Consistency Is What Makes a Brand a Brand

A logo isn’t a brand.

Neither is a color, a font, a website or a cool-looking business card.

Your brand is what people remember about you, and one of the biggest things that helps people remember you is consistency.

Think about some of the biggest brands in the world. You can probably recognize them without even seeing their name. You know the colors. You know the style. You know how their ads look. In some cases, you can practically tell who made the commercial before the logo ever shows up.

That doesn’t happen by accident.

Stop Reinventing Yourself Every Time You Make Something

I see this all the time.

A business gets a logo made.

Then somebody builds the website and uses completely different colors.

Then someone makes a flyer and decides another font looks better.

Then the Facebook page has another version of the logo.

Instagram looks different.

The business cards look different.

Six months later, everything technically belongs to the same company, but nothing looks like it came from the same company.

That’s a problem.

You shouldn’t have to put your logo gigantic across everything for somebody to recognize your business.

Ideally, they should see the colors, photography, layout or messaging and already have an idea who it came from.

That’s branding.

Pick Your Colors and Own Them

At record7, we have orange.

#ea7f2f.

I probably know that hex code better than I know some phone numbers.

Why?

Because we use it.

Again and again and again.

Website. Graphics. Buttons. Marketing materials. Print pieces. Social media.

Does that mean every square inch of everything we make needs to be orange?

Of course not.

It means there’s a visual connection between the things we put into the world.

Your business should have that too.

Pick a primary color palette and stick with it. You can have secondary colors and change things up when the design calls for it, but somebody shouldn’t wonder if they’re looking at the same company every time they see something new from you.

Your Logo Shouldn’t Have 47 Different Personalities

You can have different versions of a logo.

Horizontal.

Vertical.

Icon only.

Light version.

Dark version.

That’s normal.

But they’re still supposed to look like the same brand.

Don’t stretch it.

Don’t squash it.

Don’t change the font because somebody couldn’t find the original.

Don’t make it blue on Monday and purple on Thursday because purple looked cool on that particular flyer.

Your logo is one of the fastest visual connections someone has with your company.

Protect it.

Your Message Needs to Be Consistent Too

Brand consistency isn’t just visual.

How do you talk to customers?

Are you professional?

Casual?

Technical?

Funny?

Straight to the point?

There isn’t one correct answer. The important part is that it feels like you.

If your website sounds like a giant corporation, your social media sounds like a 19-year-old influencer and your emails sound like they were written by an attorney, customers are getting three different versions of your company.

Your message should change depending on where you’re using it, but the personality behind it should stay recognizable.

Photography Matters More Than People Think

This one gets overlooked.

You can have a great logo, great website and great colors, then fill the website with random stock photos that look nothing like your actual company.

Suddenly the whole thing feels generic.

Good original photography is one of the easiest ways to make a brand feel like a real business.

Your people.

Your building.

Your products.

Your projects.

Your customers.

Your city.

Those things belong to you.

Nobody else has those exact images.

And just like your colors and logo, your photography can have a consistent look and feel that becomes part of the brand.

Consistency Builds Trust

This is really what it comes down to.

People trust things they recognize.

When somebody visits your website after seeing one of your ads and everything matches, it feels right.

When they receive an email and it feels like the same company, it feels right.

When they see your truck, your business card, your Instagram post, your packaging or your sign and everything connects, your company starts feeling established.

Even a small business can look like a much larger organization when the branding is handled correctly.

And the opposite is true too.

A company can be around for 20 years and still look brand new if everything they produce looks disconnected.

You Don’t Need to Be Boring

Consistency doesn’t mean making the exact same graphic over and over.

Your brand can evolve.

You can try new ideas.

You can redesign things.

You can have fun.

But there should always be something tying it all together.

Think of it like your house.

You can move the furniture around. Paint a room. Hang new artwork. Remodel the kitchen.

It’s still your house.

That’s what good branding should feel like.

Give People Something to Remember

There are businesses competing for attention everywhere.

Online.

Email.

Social media.

Google.

Mailboxes.

Signs.

Phones.

Everywhere.

Most people aren’t going to remember every advertisement they see.

But if they keep seeing the same colors, same logo, same style and same message, eventually something starts to click.

“I’ve seen these guys before.”

That’s valuable.

Because recognition comes before familiarity.

Familiarity helps build trust.

And trust is a pretty important step toward somebody deciding to do business with you.

So pick a look.

Pick a voice.

Make it yours.

And then stick with it.

record7
Let’s build something.