Branding: Creating Safe* Spaces.

Once a Brand has been built—much of what we* do as Brand Creators isn't actually about creating. This is time for us* to sit back and watch how the systems we* (both the client and the creator) unfold. How pipelines uphold in the face of adversity. Where clients fall back on laurels.

Encouraging safe* spaces within Brand development—places that harbor actions like play, voice, and trust. it's cool to watch the Brand Systems we* build become their truest selves. We* see this portion of a Brand build much like taking a child to kindergarten. How will our* kid interact with the others? What attributes will they carry over from preschool where they learned how to build blocks and share? Will they be a leader or will they curl up in the corner? Should they use the systems we've worked hard to co-create; how will they move through each grade and mature over time?

Obviously we don't see the incredibly smart, agile, and visionary leaders we build with as children—but we do see the Brands we co-create and having child-like qualities.

Do You Agree?

Consent within Brand Design is an area of study often not applied. Building interactive Brand Toolkits—we* often say "Design for People not Design for Designers." As Design-As-A-Service continues to grow and expand within markets— too often do we experience Design that simply doesn't scale for its first customer; the client. Most of the time clients, although involved in the initial processes of Brand building, don't have much say how and why final files are handed over. This sucks. Watching Brands fall apart at this stage is horrifying... and how most Brand Designers continue to operate.

Rather than handing over final files—we* formally moved away from building static brands. A static brand is a brand that relies on the client to operate it correctly—handing over final files is a bit like handing a the keys of a car to a child and expecting them to understand (because they like playing with cars) how to drive a car.

Operating under the roof of static PDF's and file structures hinders Brand handoffs, basing success purely on static Brand Guidelines. To us*, this form of Brand handoffs feels archaic at this point. Tracking progress and interaction on internal brand-use including simple studies like click-through rates, frequency and duration of page views, downloads (for highly organized Brand files) and photo library interactions, and other key website metrics allow us to better understand where we can tweak brand guidelines for each next deployment.

Does this fix the problem entirely? Absolutely not.

Taking a step back, what we're ultimately after is "how and why our clients use Brand Systems based on day-to-day needs versus Designed and highly-curated interactions." This shows us how our Brand Systems are actually being used by non-Design professionals, versus our perceived intent. Employing the idea of Design for People not Design for Designers, we cross-reference where clients may need help as pipeline unfolds, stepping in as necessary while encouraging clients to use toolkits, templates, and open-source design tools to further their own understanding of their Brand, themselves.

Building Dumb Tools For Smart People

We* truly believe everyone has the power to be creative, or at least, to think Creatively.

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