Ep 16: The Roadmap Series: Phase 2: Gathering Assets + 3: Design Process

The Roadmap Series: Phase 2: Gathering Assets + 3: Design Process

Sarah

The second step to building a successful brand is to gather assets, the more assets you have, the easier it will be to create a successful brand and successful website. To start, you need to find your logo, color palette, and fonts, these are the three most important assets you need to have before you start branding your company.

You should also find your social media account and get the logos for those as well, and remember, you should make sure that everything is consistent throughout all of your assets and platform so that it looks like one cohesive brand. Make sure to download the phase two and three checklists and follow along as we go through them.

So now we’re gonna talk about the importance of registering and securing your brand name and domain name. Brand names are one of the most important assets for a company, a brand is not just so logo or identity it is a total of all customer experiences that they have with your company.

Brand names are often used as shorthand for describing entire companies, so it’s important to register them as soon as possible. Brand names can be registered at the trademark office or a domain name provider. The process usually takes up to two weeks.

A domain name is a website address that ends in .com, .net, .org, etc. There are many domain name providers, but GoDaddy is one of the most popular ones and has a lot of clients all over the world. You can also check if your desired domain name is available by checking websites like GoDaddy, or, I know Google also has, domains that you can buy from them as well, just do your research and find one that works for you.

The next step is to secure your brand’s social media handles. Social media is a crucial part of any business it can help you build your brand and get more customers, but it’s getting harder to secure social media handles lately. With the rise of social media, it is now possible for any user to create a Facebook or Twitter account with any name they want.

This is why it’s important to make sure that your social media handles are available before using them, otherwise, you may find yourself having a change in the brand’s name to keep your handle because someone else had already registered it, and locked you out. All the major platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn, would make sense for their business so that they can maximize their reach and engage with their audiences on all channels.

So now that you have your brand’s name and potentially your social media and domain name, now it’s time to secure your website platform. If you’re looking to create an online presence for your business, it’s important to do your research. There are various options available, so it’s important to determine which one is the most suitable for your needs and skill set.  We are always here to help you if you need help rebranding, securing your website platform, or even building out your website. So please remember to reach out to us if you have any questions or would like assistance on your branding and website journey.

Showit, WordPress, Squarespace, and Shopify, are some of the more popular website platforms available today.

More in detail Showit is a great platform if you need a custom design that works in harmony with your brand vision, it requires no coding knowledge and offers drag-drop tools that may creating your site easy and fast. The platform also allows users to customize their site even further with JavaScript elements. The downside Showit is only compatible with WordPress, so if you chose another platform as your content management system, this might not be the best choice for you.

WordPress is often considered the go-to platform for businesses because of its flexibility and scalability. It includes thousands of themes and plug-ins that allow you to customize and expand your site as much as you want. With WordPress though, there’s a bit of a learning curve, while anyone can install WordPress on their hosting server without any technical knowledge, making changes or adding features requires some HTML and CSS knowledge, or hiring someone who has that knowledge.

For those who don’t have any coding experience or don’t wanna hire someone else to do it, Squarespace might be worth considering due to its ease of use. As with all other platforms, Squarespace has its own set of limitations though, customization possibilities are more limited than with other options, and Squarespace only allows users to change certain elements within pre-made designs. Additionally, SEO Compatibilities, which help improve how search engines rank websites aren’t quite as good as those offered by other platforms such as WordPress or Shopify.

Shopify is perfect for businesses that want e-commerce solutions quickly and easily, just sign up for an account on Shopify’s website and start selling in minutes. This platform offers hundreds of templates for different industries so that businesses can customize their sites according to their specific needs, from retail stores, selling physical products to service providers, and offering digital products like eBooks and PDFs. However, like all other platforms discussed here, Shopify isn’t perfect either, it lacks certain features like membership sites, just to name one that other CMSs have available out of the box or via third-party plugins or apps.

In conclusion, no matter which platform you choose, Showit, WordPress, Squarespace, or any other platform, it pays off in the long run if you take some time upfront researching all the options available before jumping feet first into setting up your website.

That being said we understand this process can be overwhelming, so don’t worry, we can help guide you through this process by setting up a discovery call with us today, so we can help determine what type of website platform will best suit your website needs. After all, we know our digital marketing stuff.

Next on the art to-do list is setting up an email address, establishing an email address that displays your domain name is a great way to make your email more professional and memorable. Setting up a custom email address gives you an edge over businesses that are still using generic email addresses providers like Gmail or Yahoo platforms.

Take for example Google, with an email address like firstname@google.com or sarah@citrusstudios.com, you can easily identify it as a business email from Google or a business email from Citrus Studios, rather than something generic like abc@gmail.com or sarah@gmail.com.

Creating your personalized email address with the same authenticity as Google’s is very simple, so don’t miss out on establishing yourself as a professional and the digital world.

Since we are combining phase two and phase three in this episode, let’s dive into phase three, which is Design Process.

Before we dive in, make sure to download phase three digital download and follow along as we go through it.

Design plays a huge role in how your brand is perceived, whether it’s the visuals on your website or the print collateral used for marketing, design elements should always be taken into account when creating a brand identity. Here are a few tips for taking on the design process.

Step one is going to be work on the visuals for your brand.

Visuals can tell a story that words sometimes cannot, when starting in the design process work on creating visuals that accurately reflect your brand’s look and feel, this includes colors, fonts, images, and more. If you’re having trouble figuring out where to start, many online platforms offer templates and pre-made designs that can give you a starting point.

What I suggest doing is setting up a Pinterest or a mood board, showing you all of the designs that you like, and then breaking down why you like them and if they apply to your brand and your brand’s website, and then moving on from there, customizing it even further.

The next step is to design your website to match your brand’s visuals.

Once you have established what your visual identity looks like, it’s time to apply it to your website homepage and across all other web pages to create a unified look for customers visiting your site. Make sure all visuals are cohesive with one another and easy to navigate so that customers have an enjoyable experience while browsing through different pages of your website.

Apply your brand’s visuals to all of your social media. Social media is an integral part of any business strategy these days, so make sure that all of your channels show consistency in terms of visual identity. You want people who follow you across all multiple social media platforms to recognize instantly which company they are interacting with just by looking at visuals alone. That way each post or tweet will be associated with the same company

In addition to digital elements such as websites and social media accounts, some businesses may need print collateral such as business cards or flyers, depending upon their industry, and goals. If this applies to you, then don’t forget to take into consideration how these materials would need to look for them to accurately reflect your brand’s message and visually stand out from the competitors.

Next step is acquiring the right assets.

When designing anything, whether it’s digital or physical, material assets such as images, videos, or audio, or essential components needed during this phase of development, make sure you acquire all necessary assets legally, either by purchasing stock photos, videos, or creating content yourself so that there aren’t any legal issues down the line when publishing content online or offline.

Last step finally is to get help.  

Designing can be overwhelming at times if you don’t have enough resources or tools or even knowledge available at hand, but Citrus is here for you, we understand that this can be a very difficult process and wanna make this a more enjoyable process for you. Please reach out to us if you have any questions on the branding process, and the website designing process we can give you a handout on those.

Designing a successful brand requires focus and attention throughout every step of the process. With careful planning and execution, anyone should be able to take their vision from the concept stage to completion without breaking too much sweat along the way. For non-designers, tackling this task alone can be o feel overwhelming at times, however, you do have access to professional designers who specialize in branding and designing marketing materials. We encourage you to reach out to us if you need assistance in any way.

Visuals for your brand include creating a logo choosing a color palette, creating design elements to support your design system, and choosing a font system. All of these are extremely important and all lay a hand in creating the cohesiveness of your brand as a whole.

Some great free resource for color palettes is colors.com, you’re able to experiment with various color palettes, see trending color palettes, and create your own. Another great resource is Google Fonts, you can explore a lot of different fonts for free, and a lot of times you’re able to incorporate these into your website more easily.