When It Comes to Your Brand, Design Matters!
When It Comes to Your Brand,
Design Matters!
by, Clayton Marsh, HCS Partner, Brand Design Strategist & Creative Director
We all know that design matters – but it’s easy to forget to review your brand regularly when you’re in the throes of the day-to-day running of your business. HCS Creative Director, Clay Marsh, excels at helping companies of all sizes create or refresh brand and marketing assets to tell their story, visually. Here he lays out why he’s so passionate about great design.
To market effectively in today’s hyper-fast marketplace, your brand needs to be solid, up-to-date, and able to communicate a vision of who you are – all in microseconds. It’s no overstatement to say that the way you look is how you’re perceived, and this is true in across every channel, for every product, and in every interaction.
Is your brand up to the task?
Great design elevates your brand
For more than 25 years, I’ve have the honor of working as a creative partner with many of the world’s most recognized brands in retail, technology, custom manufacturing, OEM and graphic communications. And in all these years designing, guiding, collaborating and strategizing, nothing stands out more than the need to maintain a quality brand presence that meets the evolving needs of your marketplace.
Your brand plays a critical role in building perception about who your company is. This includes what you offer, your ability to deliver quality products and services, whether you employ state-of-the-art technology, your level of professionalism and ability to personalize – even your overall value proposition. What resonated with your target audience five years ago may not work with today’s buyers. .
More Than Just a Logo
I’ve worked with a lot of great international brands – but not all of them had the tools necessary to compel engagement. All the pieces, from your brand identity, logo and tagline to brand colors to imagery (that shows the work you do and highlights your company), from printed collateral to the web and outbound campaigns, all have to be synchronized and working together. When your brand is on target, it communicates in a visceral way that potential clients can trust you to deliver because you’ve articulated a common purpose or vision that is shared by everyone in the company.
The Science of Emotion1
Neuro-imagery shows that consumers primarily use emotions rather than factual information when evaluating brands. Their emotional engagement is affected by a number of scientific principles that correspond with content creation.Here are four key areas:
- – Design
- – Color
- – Images
- – Branding
Brands need to make sure they’re using all the tools in their palette to resonate on a meaningful, emotional way with consumers. This is true for both your internal brand personality and the public-facing work you execute for clients.
1 http://contentmarketinginstitute.com/2016/10/art-science-emotional-engagement/
Your Brand Is a Selling Tool
Great brand design allows customers to learn about you, ask deeper questions, and see opportunities for a partnership that will help their company grow. And this applies to everything you deliver:
- – Email marketing
- – Websites and landing pages
- – Presentations and brochures
- – Videos
- – Facility tours
- – Social media channel design
All of these channels are different ways to tell your story and affirm your value and capabilities.
Our team has deep marketing expertise in the graphic communication, custom manufacturing and OEM marketplaces, having worked with nationally recognized brands and their creative teams to drive marketing at every phase. This experience has allowed us to reshape many brands, make them more relevant, and modernize how they market and reach their desired customers by integrating precise brand design at every phase and in every channel.
Key Areas to Consider
1) A great brand is scalable, fluid, and tells a story that differentiates you from your competitors.
2) It is in harmony with the voice you use to tell stories.
3) It is honest and personable, and consistent across any tool or platform (internal or external).
So how can you evaluate your brand’s performance? Getting an outside perspective can be a huge advantage. At HCS we regularly review brands, audit their assets and selling tools, refine target personas – even research competitors – and deliver our insights in a confidential report.
Make an appointment with Clayton Marsh to discuss what HCS can help you achieve.
Brand Example: PSP (PSP Retail – Atlanta GA.)
“When it was time for PSP to update our brand and take it to the next level we engaged HCS. From the beginning, HCS was careful to understand exactly who we are and who we serve as a company. They didn’t try to make us look like other printing companies but came up with a look and feel completely different from any company in the industry. Every time we engage them they do a great job managing our brand standards and delivering creative concepts that fall right in line with our look and feel. At PSP, we can’t imagine working with another company as we continue to enhance our brand and stand out against the competition.”
– Robbie McDaniel, CEO / President PSP Retail, Atlanta GA.
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Clayton Marsh, HCS Partner, to Learn More About INSTANT ON! Opportunities.
