What Branding Is (and What It Isn't)

Marketing and Tools for Online Businesses

March 20

Branding is a concept we need to have a clear understanding of when starting a business, because it will serve as our guide for all the marketing communications we produce. In this post, I aim to make your life easier: I want to explain

Branding is a concept we need to have a clear understanding of when starting a business, because it will serve as our guide for all the marketing communications we produce. It’s about how we want our audience to perceive us, and we need to be very deliberate in how we build it.

The thing is, branding is a somewhat abstract concept, and sometimes it’s hard to grasp: either we think it’s just the visual aspect of our identity, or we don’t realize that it’s something created intentionally and with great care, or we simply can’t figure out what it is.

An explanation of what branding is can be as complex as we want it to be (because, in fact, it can be a very complex concept), but in this post, my goal is to make your life easier: I want to explain, clearly and concisely, what branding is—and what it isn’t.

What is branding?

Branding is, essentially, your brand’s personality: what sets it apart and makes it different from others. Just as every person has a unique personality, every brand has a distinct character.

Branding consists of graphic, textual, and experiential elements (how it looks, what it says, and how it makes people feel when they interact with the brand). In other words, when we talk about branding, we’re talking about things like:

A brand's visual identity.
The copy used by the brand to communicate and the tone of its communication with its audience.
The sensory experience that brand offers through elements such as its packaging, or the scents of its products or stores.
The shopping and consumption experience of the brand's products, and how they made their customers feel.
The user experience the customer has when browsing that brand's website.

When the audience interacts with a brand through any of the channels I just mentioned, they begin to form a mental image of what that brand is like, what defines it, and how it makes them feel.

Of course, ideally, the mental image your audience forms of your brand should be as close as possible to the brand personality you want to convey. That’s why it’s crucial to clearly understand what you want to communicate through your brand, so that every communication effort you undertake—whether visual, textual, or experiential—helps effectively convey the essence of your brand.

So what is branding for?

In general, well-designed and well-executed branding will help you build a stronger, more cohesive brand. It will also make your marketing and communication efforts easier, since you’ll know exactly what to communicate and why.

More specifically, branding will help you:

Be recognizable and stand out from the competition. When your branding is well thought out, it makes your brand stand out and become memorable. In addition, effective branding should highlight the characteristics that make your brand unique, setting it apart from other brands offering similar products or services.
Connect with your ideal customer. Well-designed branding will help you connect with your audience on an emotional level. It will also allow you to speak to your customers in the language they identify with most, and create an image that resonates with their tastes and interests.
Build trust and establish your brand in the market. If you can create a distinctive brand and stay true to it, you’ll build trust and become truly memorable; your customers will know what to expect from you because you always deliver the same experience.

Identity design and branding are not the same thing

One of the most common mistakes in branding is confusing it with identity design or, worse yet, with the logo. This happens in part because we designers often talk about a brand’s visual identity as if it were the only thing that existed, when in reality that’s not the case. Furthermore, visual information is much easier to process, so the easiest way to identify a brand and its branding is by associating it with a particular visual identity. That’s why, to wrap things up, I’m going to explain two things in more detail:

why identity and branding are not the same thing,
and how, in reality, identity design depends on a clear definition of a brand's branding.

A logo and branding are not the same thing

Although the logo is the most visible and recognizable part of a brand, visual identity is a much more complex system. Branding, as we saw, is something even broader than the graphic representation of a brand.

But even if we focus solely on visual branding (or visual identity), it consists of many elements that go beyond the logo, such as:

Brand colors.
Different typefaces.
Supporting graphic elements such as textures, patterns, or illustrations.
The style of the photos you use.

When used consistently as a cohesive system, all these elements come together to form a brand’s visual identity: that distinctive look that makes the brand instantly recognizable and, ideally, helps convey its personality and connect with its target audience.

The logo is a very important element, but it is only one part of the visual identity.
And, for its part, visual identity is just one of the elements that make up branding.

Good design won't make up for poor branding

Visual identity design is, essentially, the process of translating a brand’s personality into graphic elements. Therefore, the starting point for effective visual identity design is a well-defined brand identity.

Let me explain it with an example: suppose you’re looking for a stylist to help you with your image. You want her to put together your wardrobe, advise you on the haircut that suits you best, the makeup style you should use, and the accessories you should wear. You’re willing to invest in hiring an image professional because you want to look good and you want your personal style to reflect who you are. But when you have your first session with the stylist, you’re unable to tell her exactly who you are… or what your personality is like, or whether you’re introverted or very expressive, or whether you prefer long or short hair, or what colors make you feel best. If you have no idea what your personality is, your stylist won’t be able to design a wardrobe that reflects who you are.

The same goes for identity design and branding: without well-thought-out branding, a clear brand personality, and a well-defined target audience, there’s no way to design a visual identity that works. No matter how beautiful your logo and website may be, if they don’t communicate who you are—and are just pretty for the sake of it—they won’t serve their purpose.