Why A Corporate Identity is Important
You want to make sure your business impresses everywhere it is seen. One way it can do this is with a corporate identity.
The way in which you present your brand says a lot about you. The professional image of your company conveys a lot of information to your customers, stakeholders and even your employees.
Corporate image is the perception of a company by anyone who comes across it. A corporate identity plays an important role in forming those perceptions. A corporate identity is a means by which those perceptions are determined.
All companies, regardless of size, can benefit from a having a corporate identity. It will help to express your company ethos and differentiate you from the competition. A corporate identity is the visual manifestation of your brand that represents the personality and values of your company. And by manifestation I mean the tangible component of your brand.
The components that make up a corporate identity are various. It will typically include corporate stationery such as a logo, business cards, letterheads, envelope, corporate folder, email signature, compliment slips and pamphlets. But it can comprise so much more, such as, pens, notebooks, DVDs, badges, t-shirts, caps, packaging and social media covers. Even your office space and company vehicles.
A corporate identity is more than just business cards and letterheads though. Fonts, colours, graphic elements, icons, shapes are equally all vital components.
So how exactly does having a strong corporate identity help you and your business? It makes you look important. It infers credibility. It imparts trustworthiness. It makes your company look more prestigious. But, even more than that, it is a proponent by which to institute consistency in the applications of your brand.
If you walk into any bank branch, you will notice how the use of colours, fonts and imagery is the same no matter what branch you are in. All those elements infer distinctiveness to that particular bank over other banks. The bank’s corporate identity is an essential component of its overall corporate image and brand. A professionally crafted corporate identity helps standardise your brand’s representation across various media. It also helps establish consistency in your organisation’s use of colours, fonts and imagery.
Shouldn’t the way in which your business is perceived be the same no matter whether it’s in print, on social media and even internally within your employees? You definitely want the same brand design to extend across all of your branding materials.
A corporate identity assures that your company can be recognised and remembered. Don’t you want to be confident that when your company sends out communications that it is immediately evident who it’s from? Just from a quick glance, people ought to know it’s you who is sending them an email, a flyer, a letter and so on.
Using a corporate identity for all your communications helps to impart your brand into the minds of your audience so that they assimilate it. You are not going to have the benefit, like Nike, of a large advertising and marketing budget. But you can make use of something far less expensive to help form favourable perceptions of your company whilst creating awareness for it. And that is a corporate identity.
It is always going to take multiple impressions for consumers to assimilate your brand. Therefore, it is imperative that your communications all look like the same in order to reinforce brand recognition. Putting a corporate identity in place really does make it a lot easier and convenient every time you send out any emails, announcements or flyers. If every time your fonts and graphic elements changed, how are people going to recognise that it is you whenever they see any of your messages?
Another benefit of using a corporate identity is that it truly is a cool way to energise and drive engagement with your brand. An awesome looking letterhead with your logo is going to look far more impressive than just a plain letter. Imagine receiving a letter and the envelope design is bold and striking. You would not hesitate to open it to find out what’s inside.
A corporate identity communicates the personality of your company. It says whether you are conservative, quirky, retro or chic. Think of the way in which a skateboard company is different from a law firm. That skateboard company is going to express themselves in a very different way than that of the law firm.
In Conclusion
- Imparts a distinctive look to your company
- Elicits a positive perception
- Expresses the personality of your company
- Represents your company’s ethos
- It bestows credibility and professionalism to your business or organisation
- A professionally crafted corporate identity helps standardise your brand’s representation across various media
- Helps to establish consistency in your organisation’s use of colours, fonts and imagery
- Is a fun way to engage with customers
What should you have as part of your CI? A good place to start would be with the logo, business cards, letterhead, email signature and social media cover (especially if you don’t have a website yet). You could always add more as you need it and as your business grows.
Getting a corporate identity and corporate stationery is really easy. Team up with me to design your logo (if you don't already have one) and you corporate stationery, your corporate fonts and colours. I offer a variety of corporate identity packages. Click the button below to contact me.
