Do you have a brand guide for your business? Or better yet, have you ever Googled “Brand Guide Examples” and come across these gorgeous, highly detailed documents and then felt completely overwhelmed and discouraged from making your own, thinking “Uhhhh how do I do that!?!?!” 

We’ve got news. 

Your business needs a brand guide and it doesn’t have to be a complicated process. 

A brand guide is kind of like a rule book for how your business is visually presented. It helps to ensure consistency and provides the information needed to create a cohesive experience for your audience no matter where they find you. 

What Goes In A Brand Guide

To keep it simple and easy, there are really only 4 things you need on there: 

1. Your logo 
2. The fonts you use 
3. Your colour palette 
4. Images for inspiration 

These four simple things will act as a foundation for your marketing and communications. As your business grows and you add people to your team – whether as employees or contractors – this is a critical tool for them to have. It allows them to know exactly how you want your brand to be represented.

The example below shows a super simple layout with just those four areas covered off.

But Wait…What’s Your Brand All About??

But then all of this begs the bigger question…what exactly is your brand?? If you are going to create your brand guide, you need to have a pretty solid understanding of your brand overall. So before you get cracking on creating your brand guide, spend a little time with your biz and your biz research to answer the following: 

1. What is my mission? 
2. Who is my target audience? 
3. What is my brand personality? 
4. What are my core values? 

The visual brand that you develop should align with your answers to the above. It will help you determine if you should have a light and bright look or a dark and moody one. It will help you know if you want a feminine feel, a masculine feel, or a neutral one. It will help you to figure out if you should use heavy fonts or soft ones. 

Your visual brand isn’t just about you, after all. It has to appeal to your target market. Because if they don’t like it…guess what…they aren’t really going to pay attention to you. 

Once you sort that out, you can begin to create your own brand guide. You can keep it simple as we suggested and as you grow in your business, you can always make it more robust and detailed. To get started and just get it done though, simple is best. 

The good news that is that tools like Canva offer great options and templates to get you started. Or use our images that we posted above to inspire you. 

Whatever you do, just make one!!  

PS Are you looking to brush up your brand?? We’re relaunching Hustle + Flow Business Mentorship this summer and it’s got everything you need to get clear on what you do, what your value is, and what you want, so that you can create a kickass brand and a plan to put your brand out there. Send us a message and we’ll tell you more about it!
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