16 common branding terms every online business owner should know.
So you’ve heard the word “branding” used in about a thousand different contexts and in reference to different things… and right about now you’re probably thinking that you just don’t get it.
Maybe you’ve tried to hire a designer and been confused by some of the language they use. Or maybe you’ve tried to DIY your own branding but you’re stuck on what to search for.
If that’s you, I’ve put together a little guide full of some of the most common branding terms - and what they mean in the context of online business. No fancy jargon, just plain English!
Plus, I’ve put together a handy PDF of all the definitions, PLUS 7 extra logo specific definitions for you to download so that you never have to feel like an idiot or go searching for the right words ever again. You can grab it below!
1. Brand / Branding
First things first - let's talk about brands and branding in general. Some people tend to use the words “business” and “brand” interchangeably, which isn’t exactly wrong, but it can be confusing. I like to think about it like this: you run the business, but your customers or clients interact with the brand.
Your brand is the look, feel and personality of your business. It defines the experience your customer or client will have with you or your products. Think of it as the distinctive character that sets you apart from your competition.
As for “branding” - you might hear it used as a verb, to describe the process of creating a brand. People also occasionally use it to describe all of their branded materials or resources collectively.
2. Personal Branding
If I asked you to name a brand off the top of your head, it would probably be a large company. Businesses like these have built brands in the traditional sense - the brand itself is the recognisable face of the company. On occasion, the general public might know the CEO - like Steve Jobs and Tim Cook (Apple) or Jeff Bezos (Amazon). But ultimately, the brand is representative of the business and the products, not of any one person. This is how branding has been done traditionally, and you might hear it referred to as corporate branding.
But if you’re operating online as a solopreneur, or even if you’re building a small team, chances are, you’re building a personal brand. If your name is on the business, if your face is in all of your content or on your website, if you send emails from yourself rather than the company, or if most of your followers or customers know and trust you and for that reason, trust and buy your products or programs, you’re building a personal brand.
It’s much easier to build a connection online with a real person than a faceless company, and for that reason you’ll notice that a lot of entrepreneurs in online business choose to build personal brands, even if they have a team of people working underneath them.
3. Brand Strategy
Think of your brand strategy like a roadmap that will help your ideal customer or client find and buy into what it is you’re selling. It’s an analysis of your target customers or clients, how to best meet their needs through your offering, and how to put your offer to them in a way that resonates. It will inform why you choose certain visual elements, which platforms you choose to produce content for, what sort of language you use on your sales page, and more.
4. Brand Value
Your brand value, or value proposition is the unique benefit, advantage or transformation that you provide or create for your customers or clients. It’s the magic of what you actually do for them, and being able to communicate this value is one of the biggest challenges of building an effective brand.
Not to be confused with brand values, which we’ll touch on a bit later in this post.
5. Brand Identity
Now, this might not strictly be a definition, but I want to touch on brand identity for a moment because you might hear it from time to time. I tend to find that when people say it, they mean one of two things:
The brand in general, as in the look, feel and personality, OR
Brand Visuals (specifically, the visual identity)
You’ve already read the definition for brand/branding, and brand visuals are up next. Personally, I would make the argument that for our purposes here, the difference between the brand and the brand identity is negligible, you can typically use them interchangeably. The visual identity on the other hand is where we start to get more specific. Let’s take a look.
6. Brand Visuals / Visual Identity
As a designer, to me, this is the fun part! Brand Visuals (sometimes called your brand’s visual identity) are all the design components that represent your brand. This includes your logo, color palette, typography & fonts, photography, and other design elements, and how they work together as a whole to represent your brand. You see them in action on your website, your promotional graphics, social media icons and banners, and in your content.
Your visual identity is a heavy hitter when it comes to first impressions. We’ve all passed by a store without even going in because it didn’t “look” like our kind of vibe before. Likewise, we’ve all been drawn into a place purely because of how it looked from the outside. In online business, we want to strategically create a visual identity that helps to engage the right people and allow the “bad fit” customers or clients to pass on by.
7. Logo
A logo is the visual mark that represents your business. In traditional, corporate spaces, the logo is typically intended to become the main identifying mark of the brand - if you’re Apple, or Nike, people should know who you are from your logo alone.
In online business it’s a little different - a well designed set of logos can be beneficial to you in creating your visual identity and building out your collateral (more on that later) - but you’re probably more likely to be recognised for your face, voice, products or programs, particularly if you’re building a personal brand.
But back to the logos for a second - there are a bunch of different types of logos, and if you’re planning to work with a designer to create one, it can be helpful to know what they’re talking about. I've put together a little guide for you with definitions of different kinds of logos, why you might want to use each type, and examples of each so that you can get an understanding of what might work for you!
Grab that here!
8. Mood Board
A mood board is a collage of existing imagery that establishes the look and feel of a brand’s visual identity in the early stages of development. This is often a first step for many designers as it helps to ensure that the designer and client are on the same page.
When I work with clients, I create a mood board based on their brand strategy session and present it along with the complete strategy. This allows them to see how the proposed visual direction ties in with the strategy and why we’re choosing to include certain visual elements. From there, they have an opportunity to provide feedback before we move on to the brand development stage.
9. Collateral
“Collateral” items are typically all of the marketing materials or other items that are “branded” with your visual identity. In a traditional space you might think of business cards, letterheads, product packaging, stickers, labels, thank you cards, and more.
In the online space, I typically categorize them as templates (or finished items!) for things like social media graphics, pdf documents, presentation slide decks, video thumbnails, and more.
10. Revisions
If you speak with a designer or encounter a design contract, the concept or ‘revisions’ will probably come up. Basically, revisions are a designer term for ‘rounds of changes’. This tells you how many times you can request changes for each design element before your designer will have to start charging you extra. Most designers work ‘revisions’ into the price of your quote so that you don’t have to pay more each time you ask for something to be changed.
11. Style Guide
A style guide is like the brand rule book for everyone working in the business. It provides detailed instructions on how to use all of the elements that make up the brand’s visual identity consistently and correctly. It includes guidelines for logo usage, typography, colors, photography, and may extend beyond the visual identity to cover the brand values, personality, voice, and more.
Some designers will provide a condensed version of a style guide called a “brand board” - this is usually an image or one pager with all of the main brand elements represented.
12. Brand Values
Brand values are the core principles and beliefs that guide decision making and define a brand’s character. They’re the standards that you run your business by. If you’re building a personal brand, your brand values and personal values will probably have some overlap.
13. Atmosphere/Personality
Your brand atmosphere or personality is your brand's vibe. It's the set of human characteristics and traits you assign to the brand, like sincerity, excitement, competence, or sophistication. Having a set of keywords that describe this personality can be a really helpful tool to measure the effectiveness of the other elements of your brand. If you chose sophistication, are your visuals sophisticated? Is your strategy targeting people who identify with being sophisticated?
You can look at almost every part of your brand, and decide whether they communicate that atmosphere or personality.
14. Brand Voice
Your brand voice is your unique way of speaking. It's the tone, language, and style used in your messaging to connect with the target audience and convey your brand's personality. Your voice is what comes across every time someone hears you on video, reads an email from you, or flicks through your website or social media. Most personal brands will use their own natural voice, but in some cases, brand voice can be manufactured to best fit the client or customer’s expectations.
15. Brand Consistency
It might sound self explanatory, but consistency really is key in branding. A lot of people know to keep their brand visuals consistent, or at least know they should be, but there’s just as much value in keeping your value and voice. Showing up consistently and getting in front of people in a way that they recognise and resonate with will do wonders for your brand and business growth.
16. Re-branding
A re-brand is a significant change to the brand as a whole. You might change the name of the business, the logo, the visual identity, voice, messaging, and more. This typically happens or becomes necessary to adapt to significant changes in the business or market.
For example, it’s not uncommon for some online businesses to re-brand from their own name to a company name once they reach a certain size, to allow themselves to take a step back from being the face of the business.
Alternatively, some founders wish to keep their personal brand, but no longer have the time to create and control all of the brand on their own. Often, they need the help of a brand designer to craft not only an upgraded version of their brand, but to put in place guidelines for the rest of their team to follow without their constant input.
It’s possible to do a brand refresh without completing an entire re-brand, and I recommend doing this every so often to keep things up to date. I commonly work with clients on projects that could be considered more of an update or a refresh without changing the entire identity of the brand.
That’s a wrap! If there are any other terms or branding concepts that you’ve heard along the way and not quite understood, let me know down in the comments and I’ll do my best to explain them for you.
And if you want to learn more about logos and the types of logos that might benefit you, don’t forget to grab your free guide.
See you in the next one!
Emily Banks
