5 Important Questions to Ask Yourself Before Designing Your Brand
You sit down at your computer ready to get to work and create a brand that will be the foundation of your website, social media, podcasts….really your entire business.
You start to look at color palettes and you have seen different vibes by other brands that you like.
After you think about it for a moment and take a sip of you coffee you are ready to get started…but then it happens.
Overwhelm. Confusion. Analysis Paralysis. “What do I do now? There’s a million good choices and I like them all.”
Fear not, I am here to help. Here are 5 important questions you should ask yourself before designing your brand. My intention is that these questions provide you with insight to get you unstuck and on your merry way.
One: What is my industry?
This may seem really obvious, but it can happen where people get so caught up in what they feel like doing, that they forget what is relevant for their industry. If you are a health coach for example that focuses on healing inflammation in the gut, it would be weird to use pinks and red. Soothing colors like blues and greens would be more fitting. If you are a yoga instructor for men, it would make sense to use a more masculine color palette rather than pinks and pastels.
Two: Who are my Ideal Clients?
Why does this matter? WELL this is very important because without identifying who you are selling to, how will you know how to brand yourself.
Take a moment to visualize. Think about a client you have worked with before where you can say, “if every client I had was like this client, I would LOVE what I do.”
If you haven’t had clients yet, imagine up a person that you reallly would LOVE to work with. Someone that excites you, resonates with your messages, shares your values, and will not hesitate to pay your prices.
Want more help with this? Download my free Ideal Client Profile Guide for some journaling prompts that assist you in identifying your Ideal Client.
Three: Am I looking at too many other brands for inspiration?
If you are feeling stuck and confused at this point of the process, stop looking at other brands. It’s one thing to be inspired by others, but it’s an entirely different thing to look at so many different brands that you lose yourself entirely in the process.
There comes a moment where you’ve looked too far outside of yourself that you’re not even sure what intuitively calls to you anymore.
If this sounds like you, I would recommend scrapping the idea board and starting from scratch.
Get quiet, meditate and ask yourself the next question:
Four: What are my brand values?
This is critical. When you know your brand values, you also know your values. They will pretty much always go hand in hand. That’s the beauty of a personal brand.
What are important core values to you in life? These are values that guide your life decisions.
For me and my business they are:
Integrity, love, generosity, service, inspiration and celebration.
This shows up in my business as:
Me always doing what I say I will do.
Me giving and creating with a heart of love and generosity.
Me showing up in service rather than focusing on myself.
How I create content and how I show up and speak with my clients.
What do you value? This will inspire every decision you make in your business. From your color palette, to your copywriting, your photos, your customer service and everything in between.
So. Take the important time to write down your core value pillars.
Five: What resonates with my Ideal Client and also inspires me? (Pinterest exercise)
Use the information you just collected, start to explore.
Be very intentional here.
I would like you to go on Pinterest - but remember to stay focused.
You will make a board for your business. Title it with your business name + the word “Branding”.
Now, you will start to search. But like I said, be intentional about it. Don’t just search “color palette”. Search “pastel green and blue color palettes” for example. You want to narrow your search from the beginning. Once you start scrolling, let EVERYTHING be an intuition based decision. DO NOT intellectualize the process. You already did the ground work, so if you see something you like, make a fast decision and pin the darn thing.
I would pin:
3 different color palettes MAX.
3 different website design layouts you like MAX.
And then about 10 images that represent your brand MAX.
For this one, search specific words. If you are the coach I mentioned before and you focus on gut healing, then search “healing aesthetic”. If you are a yoga teacher search “peaceful aesthetic” for example. Any words that come to mind to describe what you do.
REMEMBER
If you make one decision in your business or choose one color palette, it is not the end all be all. If a year from now you want to revamp and make a change, so be it. But do not, DO NOT spend that year being so overwhelmed that you don’t even launch your business.
A fast and messy decision is better than no decision at all. As Natalia Benson would say, “JUST START ANYWHERE”.
