“Clients seeking an identity often think what they want is a logo. But this is like acquiring a personality by buying a hat.”
—Michael Bierut

We have said it before and we’ll say it again: Your brand is not your logo. Even the visual aspect of your brand is not just your logo. At Redhead, we invest much time and effort to develop a brand that is the embodiment of our client’s mission—a brand that speaks to the core audience it needs to reach. When we build a brand, we consider how it may grow and evolve alongside the organization it represents. That includes creating a language, strategy, and visuals that can be built upon and expanded.

We’ve found it can be particularly intimidating for clients to begin to expand the visual language of a brand after it has left our hands, likely because each client has varying amounts of skills and resources available to them. It is fairly common for our clients to not have an in-house team of creatives. If this sounds like you, don’t fret! We work hard to develop tools and assets that work for each individual client. Of course that means the deliverables look different for each project, but in the end the most valuable asset is your brand book.

Your brand book spells out your mission, vision, values, audience, tone of voice, etc. All the good stuff. It also contains the graphic elements that make up the visual language of your brand. Each and every one of those items has been considered with a holistic approach and crafted to meet your needs. Our goal is to create a seamless brand, rather than one that was designed in silos. Reflect on the time and effort you’ve invested in a rebrand, and seek to understand why the decisions were made. Ask questions, clarify rules, and request adjustments to the language of the guidelines if it is not clear. You’ll find there is a reason your brand has been developed to look the way it does. Your mission was considered. Your audience was considered. Long-term growth was considered.

If you seek to properly uphold the brand you’ve invested in, turn to your brand book. As time goes on, consulting your brand book will help you make mission-led decisions to expand your brand. With every choice you make, you want to strengthen your brand voice, not distract from it. As tempting as it might be to resort to clip art, it almost never helps you speak to your audience in an impactful way.