Color in the Context of Branding

“Our very survival depends on the ability to identify necessary objects or warning signals whether they are animal, vegetable, or mineral, and color is an integral part of the identification process.”

—Leatrice Eiseman

The emotional connection that your audience makes to your brand is often the critical factor to converting new customers. And of the many design elements that impact the emotional content of your communications, color is chief among them. Take a look at some recent marketing stats on the subject.

The use of color must therefore be used discreetly yet deliberately and with a clear understanding of what those colors consciously or even unconsciously represent to your audience.

In the multi cultural world we live in, reactions to color can be heavily influenced by cultural symbols and identities, often making selection a complex process. For an example of how conflicting are the reactions to certain colors, consider white. In the West, white generally signifies purity, peace and marriage while in some eastern cultures it represents death. Check out a more comprehensive study of colors and their meaning here.

The way to avoid the pitfalls of using inappropriate or negatively-impacting colors in communicating your brand is to work with a professional that understands color in the context of the audience(s) and applications in which your brand will be manifested.

The first and most important principle to color selection is the realization that, in the world of branding, color is not fashion. Choosing colors based on whether they are in or out of fashion is a really misguided and yet far too common practice in corporate America.

Instead colors are to be selected for their strategic significance to a particular brand. The complex of criteria that determine this selection is the subject of volumes of theory and decades of practice in the disciplines of psychology, advertising and branding, to name a few. Therefore, distilling down the options for your brand colors will require a fair amount of thought. Pantone, the authority on color, has a handy online guide that is a great place to learn more about this fascinating subject!

The Higher Education Debate

What is the role of branding in higher education? This is the debate posed by brandchannel.com recently. See http://www.brandchannel.com/forum.asp?bd_id=100 for details. Many have written in to join the discussion.

I have found a wide range of perspectives on this subject among the several clients I have worked with in higher education. Some of them clearly do not see the role of branding in academia while others embrace the possibilities of what a proper branding campaign can do to promote the mission of their department, college, institute or program.

As higher education faces an increasingly competitive landscape with more players than ever, branding is playing a larger role in winning the hearts and minds of prospective students, faculty, research specialists and donors. And it's not just the admissions departments doing the marketing anymore. In fact, the clients I am working with are taking matters in to their own hands, challenged by maintaining the brand integrity of the larger institution to which they belong, yet striving to eek out a distinctive and differentiating presence for their department or college.

If at its core branding is the act of managing perception (be it an organization, product line or service), then essentially every effort we make to shape this perception is a conscious or unconscious attempt to brand. In academia or not, do we not all have some cause or mission to promote that is important to us?

Rex Whisman, founder and principal of the BrandED consultants group made a very insightful observation recently in his Brand Champion Blog that I'd like to share to close this posting:
"From my experience, almost all institutions [of higher learning] have undertaken a branding initiative in the past five years. Most have concentrated on creating taglines and trendy advertising campaigns. To date only a few have taken a broader brand development approach. Schools will need to think about brand and sustainability beyond external communications and carbon footprint campaigns, to long-term cultural and financial approaches. The need to recruit and retain brand champions will be as competitive as ever."

Strive to Be Different in an Age of Imitation

While successful brand building typically requires a rather complex set of strategies, differentiation is the most critical among them. Some may say that differentiation as a business strategy in general is a "given," a no-brainer. Yet discovering distinctive brands these days remains more the exception than the rule.

The challenge of finding what is unique and therefore different about a brand is an enormous challenge today. Once only the domain of large organizations with deep pockets, a growing tide of small and medium size businesses are increasingly building more sophisticated and more visible brands.

Responding to this growing demand for micro-level branding is a plethora of boutique creative agencies that have become super specialized in certain industries and niche markets. As a result, the pool of brands—small and large—has increased exponentially, making differentiation even more critical to the success or failure of a business. The fact that 50 to 60% of start ups fail after the first year is a testament to magnitude of this issue.

Yet still this "democratization" of branding has not necessarily brought about a greater degree of successful, distinct brands. In fact, there are more imitators than originators than ever before. For that reason it is all the more important to select a brand partner that has proven ability to demonstrate how they have used differentiation to build their clients' brands, both in planning and in design.

While using differentiation may seem like a no brainer to some, how to actually use differentiation is certainly not. For an interesting article on this subject, go to http://www.marketingprofs.com/8/myth-of-differentiation-schultz.asp?part=2, log in and read a more in depth discussion on this.

Toward a Deeper Understanding of Branding

There is much more that branding impacts in our lives than commerce.

Through the media, it plays an active role in shaping the hearts and minds of all of us in a variety of ways. It has manifested itself in ways that have triggered public outrage on the one hand and an unwavering loyalty on the other. It has gone far beyond influencing our purchasing decisions to how we experience politics, religion, and such major life events as marriage, birth, and death.

Understanding branding begins with a much more fundamental understanding of human nature. Looking deeper into who we are as individuals, organizations, and as a society is at the core of this exploration.

To read more about this, check out this interesting article on the brandchannel.com website at http://www.brandchannel.com/papers_review.asp?sp_id=680.

Can't afford a quality print mailing? Think Again.

For the last couple of years, I have been using and referring a great online printing resource called www.modernpostcard.com. For those who think of vistaprint.com as soon as they think of online printing, please put away your preconceptions! MP offers a much higher level of service, quality and overall value!

MP is a high quality offset postcard printer that also prints a variety of folded postcard products that many have used for brochures as well as direct mail pieces. They also print business cards and some other specialty items, provide a complete mailing service, and deliver great customer service! In short, they continue to offer a great product and service each time I work with them.

There are a few drawbacks to working with Modern Postcard, but these may not be dealbreakers for certain budget-challenged jobs. For one thing, you have only one paper stock to choose from, the MP house stock, which is a coated semi-gloss card stock of good quality. Order a free sample kit. Secondly, the printing is done in California, so once you approve the proof, there is no further oversight of the printing process. And finally, they print only 4-color process or black (on white paper), so if you are intent on having precise spot color matching, this is not a good choice.

From the standpoint of a designer, I love working with them since they make the process of finalizing and submitting digital files via their online wizard a snap. Unlike services like VistaPrint, they acutally work with people in the trade as well as consumers and understand the specific needs of both. To learn more about Modern Postcard, go to www.modernpostcard.com.

The Big Picture: Not Always Part of Our DNA

I see a lot of small and mid-size businesses planning one marketing project at a time and only when driven by a looming deadline, rather than looking at the bigger picture and determining a strategy and budget that will serve long-term goals. While the planning for the long term requires more work up front, the pay off down the line is well worth it!

Many people avoid long term planning because it means committing to something and resisting the temptation to change course. It means shifting the focus on the day-to-day ups and downs to a more measured future set of goals. And it takes a lot of discipline to stay the course and avoid the temptation of taking an easier route. Having a sound marketing or branding strategy is a lot like having a sound investment strategy. Both of these promise the building of appreciation over time, if and only if, the investor has the patience and perseverance to allow it to grow.

Since many small and even mid-sized businesses do not have experienced marketing professionals on staff, it is important to seek out a professional. Even larger firms often outsource this complex project, since the outside perspective in matters of branding and marketing is so invaluabe.

There are as many ways to develop a marketing plan and budget as their are types of businesses. One thing for sure, the marketing plan should be an extension of the business plan. For those looking for some good general information on this, www.marketigprofs.com is a good place to start learning. There is also an upcoming seminar on the subject. See http://www.marketingprofs.com/marketing/online-seminars/26 for details.

Print, Digital or Both?

As a growing number of corporate communications move from print to digital formats, clients are often asking me what I think they should do. I tell them that there are pros and cons to both that should be carefully weighed against the nature of the piece itself. For example, a company brochure placed on a coffee table in the lobby takes advantage of the opportunity to inform people about your brand while they are waiting. On the other hand, a web-based form that allows users to register for your company event quicker and easier can translate into higher recruitment rates. So consider the unique circumstances of the project and get advise from a professional. Sometimes the best solution is to distribute your marketing piece both in digital and print format to maximize your audience coverage.

Digital Pros
• saves paper and printing resources
• eliminates paper, printing and postage costs
• distributes easily via email or hosted on a web page for download.

Digital Cons
• less control over how the layout looks on screen or in print since computer monitors and office printers have wildly different preview and output results
• perceived as “cheaper” and sometimes less important than the same thing in printed form.
• some people don’t like to read on screen and have much lower retention for digital media formats.