One of the main starting points of any new business or new product or service launch is to create a ‘brand’. This will form the foundation of the website you use to attract and retain customers, and any other sales and marketing tools you use. You’ll use your branding as a fun way to stand out from the crowd. But, how much does it cost to launch and promote your brand? This can depend on how much you’re willing to take the ‘Do It Yourself’ approach!
Firstly, let’s explore what is meant by brand.
Creating a brand identity
Some people think that “brand” and “logo” are interchangeable words. This is not the case! Your brand is the complete identity of your company, product or service. For example, what are your Unique Selling Points (USPs) and where does your business stand in the marketplace? This will end up revolving around the benefits you offer your customers. Is it the cheapest? easiest to use? most reliable? or perhaps the most innovative? The answers to these questions will help you start developing your brand.
When you have worked up a detailed brand profile, you then translate that into a brand identity. This includes the fonts and colours you can use to best illustrate and express yourself. For example, deep blues are often associated with reliable financial and professional firms, whereas yellows and oranges often portray tech and futuristic companies. All of that being said, you can use whatever colour resonates with who your company truly is.
So now you’ve covered the nitty-gritty, the “who am I” stage. The next step is to find a logo that sums up your brand identity. Many include a tag line to reinforce USPs (for example, ‘Just Do It’ – Nike or ‘Because You’re Worth it’ – L’Oréal).
Using your brand in your website design
Now that you’ve worked up a brand identity and clear statements about your company or product, you’re ready to create your own website. You can use your chosen colour palette as the basis of page design, varying shades and intensities to draw attention to calls to action and other important features.
It’s highly recommended that you keep your brand consistent across your website. This includes avoiding reversed logos as web design features or introducing colours that aren’t in your chosen palette. This will help solidify the look and feel and stop your site from confusing or distracting its users.
What budget is needed?
Creating and launching a brand can cost a massive amount of money – IF you’re a big company with deep pockets and global ambitions from day one. However, it can also be done on a shoestring if your goals are more manageable!
You could create your brand identity and statements yourself, perhaps using a local graphic artist to build a high impact logo for you. Though there are free online tools for DIY logo creation. Once you have your logo and all its support information, you can use Go Sitebuilder to create a professional website that dovetails brilliantly with your fabulous new brand!
If you haven’t started building your website yet or you’re still looking for the right tool for you, check out our free trial of Go Sitebuilder. You won’t need any previous technical knowledge as Go Sitebuilder has been created with busy small business owners in mind – you can even build it right from your mobile phone!
