This informal CPD article was provided by NewZapp Email Marketing. As a business, or organisation, you know how important your brand is to your identity. Your brand isn’t something which will have happened by accident, it will have evolved over time.
Consistent approach to Brand Marketing
The manner in which you present yourself to any audience reflects core values and requires a consistent approach. This is the case regardless of whether you are communicating to external or internal contacts, and to customers, suppliers, staff or stakeholders. Big budgets are spent working on the tool kits which guide every aspect – from tone of voice to colour palette, and trademarks to key phrases – and anyone designing on your behalf should appreciate that fact.
Branding Guidelines
Branding guidelines are a basic starting point for design and marketing work and material produced should never dilute or deviate from your brand. Instant recognition is key to recipient engagement; increasing the likelihood of the email being read, whilst improving and leveraging the trust bridge between employer and employee. This in turn helps improve the communication flow and ensure that important timely messages are read and understood.
For example, if an email sent to employees had a style not seen before in terms of it using colours more garish than those in the organisation palette, and with content written in a font style not used in other material, then it would run the risk of not being taken seriously.
The chances are that recipients would assume this to be a maverick email, e.g. one sent by a person or department that isn’t working as a team with management and worse still, is a rogue or counterfeit communication. Similarly, a company might offer a download of product information. Unless this in line with other branded materials the decision to buy could be seriously hampered by a presentation which is of poor quality and unlike other branded work.
Branded Material Checks
Here are 8 checks to consider when producing or commissioning branded material:
1. Is the tone of language in keeping with guidelines?
2. Is it written in the correct tense?
3. Does the call to action or overriding message portray the brand with positivity?
4. Is the material objective or has a personal angle crept in?
5. Have the correct assets been used in terms of logos, strapline?
6. Is text in the brand font and colour?
7. Does the brand have the rights to use any accompanying images?
8. Is this the very best impression you could make on your audience?
As a brand develops it’s advisable to curate a collection of a range of communication examples to refer back to and to show to designers and marketers working for you. An online storage application like DropBox is useful for this purpose, and for quick and easy distribution to specific others.
Brand Protection – quick summary
If in doubt… don’t publish or distribute yet. Even if a deadline is looming, make time to revisit, refine and reflect on the bigger picture until you are happy with the final version and that it will create results.
We hope this article was of help. For more information on brand protection from NewZapp Email Marketing please visit their CPD member directory page. Alternatively please visit the CPD Industry Hubs for more information.
