Not Just Pretty | Building An Effective Small Business Brand

What's Your Biggest Question About Small Business Branding?

Hi, there! Thanks for stopping by!

I want to make sure that this blog is as helpful as possible for you, my lovely visitors.  So, I want to know what you want to know!

Please answer my 1-question survey about small business branding: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/TC55L6T

It should really only take a moment. Pretty please, with sugar on top?

Q&A: Should You Include Your Tagline In Your Logo?

QUESTION:

Can you add our tagline to the logo? 

ANSWER:

I strongly recommend that the tagline be treated as a separate piece of artwork. It should be a part of your Visual Vocabulary, which acts as the visual sidekicks to your logo (the superhero of your brand). A Visual Vocabulary helps your logo tell more of your story, offers more visual elements to establish consistency across your brand, and allows your brand to have visual flexibility from one marketing piece to the next.

If you do include the tagline in the logo, it can affect the overall scalability of the logo - because the logo will have to remain large enough to have the tagline be legible in all applications. If the tagline is a part of the Visual Vocabulary, it can add visual interest by being placed in a different area than the logo (for example, along the bottom of your letterhead). It also can always appear at a large enough size to be read. And, if you change your tagline, you won't also have to change your logo.

Itypically develop a tagline treatment along with the rest of your Visual Vocabulary during the design process for your other design pieces - which usually consists of a business card and some other marketing materials. Developing it in practice helps to ensure that the Visual Vocabulary will be not just pretty, but also effective.

Letterhead Fonts

QUESTION:

I am trying to create a quick letterhead template for my company. Is there

a certain type of font I should use for the address block?

ANSWER:

Here are the qualities you want to watch out for in your letterhead address block font:

1. Make sure your letterhead font is legible and prints well. If you're going to send faxes on your letterhead, test the fonts you'll use to make sure they're still legible after going through the fax process.

2. Think about how you'll use your letterhead. If it's a digital letterhead that will be used on several different computers, it will be easiest to choose a font that comes preinstalled on most computers so that you'll be able to open and use the letterhead with no technical difficulties. If you're going to be the sole user, then you might want to invest in a font for your letterhead that will make it more unique.

3. Think about the personality of your company, and match the font to the personality. Sans serif fonts are good for technology-oriented companies, and give your company a more approachable and friendly feel. Serif fonts are more traditional and can make your business look more established. In any case, you probably don't want to go with anything that looks like handwriting or is too decorative. Script fonts are also harder to read.

4. If you have a logo, you should make sure that the qualities of your logo font coordinate with the font that is used in your logo. This does not mean that it has to be the same font, but it's a good rule of thumb to match some of the characteristics - whether the "o" in both fonts is round or oval, for example.

Q&A: .com vs. .net In Domain Names

QUESTION: 

Does anyone have strong opinions about using .com vs. .net? The cost difference is huge -- $299 vs. $12.99 (this is quoted from godaddy.com).  

ANSWER: 

If it's available (even at $300), then I'd recommend going with a .com for ease of use for the customer. .com is the option that most users will automatically type - people are just used to typing .com at the end of email addresses, websites, etc. - so you'll wind up with fewer lost people looking for your site.

Q&A: Metatags

QUESTION:

Hope you are doing well these days.  I was wondering if you could tell me a little bit about Metatags, their place in the market today and what may or may not be what is today.  I just want to know my options for web optimization.

ANSWER:

Almost all search engines don't look at the Keyword metatag - your competition would look there to see what you're optimizing for, so I often recommend to leave that out.

Some search engines still reference the Description metatag, so I recommend placing some information there.

Three are other metatags that are more advanced that you can use, but those are the basic two! Hope it helps!

Q&A: Digital printing and color inconsistency

QUESTION:

I just got the new batch of business cards that we ordered: they don't match the batches we ordered before. Did something get changed in the artwork? How do we fix this?

ANSWER:

No, the color values on the card artwork are all the same as in prior (successful) batches of printing. I haven't changed a thing having to do with the color.

That's one of the drawbacks of digital printing. While you can get relatively low quantities of cards at lower prices than traditional printing, you don't get the consistency of color that you would with traditional printing - especially when the batches are printed at different times. The calibration of the printer can change, or the way that they process the files can change, and you can wind up with different colors even though the artwork hasn't changed.

So, every time we send them something to print, we're hoping that their results will be consistent - but that's not always the case.

If getting the right color is really that important, then it might make sense to look into traditional printing - that guarantees that the colors will always be consistent. Traditional printers use Pantone inks, which have greater color accuracy than the CMYK process used by digital printers.

Q&A: Home page photo

QUESTION:

I want to find a stock photo for my home page, but I just can't find one that says what I want it to say. I keep coming up with photos of objects or landscapes.

ANSWER:

You'll have a better chance at forming a connection through the home page if there's a person somehow in the picture - people connect with photos of other people. We could also look for a photo that you absolutely love - if you love the photo, then there's a good chance that the people who are going to be your best clients will like the photo as well.

I also recommend matching the photo's color palette somewhat to your brand's color palette. That will make the page look more polished.

Q&A: Website hosting

QUESTION:

Which web hosting companies would you recommend?  Fees?

ANSWER:

I've worked with many web hosting companies - my favorite is Dreamhost.com, but I've also had good success with Go Daddy. They each have reasonable rates, good uptime, good email support, and provide everything a small business should need to host their site in their basic packages. I recommend that you purchase your hosting on a yearly basis becase many companies offer discounts for services purchased "in bulk". 

Q&A: Rebranding launch at a trade show

QUESTION: 

Dear Erin,

I am writing to you because I have a branding related query and look forward to your assistance. My company is a service company offering 360 degree logistics solutions. We also have other companies in the group, all of which are services oriented. We are planning to re-brand our ‘group of companies’ and are in the process of changing everything from the name, logo, website, etc.

We are participating in a large scale logistics exhibition early next year and consider it is an excellent base to re-launch ourselves. However, the re-launch will not be the only thing promoted. We will also be promoting our products, capabilities, etc.

The exhibition will be attended by our competitors, suppliers, customers and important dignitaries from the logistics fraternity.

I would like to know if it will be good idea to re-launch ourselves at this exhibition or will it dilute the re-branding activity.

Look forward to your response.

Warm Regards,

Reshma Dixit

ANSWER:

You can promote the re-branding at the exhibition along with other things - re-branding is more of a sub promotion at a trade show - a "by the way, we've rebranded - and look at all the great stuff we offer".

I would recommend keeping the number of things you promote overall focused so that the people coming to the booth aren't overwhelmed, and so that your staff can handle the different requests with ease. 

How big of a booth will you be having, and how many people will it be staffed by? I'd suggest promoting no more programs than you have people to staff the booth - otherwise, the staff can get overwhelmed trying to answer questions about many different products and services all day long.

Design your booth with the different promotions in mind, and separate them physically as well if that's possible with your booth space. This will help your visitors see instantly that you have different things to offer - and how they can use your different services.

I hope this helps!

- Erin

 

 

Attending trade shows and giving out promotional items can help develop your brand, and if you do it right you will help to keep the right people talking about your company.

Q&A: META tags

QUESTION:

I'm writing the website text, and I wanted to know if it would be helpful for me to include META tags for you at the top of each page.

ANSWER:

Thanks for thinking of it! Some of the META tags will be really helpful, but don't worry about creating others.

META keyword tags aren't actually used by the search engines anymore. Too many companies used that space to cheat and fill up their site with keywords that actually weren't related to the content of the page. So now, the engines disregard that tag and look only at  the text that you've written on the page. That tag's only use now is for your competition to take a look and see what keyword phrases you're optimizing for.

So, choose the most important 2-3 keywords per page and note those - because I can place those in the code elsewhere - and place those at the top of the page when you're writing your copy. More than about 2-3 keywords will look pretty strange when I place them in the code.

Also, writing a different Description tag for each page (or, at least for the different sections) can be helpful for your ranking.

One other way that you can help your ranking is to write a different Title tag for each page, and then to also include your keywords in your headlines and sub-heads.