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Updated corporate style guide
I have just read a memo from a client’s supplier about an update to their corporate style guide.
The article explains the value of the style guide, with comments such as “maintaining a consistent look and feel to all materials was crucial in maintaining a positive and lasting impression of the organisation.”
Comprehensive style guide
Putting the elements together for a brand
As is often the case, the article discusses the design elements of the brand (such as where the logo goes on letterheads, forms and advertising). Designers often prepare (or advice on) a style guide that is actually a design style guide; a comprehensive corporate style guide will include all elements of the brand style such as spelling and punctuation conventions and writing style.
They also make the mistake of using the word brand instead of logo – brand is so much more than a logo.
For true consistency, a style guide must include everything. It can then be split into components for specific uses – such as pulling out the website design section for a web designer or the logo and colours for a form designer.
Logo guidelines
In case you are working on your style guide, here are some of the key points this article mention about use of their logo to get you thinking more broadly.
- only use the logo in provided formats and colours
- use the logo only once in corporate documents
- use the entire logo (i.e. don’t split the image from the text)
- never print other images or word over the logo
- logo must be prominent
- unless using a provided template, get approval from {name} before using logo in external materials
Have you considered all those issues for your logo and included them in a style guide?
Branding is in the details
Branding is a big subject, covering how you use your logo through to how you give a presentation. But did you know that the words you use in documents, on websites and in presentations also form part of your brand?
For instance, if your brand is to be young and funky, you don’t want web copy that reads “In our experience, prospective partnerships are best developed through a commonality of interests…”
Some factors to consider to ensure your written communications enhance your brand are:
- using language to suit the audience you want to attract
- use Australian spelling and conventions if your brand is ‘Australian owned’
- point of view – do you say ‘you’ or ‘clients’?
- how do you write the business name? Can you abbreviate it under certain circumstances?
- the tone – casual, formal, academic, legal
- the focus – business people, families, students, employers, professionals, etc
This can all come into preparing a style guide, too.
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