board. This ensures that all new work performed on your brand will visually align with your prior projects.
• Saves time and money
Without a brand board, you might find yourself making design decisions from scratch every time you create something new. This can be time-consuming and costly. A brand board eliminates the guesswork, allowing you to streamline your design process and focus on growing your business.
Helps your brand grow
As your business expands, your branding needs will grow too. A brand board acts as a foundation, making it easier to scale your brand while keeping it professional and recognizable. Whether you’re launching new products, hiring a team, or expanding to new platforms, your brand will stay consistent.
Why Every Small Business Needs a Brand Board
Many small business owners struggle with inconsistent branding—using different colors, fonts, and styles across various platforms. This lack of consistency can confuse customers and make your brand appear unprofessional.
A brand board helps small businesses by:
Keeping branding simple and organized – No more trying to remember which font or color you used last time.
Providing a clear roadmap – A brand board acts as a reference guide that you (or any designer you hire) can follow.
Creating a polished, professional image – Customers are more likely to trust a business that looks put-together and consistent.
Making future design projects easier – Whether it’s updating your website, designing ads, or creating new products, a brand board ensures a seamless transition.
For service-based small businesses in particular, a strong, consistent brand presence can be the difference between attracting your ideal clients and blending in with your competitors.
Why I include a brand board as well as a brand style guide in my branding packages
All of my branding packages also include a brand style guide. The style guide provides a detailed outline of how your business should present itself visually and verbally including elements, such as logo usage, color palette, typography, and imagery guidelines. Essentially, it acts as a rulebook to maintain consistency across all marketing materials and communications.
The length of a brand style guide varies depending on the package selected. For a mini brand identity, it is a one-page document. For a full brand identity, it typically consists of 10-12 pages, with additional pages as needed.
Your brand board, on the other hand, serves as a quick reference guide—it provides a visual overview of your brand style. When I offer branding packages for small businesses, I always include a brand board as a key deliverable.
Here’s why:
• It keeps outside service providers on the same page - Whether you work with a web designer, social media manager, or printer, a brand board ensures that everyone follows the same visual guidelines.
• It future-proofs your brand - As your business grows, you won’t need to rethink your branding from scratch. Your brand board serves as a long-term foundation.
• It saves you time and effort - Instead of repeatedly making design decisions (or trying to remember prior decisions), you can refer to your brand board to ensure everything stays consistent and professional.
• It helps the design process flow smoothly - During the design process, you can get a quick feel for the overall look of your brand style.
A brand board isn’t just an extra—it’s a critical tool that empowers you to present your business with confidence and save tons of time when creating visual content.
Without a brand board or style guide, it is difficult to create visual elements that authentically reflect your brand.
For example, a prospective client, Toronto Veterinary Cardiology, recently reached out to me with an existing logo but lacked other essential visual elements such as logo variations, a color palette, and fonts. She was struggling to build a website that aligned with her brand because these elements hadn’t been established. She was unsure about which color palette and fonts to use.
We ultimately worked together on a brand identity design project. Here is the final outcome with the brand style guide and brand board.
One-Page Brand Style Guide
A Brand Board
Conclusion
A brand board is one of the simplest yet most effective tools to ensure a consistent, professional, and recognizable brand. It helps small business owners streamline their branding efforts, making it easier to work with designers and maintain a polished look across all marketing channels.
If you’re investing in a professional brand identity design service, having a brand board included in your branding package option is a great decision. It provides a strong visual foundation that supports your business’s growth and success by keeping your brand consistent.
