Do you feel like your brand has lost it’s edge or your communication materials have become disjointed? We often hear from established companies who feel their branding has lost its way and they want to help refocusing their efforts to get their marketing communications back on track.
Businesses that ignore design are two thirds more likely to be competing on price in their market. If the perceived value in your business has fallen, improving your presentation and brand image is the first step in gaining it back.
Our tried and tested Brand Audit: Communications Health Check offers businesses a chance to gather some renewed focus around their branding without needing a costly rebrand. Here’s how it works:
1 › Research
First we need to understand what the components of your brand are, the visual language and all the different ways it is applied and communicated.
We take a full audit of your current branding and communication materials to get a complete overview of what your branding says about your business right now.
2 › Review
Armed with our research we will review your current branding materials,. stripping back all the distractions to identify it’s core parts:
Logo – If identity guidelines exist we will check how the different communications compare. Is the logo used consistently? Does it get cramped by other elements? Has it been modified and tweaked with extra type or new effects?
Character – What do you think about your brand? It’s essential to discuss how the key stakeholders in your business see the brand, what differences of opinion there may be and find any common ground. Our interviews help to form a complete understanding of the internal perception of your brand.
Strengths & Weaknesses – How are colours applied? What works best? What doesn’t? Have new typefaces been introduced and are they a success or just random? What is the quality of images used? If has boredom has set in you will quickly spot the distractions appearing in the graphics.
3 › Discover
The review stage helps us to identify the individual tools within the brand identity, this next step defines the best way of bringing them together.
What is the best way to apply the logo? Which colours work best? What’s the most effective way to use images? Regularly asking yourself these questions about the design will pay off later.
4 › Suggestions
Once we have recognised the most effective visual components of your brand and discovered the best way to use them, it’s time to go one step further.
We’ll take one or two of the communication materials from the initial research and testing out your findings will give you a clear context to compare how much more impact your new brand ideas may have. If there are any gaps, testing the new ideas on a sample of your communications will help to show you how small changes can make a big difference.
Want To Know More?
If you’d like to find out more about our Communications Audit service, or to see if we’re the right design agency for you, please drop us a line and we can have a chat.