Breaking Down My Freebie, The Ultimate Checklist To Getting Your Website Started:

Have you ever gone to someone’s Instagram, loved it then went to their website and thought “is this the same person?”

Branding is a way to keep things consistent no matter where you are posting your content. It keeps the voice of your product the same and makes an imprint on someone's mind. When you see three golden arches you automatically think of Mcdonald's, whether you like eating there or not! They are a great example of keeping their brand voice consistent over the years. Sure, some of the features have changed but you always associate gold and red with that brand. 

Branding for your website is one of the first steps you need to take before creating your site. Making your brand cohesive is a big factor in the legitimacy of your brand. The 3 things you need to focus on when building out your branding are colors, text or font type, and a logo. All of these things help with brand recognition too. If someone sees your post, can they immediately tell that it is you, or do they need to look at your user name? The next decision you have to make is are you going to create the branding yourself or hire someone to help you create your brand? More thoughts on this later, but first let’s talk about colors! 

Before we jump into the blog though I wanted to take the time to share that this is part five of my blog series about my freebie, The Ultimate Checklist To Getting Your Website Started. If you haven’t signed up for it yet fill out the box below. If you want to read the other three parts of this blog series check them out below as well. 

Now let’s talk about colors! 

1. Colors

Colors can be a big element for your brand. We can dive deep into this topic and talk about how colors make people feel and such, but this is supposed to be a quick read so I’ll give you the fast version! Colors really showcase your brand voice. Is your ideal client loud and in your face or more calm and subdued? Do you want your brand to evoke a calmness or are you trying to make it happy and spunky? Knowing your ICA is a great way to create the colors that are in your brand. This also goes hand in hand with your Pinterest or mood board that you probably have created. What are the common colors that you are seeing that you want for your brand? If you are deciding to DIY your website and having trouble finding your colors get a screen grab of some of your favorite photos. Head to Canva's Color page after and create some awesome color pairings by uploading your photos. 

Paige Brunton recently put a video on her YouTube talking about the 60-30-10 rule which couldn’t be more helpful! She breaks down this rule by stating that 60% of your coloring should be one color (normally a neutral like white or cream) then 30% is a different tone and 10% is your bright accent color (think bright pink or blue). I watched it and instantly thought about changing my own colors to really reflect what she was discussing!

As a little side note too, Paige Brunton is the one who taught me EVERYTHING that I know about Squarespace and building this business, so I trust her when she provides advice!

2. Text Type Or Font Style

Your text type or font style can be a tricky part of the branding process. If you are like me and aren’t well versed in this area, then I recommend using Pinterest to find similar font styles that complement one another. My rule of thumb is to pick between two and three fonts when designing your website. This helps your website load time by not overwhelming the server with different font options, but using the same font with your graphics on other platforms helps with that brand consistency again. 

You want to make sure you have a font style for your headers and your paragraph fonts. They should complement one another, but your customer should also be able to see the difference between the two. Squarespace has a ton of free fonts that can match the choices that Canva provides. You also want to make sure that the fonts aren't hard to read. If a customer can’t read what you are trying to say then they may click out of your website.

3. Logo

Finally your logo. This part of your branding kit is again 100% up to you! There are no negative sides to having a logo or not, but having a logo can be nice. If you are designing the logo yourself, Canva makes this super easy by providing templates for them, where you can just change the colors and fonts. If you look at the example I provide, I recently built a site for my sister and took the Canva logo template and changed its font style and colors to represent her brand kit.

A bonus to having a logo is being able to use it on the header of your website and as the favicon. I sometimes like to have the logo on the website header to show the brand consistency again. I know that people also like to use their logo as a social media profile picture, so if your customer is coming from another platform they know that they have the right website. Using it as a favicon is another one of my favorite ways to use a logo. The favicon is the little picture at the left corner of your website tab. To me this makes it look more professional, especially if you are choosing to DIY your website. 

Do You Create Your Branding OR Hire Someone? 

Let’s circle back to the point I made earlier about building the branding yourself or hiring someone to create branding for you. This all really depends on where your business is in terms of its ‘life’ and how much you want to put towards your brand. With great free resources today like Canva, creating your own brand kit is extremely simple. Honestly in this moment that is how I created my branding. I’m still in the early stages of my business where hiring it out seems to be more of an expense that I’m not 100% on board with yet. 

With that being said one day I do want to work with someone to build my brand because I think it is important to have a professional brand kit. A great podcast episode that I recently listened to was Duo Collective’s 4 Reasons It Might Be Time To Rebrand Your Business. Duo Collective is a boutique marketing service provider that can help with branding, so if want professional branding done, contact them! 

If you have any other questions on why branding is important for your business or DIYing your website, let me know in the comments below or send me an email. If you found this blog helpful, share it on Pinterest or with a friend!