Why You Need Branding Before You Need a Website
When you’re running a business, the last thing you want to worry about is figuring out the order you should invest your business in. That’s why I’m making it easy for you today and walking you through why you should invest in brand design before web design. I often have people reach out to me for web design before they have proper branding done. This shows to me that there is not enough educational material about this. I know it seems counterintuitive, but I promise, making investments in your business in this order will be so much more beneficial for you in the long run as opposed to the other way around. Not only that, it will ensure you get the right results the first time, without wasting a load of time creating stuff that doesn’t work for you.
What are Branding and Websites
In simplest terms, branding is the essence of your business. It encapsulates the look, feel, aesthetic, and voice of your business. For example, does your business heavily rely on the color pink? That would be incorporated into your branding. Do you often use cuss words in your marketing copy? That also would be incorporated in your branding. Branding is way more than just the visuals associated with your brand. It encapsulates your whole vibe your business is curating to the world around you.
With this said, what is a website? At its core level, a website is a marketing tool to create an online presence for your business. And what does a tool to market your business need? Brand guidelines to keep it on track. Essentially, branding keeps your website focused and ensures that it is actually being effective at marketing toward your potential customers and clients.
How Branding Assists in Web Design
When I first started out as a web designer, I didn’t offer brand design. There were a few reasons for this, mainly being that I didn’t know what brand design was. I was a web-first kid, so when it came to my career choices, I started with websites first. Quickly though, I realized that brand design was an essential part of making websites.
Branding as a Part of Building Your Website Visuals
I personally believe that web design is an opportunity to take branding elements and bring them to life, to really start to tell the story of a business and its branding. When branding is set in stone in advance of a website project, this helps ensure the visual aesthetic of the website remains connected to the brand. Having these elements created (either by a web designer that also does brand design or a separate brand designer) informs the web designer you’re working with how to visually lay out and structure your website. For example, if your branding if colorful and funky, this will help inform a web designer that they shouldn’t create a high-end and chic website layout for your project. It also gives them clues as to how to solve your website problems. It can make all the difference from having a bland website that is disjointed to one that really connects with your audience.
Branding as a Part of the Web Design Process
From a process perspective, brand design makes web design so much easier. I’m sure you’ve heard the horror stories of website projects that just drag on and on. They are difficult to manage and they are even more difficult to execute. Usually these types of projects lead to websites that are lackluster and don’t meet the needs and goals of the project. No one is happy at the end of a project like this. This is something that hurts both the business owner investing in web design and the web designer.
Branding helps make the process of building a website so much simpler. With the visual aesthetic of a business set in stone, a web designer doesn’t have to waste time creating an aesthetic for their client. This eliminates about 50% of the issues that can come up during a web design project. Instead of worrying about the visuals, you can focus on the functionality and usability of the site instead. You’ll be able to achieve the results you’re looking for so much faster with the branding solidified in advance.
So How Does this Help You, The Client?
Working on branding before web design will be so supportive for you in the long run. Below I’ve outlined 3 different reasons why branding supports web design, and not the other way around:
Branding creates a visual foundation for building a website. This means your website will remain cohesive with the rest of your brand when you have branding in place in advance of its design. Furthermore, as your branding evolves over time, your website can evolve with you since it has been built with the same visual foundation.
You and your designer will have a benchmark for knowing what your website should look like. Your website project will be completed much faster because your designer won’t have to mess around with aesthetics that don’t work for your business.
You’ll save money because you’ll be creating visuals for your business that build off each other. You won’t have to waste money redoing things that no longer are in line with your branding.
Should You Work with a Branding & Web Designer or 2 Different Individuals
When it comes to hiring out for this type of work, there are a lot of options. Some designers do both branding and web design, like myself. Some only focus on brand design. Others are just web designers & developers. And some are just developers. It’s so confusing! There is so much variability in options that it can be hard to choose who will serve you best. Ultimately, it comes down to personal preference.
Choosing a brand or web designer is a big milestone in your business. Both of these deliverables—visual branding and a website—are going to be the cornerstones of your brand. They will inform how your audience connects with you and they will influence how your business performs online for years to come. It’s not a decision you should take lightly.
Ultimately, you want to choose a designer to work with that you connect with. Whether this person is a brand designer, web designer, both or just a developer is beside the point. Make sure they really understand your goals and needs. Make sure they actually understand the assignment you’re presenting them with. With this in mind, this will inform your choices in designers after that, whether you need to hire a separate web designer or not.
Also, in my experience most designers are super friendly and want to help you. If we don’t offer a service you are looking for, we’ll guide you to individuals in our circle that can assist you with the things we aren’t capable of. For example: I am not an SEO expert. I frequently recommend my clients to other SEO experts I am in contact with to help take their websites we built and have them start ranking on Google.
Conclusion
If you’re looking to streamline your presence online, I implore you to consider branding and web design for your business. I can assist with both and am happy to help you start bringing your business to life visually in a way that authentically connects with you. I will always recommend you start with branding as a starting point, and build up to web design. If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to me on Instagram and I can see how I can support you.
READY TO TAKE YOUR BRAND OR WEBSITE TO THE NEXT LEVEL? REACH OUT SO WE CAN CONSULT ON YOUR PROJECT TODAY.
Take care and talk soon,
Alex
