A brand kit is an absolute must-have for all businesses. When marketing agencies, freelancers, and several other teams use your brand, it is inevitable that inconsistencies will arise. A robust system must be in place for upholding consistency in communication, and a brand identity kit fulfills this objective. 

When you hear the word “McDonalds” what comes to your mind? Is it Ronald McDonald? Iconic golden arches? Red and yellow packaging? A Big Mac? Or all of it?

Brand recall is not the result of one factor but a combination of consistency in their logo, font, brand colors, and maybe even one of their signature phrases: “I’m lovin’ it!”

McDonald’s (and pretty much every successful brand) has meticulously crafted its brand identity to achieve this perfection. They successfully achieved what every business aims for in branding: one that is instantly recognizable. We didn’t even have to show you any of their visual branding elements for you to be able to picture what we’re talking about!

A branding kit goes beyond just basic elements like logos and letterheads. It helps you develop a robust visual identity across all touchpoints. This is why it is also known as a “brand identity kit.”

In this blog, we will help you understand the function and importance of brand kits in depth so that your team can integrate it into their brand management strategy.

What is a brand kit? 

A brand kit is a resource that contains guidelines of your brand identity, usually containing comprehensive information to ensure brand consistency. Most of the time, it is a simple and easy to understand guide.

A brand kit contains important information about the important visual elements of your brand, such as logos, fonts, color palette, branded imagery, and more. This resource sometimes also includes information on where and how to use your brand’s visual elements. In layman terms, a brand kit is nothing but your brand’s own personal rulebook. 

Your brand kit can be distributed to members of your team or you can publicly share it so that people who are involved in the creation of your visual assets have it handy. Many large companies publicly share these guidelines so that even hobbyists have the opportunity to share their brand story!

An important distinction to be made here is that a brand ‘kit’ focuses specifically on the visual elements of your brand, but don’t get too hung up on different jargon and labels. The key takeaway is that a brand kit equips your business with the framework they need to deliver a consistent and memorable brand experience.

Why a brand kit is essential for your business

On a high level, a brand identity kit helps your company express itself and build resonance with consumers. Whether your business is small or large, it helps in creating a consistent, memorable brand identity.  

If your goal is to ensure your visual communication is on-brand across touchpoints, a brand identity kit is what you need. As your brand keeps growing, you want to ensure that your image does not get misrepresented. Not only does it help you develop a brand identity, but it also promotes brand awareness and recall.

Whether your team consists of marketing executives, social media managers, graphic designers the brand assets used for communication of your brand must be consistent in terms of logos, colors, and fonts. Discrepancies will not only reflect poorly on your company but also negatively impact it.

On the other hand, implementing robust brand consistency using a brand kit provides many benefits to your business. Some of them are as follows: 

A brand kit promotes recognition

Maintaining consistency across touchpoints and visual brand assets is key to building brand recall. Over time this crisp and consistent communication lead to familiarity within the mind of your audience, leading to trust and confidence.

A brand kit helps you stand out from the crowd

How can a simple color scheme solidify a brand’s identity? Just look around at any successful brand today. Perfecting your visual communication not only promotes recognition but helps you stand out from competitors as well. For example, when you think about the color scheme of orange, white, and yellow which brand crosses your mind? If you thought about Amazon, you’re not alone.

A brand kit helps in generating interest

Branding kits make it easier for your team to deploy on-brand creatives at scale. Such a feature is ideal to grow your brand presence fast and generate new interest. An effective branding kit for your business can create excitement, pique interest, and generate referrals. After all, consumers love to talk about the brands they love.

A brand kit makes the rebranding process easier

When your company goes through the rebranding process, updated brand guidelines make the deployment process exponentially faster and easier. This not only helps announce a rebrand but also gets your team members on-board with new guidelines. 

What’s Included in a Brand Kit?

A few key components make up a brand kit. These are the most essential parts of this resource that dictate the overall communication and “feel” of your brand through visual elements. Let us take a look at the important elements in a brand kit:

Typeface

A memorable and well-designed typeface or font is so essential to branding that some experts believe that it can sometimes be as valuable as the logo of a brand itself. Your signature font or typeface is a key part of your brand kit and should be considered a visual asset itself. 

Logo 

Next, we have a brand logo. The logo is more than just a small icon; it is essentially your entire company in an image. Your logo represents your brand and its consistency must be absolutely perfect to demonstrate your companies commitment to excellence. For many, a brand logo is a visual representation of what your company stands for.

Colour Palette

A color palette is the most important part of your brand kit, as it sets your brand’s visual language.

It’s a well-documented fact that people associate colors with emotions. Therefore the details that go into the creation of your brand colors must be prioritized. Not just your brand colors but your brand’s shades are part of your brand kit to ensure absolute perfect consistency.

How to integrate a brand kit in your brand management process

A brand kit serves an invaluable purpose: maintaining consistency and communicating design guidelines to everyone involved in the creation of visual assets. Having such a resource will simplify the job of designers, writers, and developers. Besides this, it will also eliminate any chance of errors during brand development.

Brand guidelines ensure that a company’s content is distinguishable from the competition. Over time this plays a key role in building brand awareness.

Large companies across the globe use brand kits, such as Google, Amazon, and Trello. In fact, they even publish their brand guidelines publicly so that employees can access them whenever they need it!

You can integrate such brand guidelines by using an enterprise design management tool that gives you the ability to create brand-compliant designs and upload your own guidelines. 

This enables you to uphold your brand’s visual identity including features such as brand guidelines, logos, font files, colors, and templates.

• You can set your brand color palette within the workspace to guide users to create on-brand creatives always.
• An enterprise design management tool also provides custom templates that include visual assets, brand guidelines, and even add gradient colors using comprehensive gradient color generation functionality.

Conclusion

A brand kit is an essential part of your brand management strategy. In order to keep your brand identity easily recognizable and consistent even when multiple people are developing content for your brand, it is tremendously helpful to use a brand kit.