What are brand guidelines (and why do I need them)?
You’ll hear the term “brand guidelines” used a lot in conversations regarding the content for your website. Brand guidelines are a set of clearly defined rules that set out the look, feel and voice of your brand. But why are they so important?
In my day to day work as a content writer, I use brand guidelines all the time. They help me get a good idea of what kind of language a brand wants me to use - formal, chatty, inspirational, understanding etc, and who their target audience is. But that’s not to say that all of the brands I work with have an actual written set of guidelines that influence the way I write. Sometimes I need to look over their website to garner that information for myself.
But brand guidelines run deeper than that. They’re more intricate than simply a tone of voice.
So what exactly are brand guidelines?
Brand guidelines explained
Brand guidelines can be broadly split into two different sections - those pertaining to your visuals, and those relating to your written content.
Visual brand identity
Let’s take your visuals first. These are normally developed by a designer and include your colour palette, logo, typography and the type of imagery you use. Incidentally, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with using stock images on your website. We’ve most certainly moved on from the days of woman laughing alone with salad - stock images now are generally pretty good, and affordable.
Your colour palette will include the hex codes of your primary and secondary colours. A hex code is a universal six digit alphanumeric code that stands for a particular colour. For example, you’ll see my primary and secondary colours are pink and green - but not any old pink and green. Each has its own hex code to denote the exact shade that I use on my website, business cards, email signature and even my printed reusable tote bag and water bottle.
Your logo is best designed by a graphic designer, unless you’re great at Canva, and your typography is the font or typeface that you use. Imagery means the pictures you use, and how they’re styled. Do you use black and white, are your headshots professional LinkedIn style, or are they more relaxed, do you have a theme running through your site? Using me as an example again, you can see that I use greenery and houseplants a lot, along with clean, white desk shots.
Content identity guidelines
Your content guidelines will cover the finer detail of your written content, such as…
Tone of voice - are you formal or informal, chatty, warm, caring
Do you use bullet points and do you capitalise each point and add a full stop
Do you use contractions, for example you’ve, we’ve, it’ll etc
Do you capitalise headings, or do you use sentence case
Do you use the Oxford comma
Do you use hyphens
… which might all sound a bit detailed. But guess what? Content is all about detail!
Why are brand guidelines important?
Consistency. We’re shown content all the time, and whether we realise it or not, we’re taking it in. Therefore, you want your brand to stand out amongst all the noise.
Having a consistent brand identity, i.e. your look and feel and tone of voice will help your fans, customers and potential customers recognise you, wherever they come across you. Be that on your website, socials or email communications, in print or in person in your bricks and mortar. This will ultimately help you build a strong relationship with your customers. And that’s really what it’s all about.
Can a content writer help me with my brand?
Sure we can! In all honesty, having a set of content guidelines makes our job more efficient. I have notes upon notes of which clients use the Oxford comma, which hyphenate, which don’t like too many bullet points and which prefer capitalising their headings and titles. I can refer to each one as I start to write as a reminder, and there’s no ambiguity. (This is also the reason why sticking to one writer, or a small pool of them, is better for you. All of your content will be consistent. Trust me, your writer will know how you like things, it’s their job to know.)
If you don’t have brand guidelines for your content, and you haven’t really given them much thought, ask your content writer to create some for you and allow your voice to come to life.
There’s no right or wrong. How you put yourself on show to your customers is entirely up to you. Quite like the idea of formal, instructional content? Go for it. Prefer something a little more casual? Be my guest.
The important thing is that they mean something to you and that they’re consistent.
So, whether you have a well established set of brand guidelines, or you’re not sure where to start, let me help. Drop me a line and let’s get branding.
