By the proof. team ·
A brandbook is a short guide that records how your business looks and sounds, so that anyone who makes something for you (a designer, a printer, a new employee) gets it right without asking you.
Isn't a logo enough?
A logo is one file. The trouble starts with everything around it. Which blue is the real blue? Which font goes on the invoice? Do you say "clients" or "patients"? Without answers, every new piece is a fresh guess, and after a year your website, your sign and your Instagram look like three different companies.
What should be in a brandbook?
- Your audience. Who you're trying to reach, and what matters to them. Everything else follows from this.
- Your voice. How you sound in writing: words to use, words to skip, with examples.
- Your logo. The main version, a small one for app icons and profile pictures, and versions for dark backgrounds, light backgrounds and one-color printing.
- Your colors and type. The exact colors and the fonts, with simple rules for using them.
- Examples. Each rule shown in use. A rule without an example gets ignored.
Good extras, if you post or present a lot: an animated logo for video, a short brand video, and ready-made banners for LinkedIn and email.
What can you skip?
Long mission statements, mood boards that never turn into rules, and pages that explain the logo's hidden meaning. If a page doesn't help someone make the next thing, it doesn't need to be there. A useful brandbook for a small business is short enough to read in one sitting.
How do you know you need one?
Three signs. You're about to build or rebuild your website. More than one person makes things for your brand. Or you look at your own materials and they don't match. If you're a one-person business with a logo you like and nothing else to make, you can wait.
What should you receive?
A PDF guide, plus the source files: logos in SVG and PNG, font files, and the video. And they should be yours, with no license fees.
What does it cost?
Prices vary widely, mostly with how much strategy work comes before the design. Ours is fixed: the proof. Brandbook takes 7 days and costs $1,998, and if you add a website within 30 days you pay only the difference.