Designing Brand Identity: An Essential Guide for the Whole Branding Team » (3rd Edition)

Alina Wheeler engages enterprises in a dynamic process to build their brands and embrace best practices. Wheeler inspires the whole branding team to seize every opportunity to design compelling customer experiences.

Wheeler is passionate about her subject, and speaks to groups large and small around the world, from Beijing to Bucharest.

Who are you?

Who needs to know?

Why should they care?

How will they find out?

In a densely crowded marketplace, corporations, organizations, and even individuals look for ways to differentiate themselves. That is the job of branding.

Whether your goal is to express a new brand or to revitalize an existing one, here is a proven, universal five-phase process for creating and implementing effective brand identity. From research and analysis through brand strategy, design development through application design, and identity standards through launch and governance, Designing Brand Identity is an essential reference for the entire process.

Enriched by new case studies showcasing successful world-class brands from Herman Miller and General Electric to the Obama '08 election campaign, this Third Edition offers new insights into emerging trends such as sustainability and social networks.

Alina Wheeler applies her strategic imagination and process management skills to revitalize brands for Fortune 100 companies, entrepreneurial ventures, and nonprofits.

Praise for previous editions of Designing Brand Identity:

An inspiring and powerful toolkit.

The Marketer

Alina Wheeler provides a practical structure for the brand building process.

Al Ries, coauthor, Positioning

Wheeler's book offers a cogent description of how strategy and design meet in the real world among world-class companies.

Marty Neumeier, author, The Brand Gap

A valued reference book for all members of the branding team.

Communication Arts

Part 1 presents the fundamental concepts needed to jumpstart the brand identity process and create a shared vocabulary for the entire team.

Brand basics

What is brand? 2

What is brand identity? 4

What is branding? 6

Who are stakeholders? 8

Why invest? 10

Brand strategy 12

Positioning 14

Big idea 16

Customer experience 18

Names 20

Brand architecture 22

Taglines 24

Staying on message 26

Cross Cultures 28

Brand identity ideals

Overview 30

Vision 32

Meaning 34

Authenticity 36

Differentiation 38

Durability 40

Coherence 42

Flexibility 44

Commitment 46

Value 48

Brand identity elements

Brand marks 50

Sequence of cognition 52

Word marks 54

Letter form marks 56

Pictorial marks 58

Abstract marks 60

Emblems 62

Characters 64

Look and feel 66

Brand forces

Brand Dynamics 68

Sustainability 70

Social media 72

Brand licensing 74

Private labeling 76

Certification 78

Personal branding 80

Before and after

Merger 82

New name 83

Redesign 84

Packaging 86

Part 2 presents a universal brand identity process regardless of the project's scope and nature. This section answers the question "Why does it take so long?"

A process for success 90

Managing the process 92

Measuring success 94

Collaboration 96

Decision making 98

Insight 100

Phase 1 Conducting research

Overview 102

Market research 104

Usability 106

Marketing audit 108

Competitive audit 110

Language audit 112

Audit readout 114

Phase 2 Clarifying strategy

Overview 116

Narrowing the focus 118

Brand brief 120

Naming 122

Phase 3 Desinging identity

Overview 124

Logotype + signature 126

Color 128

More color130

Typography 132

Sound 134

Motion 136

Trial applications 138

Presentation 140

Phase 4 Creating touch points

Overview 142

Trademark process 144

Letterhead 146

Business card 148

Collateral 150

Website 152

Favicons 154

Signage 156

Product design 158

Packaing 160

Advertising 162

Environments 164

Vehicles 166

Uniforms 168

Ephemera 170

Phase 5 Managing assets

Managing assets

Overview 172

Changing brand identity 174

Launching brand identity 176

Building brand champions 178

Internal design teams 180

Brand books 182

Standards content 184

Standards + guidelines 186

Online branding tools 188

Reproduction files 190

Global metrics 192

Best Practices

Part 3 showcases best practices: Local and global, public and private, these projects inspire and examplity original flexible, lasting solution.

ACLU 196

Amazon.com 198

Apotek 200

Assurant 202

Aveda Uruku 204

Beeline 206

BP 208

California Academy of Sciences 210

Cereality 212

Chambers Group 214

City Church Eastside 216

Coca-Cola 218

Eimer Stahl 220

FedEx 222

Feng 224

FORA.tv 226

GE 228

Good Housekeeping Seal 230

Heavy Bubble 232

Herman Miller 234

Hot Wheels 236

HP 238

IUNI Educational 240

Kort & Godt 242

Laura Zindel 244

Library of Congress 246

MoMA 248

The New School 250

NIZUC 252

Obama 254

Olympic Games 256

Park Angels 258

PNC Virtual Wallet 260

Presbyterian Church 262

Preferred 264

(RED) 266

Saks Fifth Avenue 268

SugarFISH 270

Superman 272

Tate 274

Thomas Jefferson's Poplar Forest 276

TiVo 278

Unilever 280

Vanguard ETFs 282

Velfina 284

Vueling 286

The Wild Center 288

Xohm 290

Bibliography 292

Index 294

About the author 310