One common question we receive at With Grace and Gold is: How do you uncover my brand? If I’m simply providing responses to a questionnaire, how is my brand actually determined? While we can only speak on behalf of our business — at With Grace and Gold, your brand is determined using a blend of your values and approach as a business, our expertise, and your goals. As your designers, we create visuals and communicate visually on behalf your business — ensuring your brand effectively, clearly, and confidently communicates your values and approach — and lays a foundation for your growth and success. Today, we’re sharing 5 questions for uncovering your brand — 5 questions you can answer to begin curating the building-blocks for a strong, purpose-driven, and long-lasting brand.

5 Questions for Uncovering Your Brand

A brand can be defined in many ways — it can be your approach to serving your clients and customers, the language or verbiage you use within your business to describe your products, services, or process, how your audience experiences or perceives your business, or the visual elements representing your business, like videography, photography, or logo design. 

Today, we’re going to focus solely on design — the visual foundation for your business. As an example, through With Grace and Gold’s brand design process, you’ll receive a primary logo design, 4-6 secondary logo designs — also known as submarks or variations — pattern or texture designs, and curated brand font styles and a brand color palette. These deliverables all work together to build a strong and purpose-driven visual foundation for your business — a visual identity to be carried throughout every area of your business, like your web design, stationery designs, packaging, signage — and any other assets your business may need.

So, how is your brand uncovered? How are those visual details, from your logo designs to your font styles and color palette, determined? Here are 5 questions we ask, and we recommend asking yourself, as you look toward pursuing brand design on behalf of your business:

1. Am I focused on my Ideal Client above all? When beginning the brand design process, we remind our clients that their brand will be a blend of what they love and feel connected to, what their Ideal Client loves and feels connected to, and what is forward-thinking in their particular field. When you approach the brand design process with your Ideal Client in mind, rather than your personal preferences, you can ensure every detail of your brand design is rooted in serving your audience and building a foundation for future success. We believe a successful, purpose-driven, and meaningful brand values serving others above all.
2. What are my businesses’s core values? What does your business stand for and believe in? For business owners, these values can be rooted in or stem from our personal values. Additionally, these values can be rooted in the way we serve our customers or clients — or the way that we run our businesses. Knowing what your business’s core values are can help you to uncover the purpose and value behind your business in a forward-thinking and client-focused way. While businesses can be a reflection of their founders, our businesses are truly designed for serving our customers and clients. When we know and share about our core values, we can give our customers and clients something to connect with in a meaningful and lasting way.
3. What is my unique approach? When comparing one photography business to another, or one design business to another, your prospective clients and customers want to know why your business should be chosen from among others. Knowing what makes your business stand out can make all the difference in how you perceive your business, how you communicate about your business, and ultimately, how your audience perceives and connects with your business. Knowing and sharing about your unique client experience — or your one-of-a-kind expertise — can be truly valuable.
4. How do I want my audience to feel? When your prospective clients or customers experience your business for the first time — whether that’s through a blog post, through social media, or through visiting your Home page directly — how do you want your audience to feel? The elements of your brand can work together to capture and communicate specific feelings — romance, joy, nostalgia. When your audience has an emotional response or feels emotionally connected to your business, your brand is creating a connection between your business and your audience. Knowing how you want your audience to feel can ensure your brand is experience-driven — more than a design on a blank page, but something with detail, texture, and emotion — your audience can appreciate, connect with, and confidently choose.
5. What are my goals? When developing your brand, it’s essential to identify both your short-term and long-term goals. A long-lasting brand will be created with both your short-term and long-term goals in mind — laying a strong foundation for the ways in which you plan for your business to grow and evolve in the future. As an example, if you are a photographer today, but you plan to create educational offerings or a podcast, the visual details of your brand design can uplift those upcoming facets of your business. As another example, if you’re pursuing brand design because you hope to raise your prices or elevate your business, the visual details of your brand design can communicate on your behalf — showcasing an elevated, value-adding business, reflective of your updated pricing. 

Summed up, the five questions we recommend asking as you look toward pursuing brand design on behalf of your business are:

1. Am I focused on my Ideal Client above all?
2. What are my business’s core values?
3. What is my unique approach?
4. How do I want my audience to feel? And
5. What are my goals?

Using your responses to these 5 questions and more as a guide, we are able to create a visual representation of your business — ensuring each presented and proposed detail aligns with your business, values, vision, and goals. With a new year just around the corner, how would you answer these questions about your business?

About Brand It, Build It Podcast, Hosted by Kelly Zugay

Hosted by Kelly Zugay, co-founder of With Grace and Gold, The Brand It, Build It Podcast is a leading small business marketing podcast for small business owners, creatives, founders and entrepreneurs. Enjoy weekly, actionable episodes to build a successful, sustainable small business from the inside out.