Brand vs Branding vs Brand Identity: What’s the Difference?
“Brand” and “branding” are two terms that are similar but not the same. In this article, I’m explaining what is meant by “brand,” and answering some frequently asked questions about branding:
What is a brand?
Brand vs. Logo
What is the importance of a logo?
What is branding?
Why is branding important?
Brand vs. Branding
Branding vs. Marketing
What is brand identity?
Brand Identity vs. Logo
While a brand, branding, marketing, brand identity, and logos all work together to support your business, they’re individual parts of a whole. Each has separate functions and goals that play a part in building your brand’s image.
Understanding the definitions of brand, branding, marketing, logo, and brand identity will help you use these terms accurately and piece together the bigger picture of how each one shapes your business.
As you can see, we have a lot to clarify! Let’s start by answering, “What is a brand?”
What Is a Brand?
What is the definition of “brand”? A brand is the meaning people associate with a company’s products or services. It’s all about your customer’s perception of your business.
You can even think of a brand as the promise a company makes to its customers. And that brand promise creates an expectation of the benefits a buyer will receive once they purchase a your products or services.
People often confuse “brand” with things like logos, slogans, and visual identity design, but those are marketing tools that help promote a business. A brand is much bigger than a single logo design. It’s an intangible, emotional connection between a company and its customers.
Think of a brand as your experience with a company—how it makes you feel.
Think of brand, branding, brand identity, and logos being placed as separate rings in a circle with the biggest ring being the broadest term. “Brand” would be inside the outermost circle encompassing the other three terms, making it the broadest term.
Brand vs. Logo
Brand vs. logo, what’s the difference?
Brand, branding, and brand identity help people recognize your logo, but there’s a significant difference between “brand” and “logo.” Again, thinking about that circle, logo would be in the center as a very specific aspect of a brand.
As we’ve already discussed, a brand is how other people perceive your business. It’s about what they feel, not just what they see (e.g., a logo). However, you can shape people’s perception of your brand through branding and brand identity design, but we’ll get into that a bit later on.
A logo is one element of your visual identity design. The definition of a logo is a graphic mark, symbol, or emblem made up of text and/or illustrations that uniquely identifies a business, making it easily recognizable.
What is the importance of a logo?
So, what is the importance of a logo? Having a logo is important because it provides consumers a recognizable mark, ensuring that people remember your brand.
What makes a logo good? Good logos are designed to be memorable.
When someone sees your logo, then successfully recalls your brand when they see your logo, it’s called “brand recognition.” What is brand recognition? Brand recognition is when a person can correctly identify a particular product or service just by seeing the company logo.
When a logo is strategically designed, it communicates and evokes certain brand values and emotions in the mind of viewers. Ideally, you want people to immediately connect your logo with your company and the products or services you offer. Even more than that, you want your logo to represent the ethos of your brand, stirring positive feelings in onlookers.
To dive deeper, learn about the seven types of logos used in brand design and what makes a logo great.
What Is Branding?
One of the questions you may have at this point is, “What is branding and why is it important?”
Branding is the process of strategically shaping your brand and how others perceive it. Any time you launch a website, share a post on social media, send out an email campaign, or communicate with clients, you’re branding.
Branding is the art of expressing what your brand represents from its personality to its purpose. It’s when you marry your brand strategy and brand identity, allowing you to promote your business with clarity and consistency.
Why is branding important?
Here are three reasons why branding is important:
Branding improves recognition.
Branding helps improve brand recognition through a brand’s visual identity design, communications, customer experience, advertising, and more. A brand is more recognizable when its branding is consistent across all channels.
Branding creates loyal customers.
People aren’t loyal to a product or service, they’re loyal to the brand that sells it. A brand that clearly communicates its promise, and consistently delivers on this promise over time, will build a community of loyal customers.
Branding differentiates your company.
If all running shoes, for instance, were unbranded, there would be no competition. But when branding is applied, you’re communicating a promise through the product’s visual identity design, copywriting, quality, values, etc. which helps differentiate you from the competition.
Let’s review, “What does branding mean in business?” Branding is the overarching process of shaping the identity of a brand to make a positive impression on consumers and differentiate it from competitors.
Brand vs. Branding
What is the difference between brand and branding? As we’ve discussed so far, a brand is the perception people have of your business; branding is the process of actively shaping that perception.
Personal Branding
If you think about it, everyone has a brand and is in the business of branding—personal branding, that is. What is personal branding? Personal branding is the intentional effort of influencing the public’s perception of an individual by promoting themselves in one way or another.
In essence, you are a brand. People make judgments about you when they see you, whether they know you or pass you on the street. You can shape this perception through how you show up in the world (i.e., personal branding) or how you look (i.e., brand identity).
However, not everyone wants to capitalize on their personal brand by positioning themselves as an expert in some industry, elevating their credibility, forming a following, etc. Which is totally fine, but the option is always there.
Branding vs. Marketing
What is the difference between branding and marketing?
Branding and marketing are often used interchangeably, but they have different goals.
Branding is more internal while marketing focuses on the externals. Branding communicates who you are through your visual identity design, company values, mission, etc. Marketing, on the other hand, is how you promote your products and services to the public, which spreads “brand awareness.”
Marketing convinces customers to buy your products or services, while branding builds a personal connection. In short, marketing is what gets people to initially engage with your company, branding is what keeps them coming back again and again.
Once you get people to engage with your company (marketing), you need something to keep their attention over time (branding). You can use a marketing strategy to get the word out about your business, but branding is what fosters a long-term relationship (also known as “brand loyalty”).
What Is Brand Identity?
What is brand identity design? A company’s brand identity or visual identity design includes the visual elements of a brand, helping people recognize and distinguish different brands from one another.
Design is the foundation of a brand identity.
Some visual elements that work together to form a brand’s identity include:
Brand name
Tagline or slogan
Patterns or other graphic elements
Together, these visual elements, paired with branding, create a brand image.
Think of yourself, for example. You have certain physical features that make you unique and help people recognize you (brand identity). Then, you have a unique personality, values, name, etc. that helps you express yourself to the world (branding). In the same way, every brand has a unique visual identity design that differentiates it from other brands.
And that is the short answer to “What is brand identity?”
Brand Identity vs. Logo
A logo is a subset of your brand identity. It’s one graphic element of your brand’s holistic visual identity.
When you invest in a visual identity design for your business, don’t short yourself by asking for “just a logo.” In my professional opinion, logos don’t exist outside of a brand identity.
A logo doesn’t differentiate you, it’s basically just putting a sticker on your brand name.
A professional brand identity design includes colors, typefaces, logo variations, etc., which helps (1) keep your visual identity consistent across multiple placements, and (2) makes your brand more recognizable to the public.
Brand Identity Design Services for Creative Entrepreneurs
Do you want to differentiate yourself from the competition? Then there’s one thing you need to do: Partner with a brand identity designer that uses brand strategy and color psychology to determine your brand’s visual identity design.
Design is the foundation of your brand identity, but strategy is the foundation of your brand. As you well know by now, a brand is more than its logo. Branding, marketing, and brand identity design all play a unique role in shaping your brand in the minds of ideal clients.
But don’t stop with the visual elements. What about defining your brand’s mission, vision, values, positioning, etc.?
That’s why you need a brand identity designer who’s also a brand strategist. At Selah Creative Co., we’re at the intersection of design and strategy. Every brand identity we design starts with a strategy to lay the foundation of a successful brand.
Are you ready to take your business to the next level with a strategic brand identity design that differentiates you from the competition and positions you as a leader in your industry?
Fill out a Client Application to work with Selah Creative Co. today!
