Canny The Ultimate Small Business Branding Guide

The Ultimate
Small Business
Branding Guide.
created by
hello@canny-creative.com | +44(0)191 364 3030
www.canny-creative.com
The Ultimate Small Business Branding Guide 2
CONTENTS
1. Introduction 03
2. What is Branding? 06
3. Define Your Brand 12
4. New Brand or Rebrand 17
5. Your Brand Name 22
6. How Does Your Brand Look 30
7. Brand Identity Deliverables 35
8. Brand Rollout 45
created by
T H E U LT I M AT E S M A L L B U S I N E S S B R A N D I N G G U I D E
Introduction
created by
INTRODUCTION
When writing The Ultimate Small Business Branding Guide, the irony of commas in the title
wasn’t lost on me.
Is this...
“The Ultimate Small, Business Branding Guide”

or
“The Ultimate Small Business, Branding Guide”?

I’ll let you decide! But it’s not a small guide, and we talk about some big ideas.
Maybe a better name for this would be “The good sized, branding guide for small and
medium businesses.” But, that’s not as catchy is it?
Author
Tony Hardy is the Founder and CEO of Canny Creative. He is a graphic designer,
web designer, brand consultant, blogger, Newcastle based entrepreneur,
drummer, and wrestling fan.
Let’s get on with it:
Branding isn’t just for large companies and crazy rich business tycoons. And that’s
why we think it’s important to talk about small business branding.
When people talk about branding, and reference companies with strong brands,
they always talk about corporate giants such as: McDonalds, Coca Cola, Apple
and Google. They never talk about small business branding. But getting your small
business branding right can be the difference between success and failure.
Get it right, and you could reap the financial rewards for years to come. However, get
it wrong and you could be looking at rebranding your company further down the line,
and that could end up being quite a costly branding mistake.
created by
INTRODUCTION
Why Did We Write This Guide?

There’s always plenty of discussion around Starbucks’ new logo, the latest Apple
product and the new Coca Cola cans. While it’s easy to find quality branding
or rebranding advice about large corporations, the same ideas are not always
appropriate or easily adapted to a small business’ needs.
A local food entrepreneur with a smaller budget, running an outlet with 10 to 20 staff,
faces a very different branding challenge to McDonalds, who have more than 35,000
restaurants worldwide, employing around 350,000 people.
And that’s why we wrote The Small Business Branding Guide.
To help small businesses, like yours, to get their branding right.
Who Is This Guide For?

We wrote this guide for the local entrepreneurs and the
small businesses that find it hard to find good small business branding advice.
How Much of This Guide Should You Read?

The Ultimate Guide to Small Business Brand is intended to be read from start to
finish. And, because we know how busy you are, it’s written to take as little of your
time as possible. We estimate a total reading time of around 30 minutes.
created by
What is
Branding...
created by
W H AT I S B R A N D I N G...
Before we dive into The Small Business Branding Guide, let’s clear up the definition of
branding. We’ve already written about this twice before on the Canny blog. You can
check out those blog posts here:
1. 2.
What is Branding? Branding Definition
In this post, we try to answer the question, Branding for Businesses Explained – With this
What is Branding? We give a broad post, we break down the term further and
overview of the term and look at corporate explain what branding means to different
giants with successful brands. businesses. We also talk about pizza!
However, for the sake of speed:
Branding is a marketing
technique that helps
companies establish a unique
presence in the marketplace
whilst differentiating from
their competitors.
The brand building process will often help small businesses define a unique name,
story, strategy and visual identity.
So…
created by
What’s The Difference Between Small Business

Branding and Branding a Large Business?
Often, there’s not a lot of difference between branding a large organisation to the
branding of a small business. But there are some areas where things differ, For
example:
Many large companies need to engage in a more comprehensive brand building

process. They need to produce internal operations manuals, documents, revisit
training programs and more.
In a small business, that element of the branding process may not be a concern.
Another difference is when it comes to the brand identity design.
Large organisations tend to come with a lot of advanced design requirements.

When big companies rebrand, they have a lot of existing brand assets that need
to change too.
Smaller businesses might not have branded materials just yet, or if they do, they
might not have as much.
When large companies talk about branding, they’re normally talking about
rebranding a whole company. Rebranding is a completely different approach to
creating a new brand.
But, the key ideas are the same.
created by
Identify Your Brand’s Target Audience

Knowing your brand’s target audience is vital. Without this knowledge, you’ll be
pouring money down a sinkhole and you’ll find it hard to recover.
But why?
It’s important to know your audience because, without that, you’ll not know how
to position your brand. Telling your brand story will become more difficult, so will
developing the right name, brand strategy and identity design.
You might think that all of that derives from what the brand is all about, at its core, at
its heart. And to some extent, you’re right.
However:
You can tell the same story several different ways. You can design visuals that
appeal to one type of audience but might not appeal to another.
And all of that is great, and exactly what you should be doing. But you need to
identify your target audience first.
When you’re branding or rebranding a company, a lot of questions will be

asked. And they’re easy to answer if you’ve identified the target audience for
your brand.
So, how do you identify your target audience?
Create Your Customer Personas

When people talk about target audience in the context of small business branding,
they seem to think that your small business can only choose one.
And that’s wrong. If you can identify several different types of audience, then that’s great.
created by
The easiest way to identify your business’ audience is by creating customer persons.
Neil Patel has a great blog post called A Step-by-Step Guide to Creating Reader
Personas over at Quicksprout.
Replace “readers” with “customers” and that’s exactly what you need to be doing.
Identifying the key types of people and audience for your small business.
In Neil’s post, he walks you through the creation of a customer persona from start
to finish.
To add a little extra to Neil’s post, here’s something else to think about:
We were recently talking with one of our clients who is positioned in a pretty vanilla
niche. The finance software industry. They had no idea how to create a unique brand
persona and utilise it.
Where do your ideal customers go online?
They fired back with “Entrepreneur Magazine’s website, The Financial Times website”
and so on…
And instantly, you begin to build up a bigger picture of your customer. You can
identify with what they’re reading online. You can position your website copy to align
with their reading choices.
Most importantly:
You can start to create content that your customer’s want to read, encouraging them
to think of your brand and visit your website when they can.
Until we asked this question:
Where do your ideal

customers go online?
created by
Look at Your Existing Customer Data
Who are your customers now? Is your customer base made up of students, over 30s,
over 50s?
If you’re a bricks and mortar business it’s quite easy to analyse that data. It can
be a little trickier if your small business is online based, but you can always send
out a survey!
Look at your current clients and ask yourself:
Are these clients the best clients for our business or are we heading down the
wrong path?
If you have the right type of clients for your business already, then great, let’s figure
out how we can utilise your brand to get more of those clients. If not, then it might be
worth repositioning your brand.
It’s also worth looking at who your best and worst customers are. If you’re in a
service-based business, look for the specific accounts and ask what makes those
customers so great, or so bad.
If you run a small restaurant or coffee shop, look at the type of customers you attract.
Perhaps rowdy groups of teenagers are disruptive in your establishment. So you look
to move away from attracting those customers.
On the flip side, if you’ve noticed the over 50’s market makes you a lot of money, you
can decide to try to attract more of that market.
created by
Define Your
Brand
created by
DEFINE YOUR BRAND
I know it might feel strange to start with your customers, but it’s easier to do it that
way because, without customers, you don’t have a business.
But, once you’ve identified your customer personas, it’s time to define your brand.
Without customers, you

don’t have a business.
The Benefits, Products or Service You Offer
Your Customers
Start with the product or service that you offer. Ask yourself:
What are the true benefits that you’re bringing to your customer?
You sell a blue widget – great! But what does the blue widget give your customer,
that the red widget from next door doesn’t?
And don’t just focus on the physical benefits of the things you sell. For example:
Our client Lean Mums originally thought they were in the lifestyle and fitness
business, which is only partially true.
Sure, they sell memberships that aim to get Mums around the world into shape.
But there was more to their business than that.
The major positive that was selling memberships for Lean Mums, was the holistic
benefit of being involved in a community of like-minded people.
created by
The benefits of your product or

service are not the features of
your product.
If you’ve ever looked at writing sales copy or copy for the web, you’ll know that you
should always make benefit driven statements. And it’s the same with your brand.
Get the benefits of your brand written down and build up from there.
Your Brand Mission

Every company, whether large or small should have a mission. What does your brand
stand for? What are you trying to achieve?
Sometimes called a mission statement, or company values, your brand’s mission is

what defines you as a company. Apple’s mission statement is quite elaborate:
“We believe that we are on the face of the earth to make great products and
that’s not changing. We are constantly focusing on innovating. We believe
in the simple not the complex. We believe that we need to own and control
the primary technologies behind the products that we make, and participate
only in markets where we can make a significant contribution. We believe in
saying no to thousands of projects, so that we can really focus on the few that
are truly important and meaningful to us. We believe in deep collaboration
and cross-pollination of our groups, which allow us to innovate in a way that
others cannot. And frankly, we don’t settle for anything less than excellence in
every group in the company, and we have the self - honesty to admit when
we’re wrong and the courage to change. And I think regardless of who is in
what job those values are so embedded in this company that Apple will do
extremely well.”
created by
A mission statement gives you something to tie your business decisions back to.
At Canny, our mission statement is a lot simpler than Apple’s. Our mission is:
“To provide outstanding design, every time. We want to help companies grow with
branding, web design, and digital marketing.”
After defining our mission, I was able to make key decisions based off the back of it.
For example:
We don’t have “good enough” or “that’ll do” attitudes. And our staff and hiring
choices are made around that. If it’s not outstanding, it’s not good enough.
Your brand’s mission is fundamental in laying the groundwork for your small business
branding efforts.
Without a mission, what are you trying to achieve?
Your Brand Story

People often confuse their brand story with their brand mission.
The mission is what the brand is setting out to do. It’s the “what” of the 5W’s. Your
brand story is the “why.”
Toms shoes have a page about their brand story on their website. It’s not a mission
statement, it’s a “why we believe this is an important cause.”
Fittingly, GoPro has decided to wrap up their brand story in a video:
created by
And again, this helps you make better brand decisions. You can ask questions when
hiring, taking on new contracts and clients etc. “Does this company align with my
companies brand story? Or is there a conflict here?”
Without these fundamentals in place, your small business brand is just a pretty logo
and set of superfluous design guidelines. And that’s no brand at all.
created by
New Brand
or Rebrand...
created by
NEW BRAND OR REBRAND
Once you’ve analysed and assessed your customer base and defined your brand,
you have to ask yourself another question.
If you’re starting from scratch, you can ignore this because you only have one route
forward. But if you’re already trading, ask yourself this:
“Does my brand mission match up with what my brand is doing now?”
If it does, then great, carry on. If not, you need to take one of two routes forward on
the right.
Let’s explore some of the advantages and disadvantages of each situation.
1. 2.
Create a new brand, Rebrand your existing
whilst keeping your company, to follow
existing brand active. through on your new
brand mission.
Creating a New Brand, Whilst Keeping Your

Existing Brand Active
Creating a new brand gives you a completely fresh start. And if you keep your
existing brand rolling at the same time, you’ll also keep your revenue stream alive.
So why would you want to create a new brand?
Perhaps the area you’ve moved in to dictates

that a separate brand from your existing business is required.
For example:
Let’s pretend you currently sell shoes through an ecommerce website.
created by
Recently, you’ve noticed a gap in the market for baby and toddler footwear.
Rather than repositioning the existing shoe website to focus primarily on baby and
toddler footwear, it would probably be more effective to set up an entirely new
company and website.
That way, you can keep your existing revenue stream active, and keep the core
demographic of that brand the same.
Then the new brand launches, and you’re not harming your current revenue stream
or taking the attention away from your current demographic.
By launching a new brand in this situation, you’re in the same market space but
going after a very different target audience. The visual language of both brands
would be very different, therefore it makes sense to build a new brand entirely.
If you’re looking for a real life example, here’s an example from the cereal world.
Imagine you’re Kelloggs. The owner of most of the cereal brands in the world.
Here’s the situation:
You’ve invented Corn Flakes already. They’re wildly popular among adults all over
the world. But, then you come up with another idea.
created by
Sweeter, sugar coated Corn Flakes. Do you have one brand of Corn Flakes with adult
and child variants? No!
You create a new brand called Frosties (or in America, Frosted Flakes), and
create the Tony the Tiger mascot. And suddenly you’ve got two very successful
brands working for you.
The target markets are different and the visual language needs to be different. So
again, it makes sense to create a new brand.
Rebranding Your Existing Company, To Follow

Through On Your New Brand Mission
If your company has changed it’s brand values or mission statement, but your target
audience remains the same, you should consider rebranding.
There’s no point in setting up a new company, if your existing company is essentially

selling the same thing, with a new attitude.
Other reasons you might consider rebranding rather than creating a new
company include:
1. 2.
Your existing brand You’ve recently
identity looks old refurbished your
and dated physical premises
3. 4.
You recently suffered You’re experiencing
a PR disaster a period of growth
and your brand
feels lacking
created by
There are a lot of different reasons that a rebrand would be better than creating a
new company from scratch.
You certainly wouldn’t want to throw away your customer loyalty, or rip up existing
contracts. You may alienate people by creating a new company. But if you roll out
your rebrand correctly, you will retain customer faith.
Time for another real life example:
We recently completed work on a project for a company now called Xceptor, who
were formally known as WSI (Web Service Integration.)
They wanted to rebrand because:
Their existing brand looked years out of date (think early internet)
Their software product is called Xceptor, and everyone called the company Xceptor
anyway
As they had long standing relationships with some of the top banks in the World, it
made no sense for them to start a new company. If they did that, they’d have to explain
why, and what had changed so dramatically that they had to start from scratch.
We rebranded the company, created them a new brand identity and helped them roll
out the brand the right way.
They alienated a total of zero customers, and their company is now stronger than it
has ever been.
Once you’ve made the decision in which way to progress, you need to think about...
created by
Your Brand Name
created by
YOUR BRAND NAME
Picking the right name for your business is one of the tasks that small business
owners struggle with the most.
So how do you pick the “right” brand name for your small business? And, more
importantly – does it even matter?
What Your Name Can Do For You

In the best case scenario, your small business brand name can create buzz around
your company. If it’s exciting or intriguing, people will want to know what you do.
If you’re just starting out in business, that can be a great way to drum up some
interest.
Our full name is Canny Creative. People from the Newcastle always raise a smile and
mention our name. We’re always hearing positive comments about our name.
Canny is a Geordie word, and it’s relatable. So for Geordie’s our name has an
added level of depth. And when dealing with clients in other parts of the world, it’s
inoffensive and also creates a great talking point.
There are arguments for and against the importance of a brand name.
One camp believes in the power of naming, and the other believes that
the branding is more important than the name itself.
I’m on the fence. I think a combination of both worlds is the best

possible solution.
So, How Do You Choose a Brand Name?

Now that we’ve looked at what your brand name can do for you, let’s look at actually
sitting down and trying to decide on a name.
created by
The Post-It Note Approach
The first thing you should do is a huge brain dump of everything that’s rattling
around inside your head.
Get together a pen, a pile of post-it notes, some paper and some masking tape. Then,
go crazy.
Write down literally everything that you can think of. Objects, colours, themes, ideas
for names. Write them forwards, write them backwards. Then, stick them to one of
your sheets of paper.
Once you’ve amassed plenty of ideas, start trying to group them.
Are certain themes emerging? Are certain words reoccurring over and over again?
Maybe it’s not even full words. Maybe it’s part of a word. If there’s something jumping
out at you, make a note.
We recently went through this approach with one of our clients, MyDome (previously
known as Light Switch Timer.) And we were holed up in their office all afternoon.
Light Switch Timer is a timer for the lights on your wall. But they wanted to create a
home brand to house the light switch timer, among other products.
Get together a pen, a pile of

post-it notes, some paper and
some masking tape.
Then, go crazy.
When we began to analyse the words that were jumping out, we noticed lots
of alternative words for house. We had “TechHouse, HouseSecure, HomeLink,
HomeAuto, Casa, Castle” and the list went on.
created by
To accompany that, we had a lot of words or parts of words linked to technology and the
future. We had “iHome, Wired, Sync, HouseSync, LinkedUp” and again the list went on.
Together with the client we identified that the brand needed to sound personable yet
with a slight technical edge.
And thus MyDome was born. The “My” was on one post it note on one side of the room,
and the “Dome” was in another, grouped with other words relating to safe spaces.
The post-it note exercise may seem childish or even pointless, but even managing to get
all of your thoughts out is a big win in itself.
Identify Themes Within Your Business
As with the post-it note method, it’s important that you identify themes within your
business.
If you’re a small business owner, who owns an organic food brand for example, you
could look to use:
• Organic
• Natural
created by
• Light
• Health
• Green
Even just taking the short list, you could chop the words up and rearrange them.
And if you were an organic food brand focused on creating healthy baby food, you
could add the words:
• Baby
• Child
• Kids
• Toddler
• Infant
Combining ideas from both list could leave you with a name like “Babyganic” or
“Nature Kids” or “Naturic.” Sure, they may not be the best brand names, but if you go
25-50 words deep, you’ll be getting into unique branding territory.
Exploring the key themes from your brand’s mission and story will help you identify
unique words, phrases, syllables or sounds you may want to explore to use as a name.
Use a Brand Name Generator, No, Seriously!
Brand name generators send

shudders down the spines of
many a professional branding
consultant.
created by
However, they can be put to good use.
Much like the post-it note brain dump approach, brand name generators can be
good for creating a lot of ideas quickly.
Sure, there’ll be some horrible, horrible suggestions in the list. However, there may
just be a diamond in the rough. And if there’s not, a name generator might just open
your eyes to a new idea or direction.
Consult With Branding Professionals
The best way to develop a name for your brand is to consult with a professional
branding agency. Working with professionals who do this for a living is should work
out well for you.
Finding an agency with a good reputation can be a little tricky, but it’s worth
persevering with.
A good professional branding agency will work with you to drill down into your
business and really get you thinking outside the box about your company.
If you choose to work with a branding agency, they’ll probably run you through
everything that we’ve talked about in this post so far. If they don’t, it might be a sign
they’re not engaged with your brand or project.
But won’t hiring a branding agency cost a lot of money?
Sure, if you choose a high profile capital city based agency, you’re going to be
looking at a hefty bill. And if you have the budget for that, then go right ahead.
But knowing your budget, and being honest with potential branding partners can
work to your advantage in this situation.
How so?
Knowing your budget and being open and honest about it will help give your
shortlisted agency partners a clear idea about how they can help you. And hopefully,
they’ll be able to offer solutions to you that will fit within your budget.
created by
If they don’t know your budget though, you’re leaving them guessing, and
that doesn’t help anybody!
Are The Names on Your Shortlist Available?
Once you’ve compiled a shortlist of names, either on your own, or with an agency, I
suggest you check out a few things.
1. 2.
Are your shortlisted Can you legally register
names available as your shortlisted names?
domains?
These are 2 very important factors when choosing a brand name.
Let’s explore:
Are Your Shortlisted Names Available As Domains?
In this day and age, if you can’t secure your brand name as a .com domain, you
might want to reconsider.
Sure, there are ways around it. You can use modifiers such as “hello” or hyphens or
anything else you might be able to think of.
created by
I bought “canny-creative.com” as I couldn’t get “canny.com” unless I wanted to pay a

ridiculous price for it.
Most people want to secure the .com domain name, but depending on your
company or organisation, you may also want to consider other TLD (top level
domain) options.
For example:
If you’re in the tech space, how about the new .io that many companies appear to be
using.
Or if you’re a charitable or not for profit organisation, how about a .org domain
extension?
There are a lot of options to consider, but you’ll probably want to secure a domain
name one way or the other.
Can You Legally Register Your Shortlisted Names?
If you’re setting up your new business in the UK, you’ll need to check with Companies
House to make sure nobody else is using your chosen brand name.
If they are, you’ll need to rethink your idea.
When registering Canny Creative Ltd I took professional advice from my accountant,
and I highly recommend that you find a professional to assist you. They can then
recommend the right course of action and suggest workarounds if needed.
Most countries have an organisation responsible for checking the legalities of a

company name, and each have their own rules. So do make sure you check before
embarking on branding and marketing projects!
Now that you have the groundwork down, it’s time

start thinking about the way your brand looks.
created by
How Does Your

Brand Look...
created by
HOW DOES YOUR BRAND LOOK?
Again, we always recommend working with a trusted branding partner when

establishing your small business brand.
The look of your brand is going to be based on the things that we’ve already
identified earlier in this post, such as:
1 2 3
Your target audience Your brand mission Your brand story
and to some degree…
4
Your brand name
It’s important to remember that you’re not creating a brand that you like on a
personal level. You’re working to develop a brand that your customers like.
You want your brand to work

for you and sell your product.
You want your brand to work for you and sell your product. It’s not about personal
taste. Sure, if there’s room, you could factor some of that in. But, you need to
realise the value of design and let your branding assist in the selling of your
product or service.
created by
Who Could You Hire to Design and Develop

Your Brand?
You have a lot of options when it comes to selecting a branding partner to work with.
Depending on your budget for the work, you might want to consider some options
from the list below.
So, who provides small business branding services?
Let’s take a look at your options:
A Student
Students are a mixed bag. Some of them are great, others not so much. It’s important
to remember that if you hire a student, you’re not hiring a professional designer and
they may lack experience in working with real businesses.
That said, everyone has to learn somewhere. And I know I would have been grateful
for the opportunity while I was studying.
If you do decide that hiring a student is the right way to go, I would suggest trying to
work with a 3rd year student, or someone that had recently graduated and is looking
to snap up exciting opportunities.
Remember to pay students fairly, it’s not fair not to!
A Freelancer
Freelancers are also an interesting situation. Technically, anybody can set up a

design agency and call themselves a professional design freelancers.
You don’t need a formal qualification and you don’t need to register with a
professional body. Therefore there are no restrictions in place. People that download
a copy of the Adobe Suite call themselves freelancers, and it’s just not right.
Just like with students, it’s important you do your due diligence and check over
portfolios and testimonials of their past clients. There are some great design
freelancers out there!
Cost wise, a freelancer will usually be cheaper than a small design agency, but more
expensive than a student.
created by
A Small Design and Branding Agency
As I run a small design and branding agency, this is the area I have the most to
comment on. It’s also the area with one of the widest spreads in terms of cost and
quality.
When I say small design agency, I mean an agency based in a single location, such
as a smaller city. The size of the staff team at the agency isn’t usually the factor when
labelling the agency as a “small design agency” or a “large branding firm.”
That’s normally based on they type of clients they deal with, and the rate at which
they charge their projects.
Smaller agencies will tend to work with exciting new ventures, startups and some
SME companies. Some small agencies (like Canny) are fortunate enough to work
with large corporate clients.
For example:
We’ve worked with G4S, one of the biggest employers in the world.
The cost of working a smaller design agency might not be as much as you expect. At
Canny, a lot of our projects run in the mid four-figure range. Sure, that’s not a small
amount of money. But, design is an investment and when investing good money,
you’ll get a good return.
The advantage of working with a small agency is that you’re often working hands
on with the business owner. That’s a great advantage for a client, as they’re going
to want to make sure you’re happy, and their agency is putting out cutting edge,
professional branding projects!
Another advantage is that when the team is smaller, projects are normally worked on
collectively in the office. That means you can talk to anyone about your project, and
they should be able to provide you an update.
One of the only disadvantages I can see of working with a smaller agency is the
scalability factor.
If you’re looking to seek huge investment, strap a rocket to your back, and fly to the
moon - you could quickly outgrow your smaller branding agency.
created by
That said:
If you work with your agency to formulate a brand strategy and scope of work, you
can potentially help them grow them too, for which they’ll be forever grateful.
Choosing a good design agency to work with can be tricky, so check out our
handy guide.
A Large Branding Firm
Unless you have mega money to spend, a large branding firm probably isn’t the right
choice for a small business branding project.
That said, if you are looking to strap a rocket to your back from the start, perhaps
looking for seed money and investors (like Uber) then maybe it’s the right choice.
Large agencies are normally based in the bigger cities across the country. They’ll
also tend to have pretty central locations. As well as that, large branding firms tend
to have multiple premises.
created by
Brand Identity
Deliverables
created by
BRAND IDENTITY DELIVERABLES
The deliverables that make up a small business branding project can differ from
business to business. However, there are some key elements that tend to make up
every brand identity design project.
Let’s take a look:
Logo Design
When working with a professional designer, you’ll be given several variations of your
logo. These will include:
1 2 3
A full colour version A black and white version An alternative colour version
4 5 6
A vertical lockup A horizontal lockup Social avatars
The files should be delivered in multiple formats, ranging from JPEGs and PNGs all
the way through to vector formats such as EPS and PDF.
The price of professional logo design has and always be up in the air.
However, you should be working with a professional design agency or designer to

work on your brand identity project.
If possible, when you create a brand logo, it should symbolise your brand mission
and story. But it doesn’t need to show exactly what you offer!
created by
For example:
The McDonalds logo isn’t a hamburger and fries. The Apple logo isn’t something hi-
tech or technology based. The Nike logo isn’t a pair of trainers.
So try to resist that temptation! And again, remember, it’s important that your logo is
designed with your customers in mind, not just to satisfy your personal taste.
Stationery Design
Your stationery design is often derived from your logo. Colour choices that have been
made roll through into your stationery and other materials.
You might use your logo in it’s original form, or one of it’s variations. Along with
that, your designer might choose to explore further colour choices and typographic
solutions.
As standard, we include business cards and letterhead paper with all of our projects.
We’ve not had a small business client yet that hasn’t asked us to design a business
card for them. Some people say business cards are on the decline, but we simply
can’t agree!
created by
Business cards and letterheads should definitely be considered, and after that you
need to start thinking about your promotional materials.
Promotional Materials
And this is where a lot of small business brands vary depending on the area they’re
in, and their target audience.
You need to think about the type of business you are and how you’re going to reach
your customers.
Let’s examine three types of business to understand what type of promotional

material they might have designed.
An Accountants
An accounting firm are probably looking for businesses to work. They might rely on
networking and attending expos and conferences to market their business.
Therefore, for them, banner and exhibition stands are probably a must. As are flyers,
and maybe even smaller promotional items such as pens, bags and key-rings.
created by
That way when they’re attending conferences, they have a professionally branded
look to their exhibition stall and marketing material that they can give away.
A Sports Team
In sports, you need to stand out. There’s a lot of noise and colour.
Flyers probably aren’t the right choice for a sports team, unless they’re being used
to specifically promote a one-off deal. However, a weekly or monthly newsletter or
programme could be a better choice.
Other considerations could include: team kits, mascots and saleable merchandise.
A Restaurant
A restaurant will have a different set of requirements to both of the other ventures
outlined above.
Sure, they too could use flyers, but how about a coupon book instead? Something
that gives your visitors an added benefit when returning.
Restaurants need to focus on brand building,

and small marketing materials such as pens
and notebooks aren’t so relevant. They could instead need to invest in signage and
decor for their premises.
Another option for restaurants is to focus on building a restaurant “cult.”
For example:
Red’s True BBQ sell their own range of tshirts and BBQ sauces. Nandos sell hot sauce
and have a great rewards scheme to help build brand loyalty.
As you can see, promotional materials will vary depending on the type of small
business you run. You need to think about your ideal customers and how you’re going
to market your business to them.
Brand Guidelines
The final thing to consider is your company’s brand guidelines. Brand guidelines are
created by
an all encompassing document that outlines exactly how your brand should look.
They’re great for handing over to companies that will be working with your company.
For example:
If you change to a different design agency, your brand guidelines should be handed
over to help ease the transition.
Or, if you’ve worked exclusively with a graphic design agency, you should hand your
guidelines over to your web development team.
They’re a handy versatile document that will grow as your company grows.
So what exactly should be in your brand guidelines?
Let’s take a look:
1. 2. 3.
Your logo - Full colour and Logo use cases - Your Fonts and typography - If your
single colour logo designs guidelines should explain brand has a distinct typeface,
should be included. As should exactly how your logo should it should be included. Think
horizontal and vertical and shouldn’t be used. They about typography in your
iterations if possible. should also outline “clear logo, marketing materials,
areas” around your logo, and and website.
minimum and maximum sizes
your logo should be used at.
4. 5. 6.
Colour palette - Your brand’s Language - This is an Photography - A lot of brands
colours should be include. interesting one. If your brand include photographic styles in
The colour values should be has a unique written tone, their guidelines. If they’re key,
outlined in HEX code, RGB and include it. Do you say “Hello” they need to be in there.
CMYK values. or “Hey” or “Hey there!”?
7.
Additional features - And finally, include
anything else that differentiates your brand.
Perhaps its uniform choices, or maybe it’s
email signature designs. If it’s unique to your
company, make sure it’s included.
created by
You need to be able to hand

over your brand guideline
document and have the
person on the receiving
end understand your
company completely.
If you’re looking for some good examples of brand guidelines, have a look at Skype
and NASA’s documents.
Your Website
Your brand’s website is an important part of your brand identity, and it shouldn’t
be overlooked.
Your website should reflect your business. And it’s important that you avoid making
one of the top website design mistakes.
There are a number of ways that you can make sure your website reflects
your brand:
1. 2. 3.
Use the same creative agency Know your brand identity Revisit your brand mission
to create both your brand inside and out, ensuring your and story, and make sure that
identity and website. website design follows suit. is evident online.
4. 5.
Bring your social media Create a plan to effectively
strategy in line with your brand market your brand online.
strategy, identity, website.
created by
Small businesses often overlook their own personal website in favour of using a social
media platform like Facebook.
And that’s a huge mistake!
Facebook and other social platforms are a

great way of extending your brand reach and following. But, ultimately, you have no
control
over those platforms.
If Facebook implodes, or restricts your brand reach, you can’t do anything about it. If
Twitter closes down tomorrow, and you’ve not built a following elsewhere, you’re up
the creek without a paddle.
That’s why it’s important to grow traffic to your own website. Then you’re control of
your own destiny.
You can track your website traffic using a tool like Google Analytics.
But what do you do once you’ve got people using your website? Essentially, you have
two choices:
Sell them your product right away
Convert them into a subscriber
created by
Let’s take a closer look at each option:
Sell Them Your Product Right Away
Selling your visitors a product right away can be difficult. Especially if this is the first
time a visitor has come into contact with your brand.
Think about it:
How many times did you see adverts for Netflix or Spotify before signing up?
However, if you are selling products online, it makes sense to try and sell them to
each and every website visitor.
Convert Them Into a Subscriber
This is the easier route forward. Rather than focusing on the sale, focus on a
conversion.
Get your website visitors to become either a mailing list subscriber or, a social
media follower.
In essence, you’re turning visitors into fans of the brand.
Over time, this will help you generate a return

from your website’s visitors. And that, is exactly what most small businesses want.
It’s important you don’t rely on existing platforms to build your online following.
Sure:
Use social media to promote and market your business, but you need to be in control
of your own online audience.
created by
A Final Note on Brand Identity Design

It’s important to work with a professional branding agency to create your brand
identity.
When working to create your identity, it’s important to create your own unique,
distinctive identity.
You don’t want your small business brand to be accused of mimicking the feel of
bigger companies. You need to focus on what makes you unique!
Stealing ideas from others means your brand isn’t authentic, and people buy into
authenticity. If you’re struggling to differentiate your brand, have a look at our small
business branding tips to help you out.
created by
Brand Rollout
created by
BRAND ROLLOUT
Once you have everything in place, it’s time to focus on your brand rollout.
We’ve come this far, now it’s time that your small business branding efforts start to
reap the reward they deserve.
So, how do you perform an

effective brand rollout?
Give Yourself Enough Time
Rushing out your small business branding can be tempting. It’s exciting to see your
new brand vision and identity spring to life.
But don’t rush it!
Give yourself and your chosen branding partner time to pull everything together.
At Canny, we recommend branding projects run over the course of 12 weeks

if a web element is included. In that time, it’s important to prepare all of your
brand touch points and create a launch calendar.
Prepare All Brand Touch Points

Get together everything that you’ve been working on with your design agency. Make
sure you have all of the designs and guidelines in place and list out all of your brand
touch points before launch.
If there’s anything you’ve forgotten about, revisit it and get it ready for launch too.
created by
Create a Launch Calendar

Work with your agency to build out a launch calendar. If you’re gearing up towards
an event, build your brand rollout around that.
If you’re launching at a particular time of year, make sure you’ve got your project
rolling early enough and get the important dates in
the calendar.
That way you’ve got key dates to build your rollout plan around, making it clear for
everyone involved.
And Don’t Forget…
Don’t jump the gun and

accidentally leak out parts
of your brand in dribs and
drabs. We had a client do this
recently, and it left them in a
bit of a pickle!
created by
Conclusion
created by
CONCLUSION
Small business branding can be a headache. Especially if you’ve never done it

before.
Working with a professional branding agency is the easiest way to ensure your small
business branding or rebranding project goes off without a hitch.
It’s true that if you have an exceptional product or service, you can start a small
business without building a professional brand.
However, if you want to grow the business and expand into more aggressive markets,
you’ll need to establish a great brand identity!
When facing similar pricing and comparable quality in a tight marketplace,

developing a strong brand will pay dividends and can often tip the balance in your
favour.
In the end, the most successful small business is going to be the one that’s...
1. 2.
Making the Building the biggest following
most money of loyal customers.
The power of the small business branding should never be overlooked. Do you
agree? What steps are you taking to ensure that you’re building the strongest
possible business brand?
We would love to talk with you about your rebrand and welcome questions
at any time.
hello@canny-creative.com
+44(0)191 364 3030
created by
I have worked with

design agencies
of all sizes in my
career, and Canny
are simply top
class.
Justin Brown, Founder
Shodai / Letsg.oo
created
created by
by
Thank You.
created by

Canny The Ultimate Small Business Branding Guide

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Canny The Ultimate Small Business Branding Guide

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

The Ultimate

3. Define Your Brand 12

4. New Brand or Rebrand 17

5. Your Brand Name 22

6. How Does Your Brand Look 30

7. Brand Identity Deliverables 35

“The Ultimate Small, Business Branding Guide”

“The Ultimate Small Business, Branding Guide”?

Let’s get on with it:

Why Did We Write This Guide?

And that’s why we wrote The Small Business Branding Guide.

To help small businesses, like yours, to get their branding right.

Who Is This Guide For?

How Much of This Guide Should You Read?

However, for the sake of speed:

What’s The Difference Between Small Business

Many large companies need to engage in a more comprehensive brand building

Another difference is when it comes to the brand identity design.

Large organisations tend to come with a lot of advanced design requirements.

But, the key ideas are the same.

Identify Your Brand’s Target Audience

When you’re branding or rebranding a company, a lot of questions will be

So, how do you identify your target audience?

Create Your Customer Personas

Where do your ideal customers go online?

Until we asked this question:

Where do your ideal

Look at Your Existing Customer Data

Look at your current clients and ask yourself:

DEFINE YOUR BRAND

Without customers, you

But there was more to their business than that.

The benefits of your product or

Your Brand Mission

Sometimes called a mission statement, or company values, your brand’s mission is

Without a mission, what are you trying to achieve?

Your Brand Story

Fittingly, GoPro has decided to wrap up their brand story in a video:

NEW BRAND OR REBRAND

“Does my brand mission match up with what my brand is doing now?”

Let’s explore some of the advantages and disadvantages of each situation.

Creating a New Brand, Whilst Keeping Your

So why would you want to create a new brand?

Perhaps the area you’ve moved in to dictates

Let’s pretend you currently sell shoes through an ecommerce website.

Here’s the situation:

Rebranding Your Existing Company, To Follow

There’s no point in setting up a new company, if your existing company is essentially

Time for another real life example:

They wanted to rebrand because:

Your Brand Name

YOUR BRAND NAME

What Your Name Can Do For You

I’m on the fence. I think a combination of both worlds is the best

So, How Do You Choose a Brand Name?

The Post-It Note Approach

Once you’ve amassed plenty of ideas, start trying to group them.

Get together a pen, a pile of

Identify Themes Within Your Business

Use a Brand Name Generator, No, Seriously!

Brand name generators send

However, they can be put to good use.

Consult With Branding Professionals