Clarity is something you might be missing right now? True? Feeling overwhelmed in the process and not knowing where to start? Gotcha! Let’s tidy up the mess. I am pretty sure you just have way too many puzzle pieces already created on your mind and your To Do list.
As you know, I am basically Mary Poppins and love tidying up. So, let’s snap it all away!
Before you get started….
We will be unravelling your values, corporate and brand identity, create an almost “origami” alike value card and get a clear picture of your first impression a.k.a your hero section.
Therefore, get a pen, scissor and paper to take notes as well as a clean DIN A4 piece of paper.
The [Non] Creatives Mess
We often have this idea of the crazy all over the place artist when it comes to creativity. I will never forget one of the UX MeetUp’s I attended at the Amazon Office in Edinburgh, where certain differentiations were clarified when it comes to organizations, their different functions and culture in general.
Individualism vs Collectivism
So, let’s get things straight here. Various “Business folks” a.k.a. the ones perceived as “Non-Creatives” wearing classic business attire, being placed in a classic dull looking open office space and the creative ones being in this very special different Disneyland alike office, with tons of cool posters, whiteboards, post it notes [that might actually hang there forever] wearing their colourful funky clothes or only black, having their laptops full of stickers and just being their unique individual as they are.
First of all - I really hope the business world will eventually open up to individualize themselves a bit more, because I am quite certain that no one really wants to be squeezed into a costume and be forced to act like a robot following a system only. As said in my last post about creating your own content character and voice, it is draining to be someone you are not for too long and I have seen plenty of office spaces in my life full of quite unhappy people. To be honest here, I cannot exclude myself fully as vibes are always influencing us.
Second note, you will not create this environment! This is basically part of your corporate identity to create a lovely culture and atmosphere. It pays off!
Either way you have to find your balance, because 100% individualism for a company is not ideal– to put it mildly. If you are working with a team and your company is representing certain values, traits and professionalism, the individual actions need to be in alignment with this common vision to create a strong collective.
Are you wondering what this has all to do with your website now?
I provide you with a first hint … clarity. You need to have things clear if you want to design your website and we are starting from the bottom today.
But let’s get cracking now and finding your style.
I could share various theories right now with you, but I believe in an intuitive approach – especially when it comes to YOU as your very personal brand. It must be you and even though you might have various facets and traits, you will have your key values, favourite colours, dreams and visions within yourself, and you are you. Full stop. This is your unique selling point [USP]. You.
The non classic comfort zone talk – because I want you to feel comfortable with your first impression
Despite the entire “getting out of your comfort zone” talks, I personally believe you should feel super comfortable with the way you are presenting yourself online.
However, to clarify a few things straight away. You should feel comfortable because your corporate and brand identity is clearly designed in accordance with your business objectives.
Let’s say you would like to design professional sleek websites for doctors or corporate organizations and your childhood hero is Goofy and you love comics. The latter indeed is super cool and could be creating a funky creative comic alike theme.
However, unless your doctors and corporate clients want to show up in a comic goofy way, you should appear in the professional and rather sleek way you were targeting in the first place. Especially, if this practice has already been proofed as a functioning approach to serve these clients.
Therefore, I want to guide you through some basic crumbles of Corporate vs Brand Identity as both are crucial to start with your design.
Corporate vs Brand Identity
It is easy to mix up things – so let’s look into the differences between Corporate Identity vs Brand Identity.
Corporate identity is basically everything your company is about and how you are presenting yourself to the world. It includes your corporate design, behaviour, culture, core values, internal & external communication and processes around it. This is your holistic identity considering both clients [external stakeholders] and your own colleagues [internal stakeholders].
A company could contain various brands with different brand identities and strategies.
The Brand Identity on the other hand is a bit more specific focusing on the emotional connection you build with your clients for a brand. Therefore, it includes your logo, colours, fonts, typography, shapes and patterns [icons] to provide a consistent style altogether. The main goal of your brand is to create a consistent feeling and a psychological connection with the audience. Therefore, values and your messaging style can also be defined on this level.
If you have a bigger organization eg. a big Hotel Group, you might have multiple brands under your belt. Therefore, the corporate identity would most likely be defined on the Hotel Group level and handed down the individual brands. These individual brands might have further individual traits, values, communication style and standards.
Depending on your current objective and stage of your business eg. solopreneur vs startup, you might focus more on creating a brand identity as it is only you and you do not need to create a culture and communication style with your team.
The Value Card Model
Let me introduce you to the “value card” model today. This is something I am primarily connecting the dots with now as it is quite common that Hotels have these developed and included in their daily practice [corporate culture]. The german word “Wertekompass” used for this would basically translate to value compass as values are always our guide.
However, I will use the word value card as I do believe it is valuable for you to create a visual overview as you have so much on your mind and our brain appreciates some support.
Value cards are used to describe the most important traits, values, mission, vision, goals and any other most prioritized items for everyone to follow.
When I was working in a popular 5* Hotel back in the days, we had daily Stand-Up Meetings where one service standard was picked each day to be read by an employee and discussed with the team. This approach is primarily about repetition and internalization to ensure everyone is on top of the game, ready to start work as one team in alignment with their superior goals – serving clients excellently. It is part of your corporate identity and culture.
Value card for your Personal Brand
If it is only about you and your personal brand it might be a bit easier to stick to it if you really do what you really care about. Be careful though - consistency is key and is feeding into your authenticity. So, if you care about “sustainability” for instance – do you really? What are you doing to achieve this and act in alignment? It will be easily discovered if it is not really your goal.
A value card can be a helpful way for you to check in with yourself and evaluate whether your actions are in alignment with your words. Be honest.
Value Card for your Company if you have team
If you have a team, it might be useful to create a value card to help you remember and internalize what you stand for in your group. It is your active guide and process in place reminding you all on your mission, vision and standard operating procedures to get there on a daily basis. Therefore, it should become part of your culture. Remember, habits and systems help us to achieve almost anything. We need repetition to internalize it and a system eg. every Monday at 10am during our Team Meeting is the time to pick one specific topic to ensure it is taking place. Like brushing your teeth, just less frequently, depending on your current goal.
Why is it important to start at the bottom when designing your processes and website and basically anything that has to do with your business?
In short:
Consistency, authenticity, clarity and a strong emotional connection from day one.
Everything you do has an effect and creates an experience. If your actions are not in alignment with your words, it is tricky, and negative experiences have a multiplier effect. You want to avoid this.
Of course, perfectionism is a myth. However, if you want to thrive and show up as a professional for a certain product, industry, whatsoever, you must show up professionally and this includes your online appearance and all the steps around it.
Your website is not just a tiny little add on. It is one of your key business cards and a hub connecting your customers to you and your products and services.
Consistency is actually a very important design principle. It is quite simple and natural and why I love it so much. UX to me is like defining labels and words, to make sense of patterns and human behaviour to underline and find a common language to describe it with. However, in theory we already know all of it, but might forget it in the whirlwind of daily life.
First impressions are a very short timeframe you get, and the list of your competitors might be endless. Remember, users are leaving within 10-20 seconds.
Therefore, your corporate identity and brand identity should be clear. It is part of the bigger picture you are creating with everything you do. Document this as clear and specific as possible.
It is changeable, but you should start with an aligned goal and not appear as a healthy green startup on one day and as yellow entertainment one on the next. Everyone will be confused and not recognise you anymore. Recognition is important for you and will help you to create a familiar feeling for your audience.
In the next steps, I want you to think about your values and brand style. This will be the goal for today’s task. If you have this already in place, skip and move on to Value Card “Origami” Exercise straight away.
Creating the Value Card & Identity
Whether you are rather on the corporate or [personal] brand identity side of life, we will focus on your core values for now.
So, do not focus too much on the word “corporate”. You can be a small coffee shop, design studio, design freelancer, travel agent, hotel or whatever you are working on. You basically do not need to be corporate, but you should have an identity.
If you do have a team working together you need one superior design and common values to clearly show up on your value card.
Value Card Creation Questionnaire
Let’s answer a few questions to start with:
- What are your key values? Write down 10.
- Which 3 - 5 do you care about the most and why?
- Which behavioural traits do you appreciate in professional relationships?
- Why do you do what you do?
- Which problems are you solving with your actions on a daily basis? [Mission]
- What would you like to achieve with your actions in the future? [Vision]
- Which colours appear to you and why?
- Which images appeal to you when you are visualizing your brand? Why?
- Who are your dream customers you would like to serve?
- Who is a competitor you are looking up to right now and why?
- Who is a competitor you are looking down to and why?
- How do you stand out from the crowd [what makes you special]?
Value Card “Origami” Exercise:
Let’s now create a card together. Get the DIN A4 sheet of paper, fold it into three long rectangles. Like folding a letter back in the office days in case you have ever been sending office snail mail.
Cut it, to have three similar sized long slices. Each of them should now provide you with around 10.5cm height and 21cm widths sheets of paper.
Pick one and fold this one again three times to create portrait-oriented sheet in 10.5 cm height and 7cm width.
This is your first prototype to sketch. #Tadaaaa and we will fill it now from right to left designing the back of your card.
- Right Rectangle: This is your cover. Write the word “Value Card” on it and the name of your company and date
- Middle Rectangle: Practice what you preach - Behavioural traits you appreciate when engaging with your professional relationships reminding you to act in the way you wish to be treated.
- Left Rectangle: write down your 3-5 core values* you have marked in bold earlier
* A popular method here is to summarise your values in a way the first letters create a cool word you can remember.
Some organisation such as Hubspot like to find values that end up creating the word HEART to include in their culture code as follows:
- H – Humble
- E – Empathetic
- A – Adaptable
- R – Remarkable
- T – Transparent
An international Hotel Group used to have similar approach in place using matching words for their guest experience:
- H – Host
- E – Engage
- A – Always
- R – Responsibility
- T - Teamwork
This might not always work, but if you have time to play scrabble for a bit, this could become a cool way to create something memorable for your baby [business].
Turn the card around. We have 3 more rectangles to fill for the inside of your card now moving from left to right.
- Left Rectangle: Mission | Vision | Goals
- Mission – what are you doing right now considering your company’s purpose, values and goals
- Vision - what are you hoping to achieve with your mission in the future
- Goals – you would like to achieve
- Middle Rectangle - Your offering and unique selling point
- Right Rectangle - Standard Operating Procedures helping you to serve your clients according to your Mission | Vision and achieving your Goals
Iterate your value card until you cannot take anything away anymore.
If you feel a struggle to write up your perfect mission and vision statements right now, do not worry. This is only a very short introduction and should start to get you thinking about all these tiny puzzle pieces.
Remember, great design takes times and effort until you have discarded all unnecessary elements and achieved a pure clear statement.
“A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.” – Antoine de Saint-Exupery
To get there, remember to step away from this exercise and come back to it until you have created your “comfort zone” you feel ready to present to the world.
Hint: the presenting part still might feel uncomfortable though. It is fine and will feel better over time as you will learn and grow with each iteration.
Sidenote to your Corporate Identity
As mentioned earlier, your corporate identity is how your communication, behaviour culture and design is built around your brand to ensure your message is consistently and clearly communicated throughout your entire business.
We will not have deep dive on this topic today, but you can already start to brainstorm how you see your core values and mission to impact the bigger picture:
- What culture would you like to build?
- What are red flags and green flags for your behavioural traits?
- Which words would you like to use or potentially avoid when communicating with your clients?
Creating a Style Guide
A style guide is crucial for your design and creating a consistent look and feel. It should therefore contain clear instructions about:
- Logo & Logo Usage
- Photos & Images
- Colour Palette
- Icons
- Grid Systems
- Tone and voice
- Typography and font sizes
It can even be included on an individual private page in your web design tool to have it handy whenever you need it later on.
If you have this already, you are good to go straight to the creation of your superstar hero section.
Creating a Mood board if your Style is not there yet
If you do not have this, do your homework and start your research creating a mood board using all images, colours, fonts or styles from other organizations that caught your attention. It can also include inspiring quotes to underline your value and mission.
Tools like canva, miro or pinterest can help you to get started. If you prefer the vintage way, open a plain white word document, change the orientation to landscape and copy paste any screenshots into it [unpaid advertisement].
If you fancy some inspiration, read How to Create a Mood board and the effects of colour psychology.
Sneakpeak into Colour Psychology
When choosing your colours, remember that colours have a psychological effect on the overall mood of your first appearance. Let’s say your personal style is elegant and sleek including black and white, but you want to create a first impression for a holiday home, yoga retreat or children toy. Colours underlining warmth and playfulness will help you to create this look and feel.
It is not unreasonable that certain health care companies are using green as it stands for growth, health and peace.
Fun Fact - isn’t it random that the fuel company bp is using this colour as well even though it seems to be much more in use when it comes to Whole Foods?
Creating your Hero Section
Starting to feel a bit sweaty after all these questions? You are doing well making it until here. This is basically your first peak you have been climbing up now. : )
Your Hero Section is the top part of your landing page or any other page that should connect the dots and provide a clear message to guide your customer where there are and what they get.
Now, consider that most of us are using mobile screens these days. That space is even more tiny. Therefore, your offering, colours, and first appearance need to be sharp and clear. This is why the groundwork is so necessary. You need to bring all your puzzle pieces well together to achieve this level of clarity.
Pick one of the remaining two long sheets of paper to sketch your hero section.
Mobile Design
If you want to be super-efficient and smart as you are aware most of your users will be looking for you on their smartphone, place the long rectangle sheet of paper into a portrait orientation folding back 1/3 of the bottom part.
Desktop Design
For desktop design you can place the long rectangle in landscape orientation again.
This is the space you have available for your first impression. This needs to include what you do, which problems you solve and create an urge for your potential client to stay longer and keep scrolling.
Now place your logo, name and created slogan on this piece of paper creating a clear message what value you are proposing to your clients a.k.a value proposition.
Again, dream big and do not get into your head too much. You can also look at some of your favourite brands and slogans and ask yourself why certain words had such an impact on you. This is what you want to design. So, dream big, find your words and define your message.
Finally, if you are working on such an exercise for the very first time, step away and fine-tune. Set yourself a deadline to get to your first final version and include small milestones on the way where you dedicate some time to work on this.
Let me know how it went or drop me a message if you have any questions. Really, it is as valuable for me as for you to receive feedback and there is no sales pitch attached to this. I promise. #SharingIsCaring
Thanks for reading and until next time!
Victoria