Developing a corporate identity for your business or organisation is a service that can be extremely in-depth or quite simple. The main focus should be a visual look and feel that translates across all corporate material, from your logo, business cards and letterheads to website and product display. Your identity is a visual reinforcement of your brand, establishing recognition, and promoting your business to future success.
How can you maintain consistency of your corporate identity?
Developing a corporate styleguide helps to protect your identity from manipulation or inconsistent use. The added benefit of a styleguide is to improve the recognition and longevity of your brand. Internal use provides access ‘in-house’ to staff, or an external example might be providing a copy to your print suppliers. A styleguide may be a printed document or may be supplied online or via PDF, and can be simple or advanced depending on your requirements.
You may include details of many design components such as:
- Logo use – allowed and prohibited use
- Business cards and letterhead layouts
- With compliments slips
- Presentation folders
- Powerpoint / slideshow presentation graphics
- Exhibition graphics such as banner-stands
- Signage and displays
- Website layouts and email campaigns
- Newspaper and magazine layouts
- Logo and supporting colour breakdowns
Many years ago a corporate styleguide could be a huge, forbidding, ringbound volume. These days you’re more likely to encounter a PDF document, or perhaps a section of the company website.
Whether you have a set styleguide with rules and regulations, or just an existing look and feel to work with, [and assuming that you want to continue with it] your designer should create work that speaks the same language as your previous material.