Steps to Production Series-Branding
First impressions are everything. Having a strong brand identity is important to stand out from your competitors. As part of your brand image, your brand identity is the first step in visually communicating the essence of your brand to potential and returning customers.
While you are working on sourcing fabric and the To Do’s from my previous blog post HERE, it is a good time to start your brand identity. You will have some down time while you wait on swatches to arrive and communicate with fabric vendors.
Branding is just as important as your designs, fit and fabric to your overall sales. Your brand identity will be the story that links everything together to relate to the customer. While it may seem a bit premature to start your brand identity before you even have samples, I promise it’s not! Branding is something you want to rush.
First impressions are everything. Having a strong brand identity is important to stand out from your competitors. As part of your brand image, your brand identity is the first step in visually communicating the essence of your brand to potential and returning customers.
Before you start, find a time that you feel inspired and ask yourself some questions about your brand. What story do you want to tell? What inspires you to create this line? Who is your desired customer? What would you like your brand to represent? What words describe your brand? If you are doing a self branded line, ask yourself; who are you? What inspires you? What words would you use to describe yourself?
After you have had some time to put some thoughts on paper, you will want to decide on a brand name. This step should not keep you from moving forward. There is no “perfect” name. There are a ton of successful brands with less than amazing names. There is no right or wrong name but, I suggest making it something easy to remember, pronounce and READ. I have previously bought a dress, looked at the label to buy more from the brand only to find the label and brand name illegible, brands like that lose future business.
After you have found your brand name you can move into logo design, color palette, typefaces and taglines. These will be the standard for all your branding material. You want to be consistent in what your tagline is, the fonts you use and the colors on your website, hang tags, instagram, mailers, etc. Keeping consistent helps jog people's memories. At every tradeshow I do, I have a purple table cloth (many of you may have met me at one of these shows) and while they may not always remember me, they remember my purple tablecloth and matching dark chocolate purple hershey kisses.
Once your brand guidelines are developed, you branch out into designing your logo labels, hang tags, business cards and even packaging. The reason I always bring this to my clients attention so early on is because we do not want your logo labels to hold up production or your lack of packaging to prevent you from shipping your customer orders.
It is important to note that a factory will not start cutting your production until EVERYTHING has arrived at their facility. This includes your logo and care labels. If your factory has told you that your production will take 6 weeks to complete, that clock does not start until all supplies have been delivered. And coming up with your name, logo, color palette is important so best to do this upfront and not wait until you realize the factory is waiting on them!
The same goes for your packaging. This speaks to your customer experience. How do you want them to feel when your package arrives? Do you plan to have an unboxing experience? Are you avoiding using plastic here? It is also totally fine to say no to all of these questions, packaging can get expensive and it may be something you want to save money on. Plenty of brands ship in a simple poly bag and unbranded boxes.
Keep this information in one location so you can easily pass it to social media managers, web developers, and anyone else who will work on your branding.
Need help with branding? V.Mora Consulting can help guide you through the branding process with comprehensive templates, branding exercises and references to pinpoint and properly define your brand.
V.Mora offers branding services such as:
Brand Analysis
Brand Identity
Social Media Management
Social Media Strategy Package
Photoshoots
E-commerce shoots
For branding services please email vmorainquiry@vmora.com