In the last decade or so, branding has risen in importance, becoming a buzzword in large organizations. Marketing departments either develop their new brand internally or contract an outside agency to create the brand. The new brand will likely include an updated visual identity that will consist of a new logo and usage guidelines, typography standards, a color palette and more. Many times the branding agency develops the concept, but the specific application for internal product usage--proposal covers, presentations, ads, collateral--will be left to the organization. This is when the in-house Creative Team becomes invaluable, giving the creative leader and her team members an opportunity to work with the branding lead in the Marketing department to partner in their roll-out efforts.
To unveil the brand, the Marketing Team will want to show the organization how the brand elements will work with its various communications products. This is a key opportunity to become involved because the creative team lives the visual identity day-in and day-out and is the most knowledgeable when it comes to identifying all of the products that will be impacted. In fact, offering to partner with the Marketing department to publish an online style guide is a great step in asserting the creative team's role and while at the same time documenting proper usage of the brand elements. The creative team may even want to create an online template gallery with updated Microsoft Office templates featuring the new brand.
It is imperative that the Creative Team is known for branding products properly, as well as ensuring and enforcing consistent application the of brand throughout the organization. To become recognized as the branding experts in your organization, here are a few steps creative leaders and their teams must take:
1. Know the Brand Beyond the Visual Representation
Work with the marketing team, and have them fill out a Creative Brief on the intent of the brand. If they have contracted with an outside branding group, have the marketing team give you that brief. Better yet, if the brand project is still underway, request that you or a member of your team be on the internal project team. Your team must understand (1) what the new brand is intended to convey and why, (2) how to determine if the brand application conveys this message and (3) the business goals of the new brand. Often, your team will be the brand spokespeople, and they must be able to support and teach the brand and its elements to their internal customers.
It will be extremely helpful if your team can partner with the branding agency or group that developed the brand as the team applies the brand across the product suite. Try to schedule an on-site presentation of the brand by the external agency to help your team learn the background of the brand elements. Your team should understand (1) how the agency arrived at their results and (2) how the outcomes satisfy the brief. Ask these questions and more. Once the rationale behind the brand is fully understood, your team can move on to learn the mechanics of the brand, such as the color palette, application to print versus web productions, typography choices, etc. Jumping ahead to these elements without understanding the background could leave your team looking like order takers instead of partners.
2. Create Extraordinary Brand Applications
Your team knows the products that your organization creates better than anyone. The organization already comes to you for their collateral, proposals, posters, websites, newsletters, ads, etc. So now is the opportunity to help them apply the new brand in the most impactful way and to give their products a fresh, new look. For creative teams struggling to move beyond order taker, supporting the roll out of a new brand provides a launching pad for a transition to strategic partner. It is your team's job to expertly apply the brand so that it establishes consistency and repeatability across the product suite and that these applications are documented in the style guide. During these early stages, it is critical to establish the new brand to help gain traction with audiences in building the company's new image.
3. Follow Your Own Rules
Often people who set the rules wrongly feel that it gives them license to break them. Nothing can be further from the truth. As you apply the brand, you are setting the example or the bar for what the rest of the organization must do. As the ones setting the example, you must be consistent in standing behind the example. So be careful in identifying hard and fast rules too early on and insist the same of your team.
4. Evangelize
Now that you know the new brand well, have extraordinarily applied the brand and are setting the example and following it, it is time to evangelize! Seize every opportunity when you meet with clients about their projects or meeting their communications goals to remind them about staying "in brand" and the intent and importance behind building the company's reputation--inside and outside--through the brand. They can follow and "buy into" the importance or at the least, you can gain a reputation of keeping them brand compliant and out of hot water with management.
5. Provide Helpful Brand Service
As many do-it-yourselfers are downloading templates and trying to apply the brand to their projects, there will inevitably be questions. As they respond to your team's evangelism and return with questions, provide clear answers that will help them along the way--at no charge. It will build goodwill and credibility for your team of brand experts. This will pay off long term as your internal clients continue to rely on your team at a consultative level.
6. Take Your Brand on the Road
Your Marketing department partners need as much help as possible in "spreading the news" about the new brand (e.g., what it means, how to use it, what is "in brand" and what isn't). You can help them by offering to meet with your internal client groups and lead brand education efforts. Your team must be familiar with (1) what will enhance or detract from the corporate brand as well as (2) what customizations Marketing will and won't allow. You should then partner with Marketing to develop and document those guidelines. In addition to meeting with current clients about the brand, your team can make presentations to larger groups across the organization, such as new hires during onboarding. As you make these presentations, you will gain the reputation of "brand experts."
7. Evolve
As the brand takes hold internally and externally, monitor its progress. Marketing may do this themselves with target audience awareness surveys, as it is important to measure results against the intended goals of the brand, e.g., increase market share, shift perception, generate leads, etc. You must also measure saturation. At some point, the repeated use of the brand--which was critical to establish a new corporate identity--will become stale. Partner with Marketing to know when it's time to refresh the current brand or create its successor.
Active partnering with Marketing during a re-brand or brand refresh identifies your team a branding expert with internal clients. This association will support the creative team's ambition of becoming or continuing its role as a strategic partner to your internal clients, which should lead to more projects of increasing importance.
For information about how Cella can add value to your business through consulting, coaching, and training, please email cella@cellaconsulting.com.
Cella Consultant Susan Hunnicutt is an expert in using marketing and communications to achieve business objectives. She works with organizational leaders to assess their needs, determine their goals, analyze their resources and develop an action plan and recommendations to meet these goals. Susan's value proposition is taking a growing in-house creative team "to the next level," not only in metrics but also in systems and processes, quality control and increasing the number of high-profile and quality client projects.
