Creating an Identity

As the saying goes, “clothes make the man.” The business equivalent is “visual identity makes the brand.” Every successful company has a unique style that makes it identifiable, so you’ll need to commit time and resources to unite your brand and visual identity in a way that attracts customers and keeps them engaged with you.

Read on

How to pick a name

Your startup's name is vital to its brand. Aside from the logo, it’s people’s first encounter with your company, so you want to make a good first impression that lasts. Your company’s name must be short and memorable, and it should correspond, at least a little, with what your startup does.

Your brand name should also be unique so it’s easily searchable. You don't want to choose a common word that will be hard to find through search engines. A memorable domain name can be a significant advantage for your startup, but be sure to check whether the domain name for your startup moniker is free. If it’s not, but you’re really attached to a specific name, you’ll need to get creative. For example, you may be able to combine the domain and its ending to form your company’s name—a lot of tech startups use the .io domain in this way.

Your startup’s name must be easily pronounceable by native English speakers—if you want your business to go international, try and avoid using terms in your language. Of course there are exceptions, for example:

  • Volkswagen—German for “the people’s car"

  • Hitachi—Japanese for “sunrise”

  • Ubuntu—ancient African word that means “humanity to others”

Follow these fundamental rules when naming your startup:

  • Make sure it's easy to write and pronounce

  • Try to translate it, as it might mean something inappropriate in other languages

  • Define how you want to position yourself

  • Register your unique domain name and sign up for web hosting. While you can get free web hosting and portfolio sites, you have to include the service provider’s name in your website’s address—your own domain name lends credibility to your business or online persona. Don't rely solely on social media accounts as your online presence. Regardless of online trends, your domain name helps reinforce the legitimacy of your online business.

  • Your domain name should drive your brand name search.

Here are some tools that will help you in your hunt for the perfect startup name:

  • Wordoid—Pick a short and catchy name for your business

  • Naminum—The Internet's leading startup, company, and website name generator

  • Domainr—Fast, free domain name search and short URL generator

An instantly memorable logo is invaluable to building awareness for your startup. The process of designing the perfect logo is neither simple nor quick, and can be highly iterative. However, it also gives you the opportunity to get creative, or work with creative people, which can be immensely rewarding.

Mood board

Use a mood board to kick off your logo or website design process. It's a set of artwork that serves as inspiration and contributes to the final logo design. In terms of colors, shapes, and overall design, it's the goal of how your logo and/or site should look. You and your designer must be on the same page and compare mood boards with other websites, fonts, colors, pictures, and even site architecture so you know each other's vision for the project.

Know your target audience and research appropriate visual styles. Be prepared to answer questions such as: "If your brand was a person, what would that person look like?" or "What emotions should the logo evoke?" Your designer must know your business well to prepare a suitable visual brand.

Simplicity is key, as it will make the appearance of your unique logo and website straightforward and easy to understand. However, it shouldn't be too vivid or overbearing.

Your logomark is a symbol that represents your brand, while your logotype is a typographical logo consisting solely of text, though you have the freedom to alter the appearance of one or more letters without turning it into a symbol. Unless you're Nike, you should be okay with using a logotype.

Brand Manual vs. logo manual

Your logo manual is an essential technical document that defines your logo’s color, font, shape, and construction. It also indicates how to place the logo on your online and offline communications, how much padding should be around it, minimum size, etc.

Your brand manual is an extension of your logo manual, which defines all your brand materials, such as business cards, letterheads, posters, stickers, and everything else that presents your brand. This manual’s main purpose is to store all your brand needs in one place so you’re not reliant on a designer to maintain your brand—you can update contents yourself or when you’re preparing materials for printing.

Style tiles

Make sure you get a style tile from the designer who’s preparing your website. A style tile defines all design elements, including, but not limited to:

  • fonts
  • colors
  • spacing and padding
  • heading styles (e.g. H1, H2, H3)
  • button states (default, hover, click)
  • form fields

Think of a style tile as a virtual Lego kit containing all the building blocks you need to build your website or landing page.

Colors

Simply changing a color’s saturation or hue can make a huge difference in the mood your design conveys. You also need to be aware of the meanings colors have in different contexts and cultures.

Slogan

Your slogan, or central claim, should trigger an emotional response—you’ll lose people with a slogan like “We are a digital product development company and tech investor." That works as an explanatory subheading, but your slogan should have some warmth and personality that people will remember. Your slogan should intrigue your customers and interest them enough to learn more about your product. For example:

  • Disneyworld “Happiest Place on Earth”
  • General Electric “Imagination at Work”
  • Slack “Where Work Happens”
  • U+ “Minds Set on Innovation”

Painkiller vs. vitamin vs. candy

A popular school of thought suggests the best slogans should tap into a potential user's pain. If not, even if your product sells something beneficial, it might only be viewed as a vitamin, meaning it doesn't address acute frustrations. Finally, you might be selling something addictive, but which is primarily a diversion, making it candy. Focus on the pain—more specifically, your slogan should tell people your product will kill that pain.