Consistent branding is one of the best ways to make sure your content is recognised everywhere people find it. Particularly on social media, people don’t spend a lot of time reading everything they see. So being easily recognisable when someone is scanning a newsfeed makes it more likely that they will stop and read your content. And face it, getting eyes on your work is the whole purpose of creating it in the first place.
My Facebook, Website, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn pages all look alike.
Using images
1. Use your logo on everything
Your logo is an easy and clear way to represent your business and if you’ve gone to the trouble to get one, then make sure you use it. It should be on all social media profiles, either as the avatar, or in some part of the cover. It should be on all printed materials, letters, documents and in your email signature block.
2. Use your logo and/or picture in social media profiles
For your social media branding to be recognisable across platforms you should use a consistent avatar for all platforms. If you’re a larger business, or want to be represented as a larger business use your logo or a pared down version of it as your avatar on all profiles. When you’re a soloist and want to share the personal touch, use a good quality image of yourself as your avatar on social media profiles. Then include your logo in the cover images for each platform. If you are going to use an image of yourself, make sure it’s a good one. Having a professional photographer take a good quality image is not expensive. And it is possible to have a professional looking image with a bit of personality. But while cropped snapshots, or random images off the web are fine for your personal profiles. They don’t belong in a business profile.
Using fonts
3. Have a standard font style and size
It may seem over the top, but a consistent font style and size is a great way to reinforce your branding. What it does is make everything that you produce clearly identifiable as yours. You don’t need to spring for an expensive font. I’d suggest you don’t get too fancy with your font choice as some non-standard fonts will display differently on other computers. But if even if you use a standard font like Arial; Calibri; Verdana or Times New Roman. By keeping the font style and size consistent across all your documents and publications will make it easier for people to recognise your work.
4. Have a set of colours you use
The same way that having a consistent font style and size makes your work easy to identify, having a standard colour or even a small colour palette that you use consistently is a great way to brand your business. For example, I use a specific shade of purple as my main branding colour, but I also have a shade of orange, and a grey that I use when I need a little contrast. I use them on everything from social media profiles to my website to my documents, business cards, brochures, graphics, slides, videos and infographics.
By just making sure your work all looks the same, you’ll be able to take advantage of good will from your connections and get them to pause when they see content you’ve created and hopefully to take the time to read a bit further. If you don’t have consistent branding, chances are they’ll miss you in the clutter.