Brand Identity

Brand identity is the set of elements a business designs so people can recognize it: name, logo, colors, typefaces, imagery, tone of voice, packaging and sometimes sound. It is the part of a brand the business fully controls, unlike brand image, which is the conclusion customers reach on their own.

What elements make up a brand identity?

The part you can see is called visual identity. The parts people read and hear usually get less investment, even though customers run into them every day on the brand’s Facebook page, in emails and on the hotline.

• Visual: logo, color palette, fonts, photo and illustration style, packaging layout.
• Verbal: brand name, tagline, tone of voice on the website and social media, the way staff greet customers. This part decides whether the brand has a voice of its own.
• Other senses: jingle, in-store scent, packaging materials.

All of this goes into one document called a brand guideline, so that an agency, a print shop or a new hire still turns out materials that look the same.

Kapferer’s brand identity prism

Jean-Noël Kapferer, professor emeritus at HEC Paris, argues that identity is wider than visuals. In The New Strategic Brand Management (Kogan Page, 5th edition, 2012), he describes identity through six facets, which he calls the brand identity prism:

The model is useful when you review a new identity. If the logo looks premium but the copy is casual, viewers feel the mismatch even when they can’t say where it is.

What makes a good identity element?

Jenni Romaniuk of the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute at the University of South Australia calls identity elements distinctive brand assets. In her book Building Distinctive Brand Assets (Oxford University Press, March 2018), she measures each asset on two metrics:

• Fame: the share of category buyers who think of the right brand when they see the element.
• Uniqueness: whether the element is also linked to other brands.

A shade of green that is already common in the dairy category is hard for anyone to own. A cartoon character used consistently for 10 years can become one brand’s asset.

Example (hypothetical)

A hypothetical bubble tea chain in Ho Chi Minh City has an orange logo, but each franchise prints its menu in a different font, and every branch’s Facebook page uses its own photos with its own filters. Two years in, customers remember the shop’s name but don’t recognize its ads when they scroll past them. Redesigning the logo is not the job at this point. The chain needs a brand guideline with enough detail, a set of templates for branches and one person who approves materials before they are posted.

How is brand identity different from brand image?

Identity is the message the business sends out; image is what customers take away. A business can change its identity overnight with a new logo, while image only shifts after many experiences. Pair a premium identity with slow service and customers will believe the service. Identity doesn’t come from nowhere either: it is designed on the positioning settled in an earlier stage of the branding process.

Frequently asked questions

Is a logo the same as brand identity?

A logo is only one part of it, usually the most recognizable part.

How often should you refresh your brand identity?

There is no fixed cycle. Change it when your positioning changes or when an old element gets confused with a competitor’s, and when you do change it, keep what customers already remember.

How long does a small business’s brand guideline need to be?

A few pages is enough: the logo and its clear space, color codes, fonts and a few examples of correct and incorrect use.

If your brand identity is being applied differently in every place, Adtek’s Brand Strategy team can review it with you and suggest how to standardize it. Contact Adtek.