Brand Identity - Lessons for Small Businesses

During the recession we witnessed a boom in many kind of small businesses all across the United States. Many of these small businesses are making smart decisions to build their brand identities. However, some of them fail hopelessly, not due to lack of passion but due to lack of knowledge.

To understand brand identity you need to understand what brand identity means. Corporate Brand Identity, is the persona or characteristics of an organization as it intentionally adapts and tries to promote using their marketing campaigns. It is implied by using coporate logo designs, web design, and other marketing created in synchronization with other design elements of the brand or the product.

A company, business or organization's brand identity promotes the business, describes its objectives, displays the values and culture behind the organization. With effective marketing it becomes symbolic to how your brand is generally perceived. From the visual appearance of your products, to the corporate logo, and from letter heads to all communications every things help businesses establish a brand identity.

Since most small businesses cannot afford a elaborate marketing campaign, still they can strengthen their brand identity by following some basic practices. First of all, hire a professional logo designer to create your business logo design. Getting a professional custom made logo design is not that expensive. Also if you need (well every one needs) a website you better give it to the same designer. That way your logo and your website will compliment each other better.

Once you got your logo design, use it well to promote your business's brand identity. You can use your logo on business cards, office stationary, banners, brochures, and every thing else you can think of.

Indian Identity Authority in Search of Logo Design

Indian government has recently formed an agency to issue a unique identification number to each and every Indian. The agency is called Unique Identification Authority of India or UIDAI. Imagine the enormous task this agency is assigned to achieve. India is the world’s most populous country and the second most population in a country after China. It has a population of roughly about 1.13 Billion people, and registering all of them and giving them a Unique ID is a gigantic job.

UIDAI, which is going to issue an Identification number to all Indians, is also looking for an Identify for itself. Recently the Agency launched a logo design competition to select the best logo design for the Agency and received 3000 submissions from all over the country. Again, keeping India’s population in mind this is a very small number of submissions, most probably because the prize money is not that significant (INR 100,000 $2200 USD). UIDAI recently got RS 19 Billion from Indian Government so it’s kind of cheap that they are offering just 100,000 to just one design.

While speaking to Press Trust of India a UIDAI official told that:

“The official said it is important that the powerful idea behind the project gets communicated to its recipients in a way that is motivating. He said the logo will act as a visual shortcut that communicates what the brand stands for”.

He further added, “It is our constant Endeavour to involve as much public as possible in this Endeavour. The selection of the logo will take place by April”.

Popular Ways to Promote Brand Identity With Logo

They say a diamond is forever, I would tell you that a good logo is also going to stick with you and your next generations for decades if not centuries. There are so many businesses out there with such beautiful logos, I mean even your competitors might get a logo much better than yours. So how do you beat them all? By using your logo for promotion of your brand identity and doing it more effectively than any of your competitors.

Get your logo printed on these China mugs and sell them to your clients. Or simply give them away for free. People love free stuff and each time they are drinking coffee in this mug they are thinking about good things in their lives coffee, comfort, and your business logo.

Print your logo on T-Shirts and distribute them on some special occasion or simply give them away for free.

Get your logo printed on Paper Bags. If you already use paper bag at your workplace thats good if you don't then you should start using them now as these bags are more environment friendly than plastic bags. Also make sure that the paper used in your bags is the recycled one and no trees get hurt when you promote your brand identity.

Print out I heart Stickers and distribute them to your Customers. I love such stickers and I love many things for example I love the book shop around the corner of my street if they distributed such stickers I would gladly display them on my car's bumper.