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OWN IT

Advice and templates to ensure consistency

Your brand becomes the centre of your social universe. Once you've established who you want to present and created and identity to match then you need to
work on consistency.

BRAND MANUAL

The right and wrong ways to use your brand

Online Presence

 

The most important part to any brand is consistency. No matter where viewers come into contact with your brand it should be instantly recognizable. This helps build credibility in your brand and is an indicator that the viewer has found the right person.

 

Let's start with your online presence. When you set up a profile on your favourite social media sites you're asked to upload an image to represent you. This is where your identity should be placed. Each site displays your image differently so a couple of things to keep in mind:

 

  1. Whenever possible you should use the full identity including the name and graphic

  2. If the image is too small to see your name then only the graphic should be used. The sites will have an opportunity to crop your image so make sure you only show the graphic

  3. Some sites such as LinkedIn and Facebook let you place a background photo in your profile. This photo can be anything you like however we recommend finding a photo that represents your brand essence. This will help reinforce your brand and give it further credibility. To help we have made available a number of images that are formatted to optimize the provided space

  4. Identities created by Marblehead Creative are saved in a square format, this ensures that it doesn't get stretched or squashed when uploaded to a site.

To ensure consistency it is important that your brand identity always looks the same. Would you be confused if you drove up to a McDonalds and the arches were blue? 

 

Below are a few examples of what NOT TO DO with your identity.

Do not stretch logo

Do not compress logo

Do not change the location of elements

Do not change the font

Do not place logo over noisy backgrounds

Do not change the colour of elements

The business card

In today's world an online pressence is increasingly important but you still need to tell people where to find you. A business card is still the easiest and quickest way to communicate your brand. From chance meetings to interviews handing out a business card makes you look professional and shows confidence in your brand.

 

To start it is important to understand some of the technical details of a business card. If you're printing your own cards at home or using a printing service it is important that your card look professional. 

 

Here are a few terms you should know about business card printing:

BLEED

This refers to the area outside the trim area of a card. If you're using an image or colour that goes to the edge of your card you should scale it past the trim. This ensures when your card is cut you don't get white edges.

TRIM

This refers to the final size of your card. The standard card size is 2"x3.5"

SAFETY

This refers to the area on the card where your information  will be printed. When cards are cut, slight shifts can occur. To ensure your information won't be cut off it should be within the safety boarder.

Colours

When you print cards at home or through online services it is most likely that the colours will be CMYK (C=Cyan M=Magenta Y=Yellow K=Black). This means that tiny dots of each of the four colours combine to create all colours. This is a very affordable and convinient way of printing but there are a few things to keep in mind to get the best results.

 

What you see on screen isn't what you get in print: Digital screens are back lit and have different set ups, therefore it's impossible to have accurate colour compared to print. It is important to look at the values of the colours you're using when building them out of CMYK.

 

Let's look at green as an example. If you want a bright green then Cyan and Yellow should have the highest percentages and Magenta and Black should have little to no percentage. If you look at the circles below it gives you and idea of how a bright green becomes darker and muddier when adding more Black or Magenta.

 

You must remember that when it comes to printing the higher the percentages of ink the more dense the colour becomes

50% Black
100% Yellow
50% Magenta
100% Cyan

It might sound limiting when you're only using two colours to make up a third but adjusting the percentages allows you to make a wide range. If we again look at green you can see that we can go from yellow to teal simply by adjusting the percentages.

 

This is a good place to start when building a colour. Once you get the green you want then you can slowly introduce a Black or Magenta to achieve a darker tone.

 

The same can be said for Orange (Magenta+Yellow) Purple (Cyan+Magenta) etc... 

Some printers have the ability to use "Special" colours when printing cards. This refers to special inks that have been professionally mixed into an array of colours to choose from. The most popular colour system is Pantone®. They have a palette of thousands of colours to choose from and once you've selected one the ink is placed into the printing press to produce the final product. This is a more expensive way of printing but it ensures accuracy in the colours. 

 

If this option is in the budget then you should work with your printer to find the best results.

ONLINE ETIQUETTE

Thinking about what and how you communicate online

Should I target a specific audience with this message?

  1. Will anyone really care about this content besides me?

  2. Will I offend anyone with this content? If so, who? Does it matter?

  3. Is this appropriate for a social portal, or would it best be communicated another way?

  4. How many times have I already posted something today?
    (More than three can be excessive.)

  5. Did I spell check?

  6. Will I be okay with absolutely anyone seeing this?

  7. Is this post too vague? Will everyone understand what I’m saying?

  8. Am I using this as an emotional dumping ground? If so, why? Is a different outlet
    better for these purposes?

  9. Am I using too many abbreviations in this post and starting to sound like a teenager?

  10. Is this reactive communication or is it well thought-out?

  11. Is this really something I want to share, or is it just me venting?

 

Run through these 12 questions in your mind–before clicking “post.” Trust me–you’ll be happy you double-checked before sharing with the world.

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SOURCE: http://www.forbes.com/sites/ilyapozin/2013/01/09/social-media-etiquette-12-step-checklist/

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