Text reads: Craft your brand intentionally

Having a consistent brand is something that a lot of people aspire to have.

It matters. 

This is because if you see the same things over and over again, then those things are going to stick in your mind and you’re gonna remember what they were. You’ll remember which business it was. You’re gonna recognise the Cadbury‘s colour purple, the Virgin colour red – you’ll see things in terms of brand colours, even though it’s just a colour.

Colour is very powerful. Read more about colour here. 

Colour creates recognition, which is what we’re all aspiring to achieve, because if you create recognition, then that’s when people realise who you are and they know who you are so you can help them to understand even more about who you are and connect with them even more.

I have a five-step process for this, which I call the 5 R’s.

It’s about being consistent so that ultimately you can reach the results that you are aiming to achieve with your brand.

The first step is REPETITION, which is what consistency is. It’s about repeating the same things over and over again. You may have heard me say this before in different ways, because this is a message that I’ve spoken about multiple times – that’s because I know how important it is. I know that if you can get into people’s minds and help them to know who you are, they remember you. Then when they need the thing that you do, you’ll be the person that they go to. Or one of the people that they look at when they’re making that decision.

Being consistent helps you to get to that place.

It helps people to be able to start seeing your brand and recognising that it’s you. If they’re on Instagram and they see your post and it’s got your colours in they go, “Oh, that’s such and such” and they’re going to stop and have a look and see what it is you’ve got to say.

It’s about achieving that recognition, which won’t happen without repetition. You can create a phrase that might start to stick in people’s minds like Nike, “Just do it”. There’s so many different things that you can create with intention and repeat on purpose that are going to help people to then move on to the next R, which is…  RECOGNISE.

This is where they’re going to know who you are. And that’s the reason why we do it.

When I’m talking about repeating things over and over again and being consistent with those things, I don’t just mean always put the same colours out or always do the same thing every Tuesday. What I’m talking about is being really repetitive with your message, with who you are speaking to, with what it is that you’re telling them with those visuals, with your message, with your brand purpose, with being really focused on what your mission and your vision are. It’s about being really clear on your brand strategy so that you can get to where you want to go and so that you know what it is that you’re trying to say on the way there. 

You are being consistent with the pieces that make up your brand strategy – your values, your positioning, everything that matters that helps you to get to the next step – so that people know that it’s you and so that you are putting out the right content, the right words, the right imagery. You’re really working to craft your brand intentionally rather than just slapdash throw anything out and see what happens.

The more intentional you are, the stronger your brand is going to be.

If you can be intentional on repeat, then that’s going to help people to recognise you and to know who you are and then they’re going to start to RESONATE with you and with your brand. They’re going to say, “Oh, I feel like this”, and “Oh, I recognise that idea” and “yes, I really like this”.

And that’s the point where you are really speaking directly to your ideal customer and they know who you are and they feel like you know who they are, which is even more important. It’s about them understanding that you can help them.

If you are being intentional on repeat and they are starting to recognise you, then they’re going to start to notice you more. That resonating step is really important because that’s all about connection, that’s all about them thinking, “yeah, this person really gets me, they really understand where I am” – you may have been there before – or maybe you haven’t been there, but you know a bit of what it’s like because you’ve had so many conversations with other people that were in that same position.

Once you are being repetitive, and people recognise you and resonate with you – they’re going to start to REMEMBER you. Maya Angelou said “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” This is what comes through in the resonating part.

That’s going to help people then to remember you and know who you are and feel good things about your brand, which is the entire point – emotions are so important. So if you’ve got that step-by-step process over to them, really resonating with you and then remembering you, that’s going to help you move on to the final, section of the 5 R’s, which is RESULTS.

Results are not always about money. When you think about business. We’re always thinking money, money, money, money. But often results can be things like commenting on your posts, sending you messages, having conversations, and you might do some of these things, alongside some of the other parts of the 5 R’s. 

They might start to like your posts and share your posts and read every single blog post, listen to every single podcast you put out, they may start to refer you to other people that they know who are going to be benefit from what you do. They might buy from you. You might end up with some new friends. That’s quite a nice result that you can get as well.

They might sign up to your email list, they might come along to an event that they know you’re going to be at. They might buy a ticket to hear you speak somewhere. They might decide that they want to explore working with you at your entry point level – whatever the smallest way they can work with you is and then start to step that up.

They might join your free group.

There are so many different things that can be results. So just look at all of those things.

They’re all really good results.

We need to celebrate them all.

And a lot of those things can go alongside the process. They might join your free group because they realise they need what you have to offer when they see your post. But through being in there, they might start to recognise you more and resonate with you more and feel like they are prepared to move further along in their buyer journey or a journey where they become one of your best referrers, or they are people who shout about you the loudest, even if they don’t buy. 

Brand consistency is about being repetitive so that you will be recognised, so that people will resonate with you, so they’ll remember you and so that you will get results in your business. It’s about popping you into other people’s minds so that they don’t forget who you are.

It’s about other people knowing that you were the right person for them or knowing that you were the right person for somebody else that they know and feeling a connection with you and your business and how that’s going to help them. Being consistent is really important if you want those things to happen because it’s going to allow people to be able to recognise you and to be able to resonate with you and to see what you have to offer.

If we think about it from a visual perspective, a lot of this is messaging, a lot of this is thinking about the kind of things that you’re going to say, the kind of things that are going to be useful to the people you’re speaking to. But there is, of course an element of using your visuals to help you to stand out and be consistent.

It’s really important to use the right colours – the same colours over and over again.
It’s really important to use the same fonts over and over again.
It’s really important to use the same style of photography over and over again.

This helps people get a feel for what your brand looks like and then when they see something you’ve put out, which could be on socials or on a banner, an advert in a magazine, in a brochure on a poster or on the back of a bus – they’ll know it’s you before they even read the copy.

There are so many different places that your brand can be visible and when you’re thinking about all of those places, you need to have that constant that runs through them.

Thinking about that and getting your visuals sorted out is going to really help you. It helps shortcut that whole process because people aren’t coming across you showing up differently here, there and everywhere – they’re going to start to relate your brand colours, your brand fonts to you, and they’ll start to notice you quicker because of that consistent visual image that you have. So that is why it’s a really good idea to be consistent with your brand. 

I always say it’s about making decisions and sticking to those decisions, but I know that that is also quite hard to do. If you do find that hard, then it’s about writing it down and storing it somewhere where you can get hold of it and you can know that you’ve got all of that in a place where you can refresh your memory really regularly so you don’t forget. 

And not including new things ‘just because’.
And then keeping them ‘just because’.

Being really intentional with those new elements that you might add into your visuals and your message means asking yourself; is this a good idea? Is this going to help me find my ideal client? Is this something that they’re going to really benefit from?

Once you start introducing something new in that’s going to take a little while of building up consistently for people to start to recognise it’s going to dilute what you already have because you’re adding more of something else. And until people get used to that, your brand won’t be quite so strong. Be intentional.

A strong brand is more consistent and more memorable. It will work for you to help you create the results you’re looking for.

If you feel that you need extra support with having a consistent brand, there’s a few different ways that I’d love to be able to support you with that. You can:

Amy Purdie, The Brand Explorer takes you on an Adventure to discover what your brand is all about, helping you with your brand strategy, brand visuals and content ideas. You can join Amy’s Brand Success Club or join her in your very own Private Brand Adventure.

Amy has been enjoying designing logos, brand identities, illustration, print work and websites – since 2007 fuelled mainly by tea and chocolate.

Discover the 12 Steps to Brand Bravery

Fill in your own brand map to see how Confidence + Clarity = Brand Bravery.

You'll also get other emails with helpful information relating to branding, offers, giveaways and useful stuff! You can unsubscribe anytime (of course).