INTRODUCTION
Why is your brand not standing out in 2025? I’ve seen you rebrand a lot of times but it’s
still not standing out. Neither is it consistent with its tone of voice, why? To all CEOs,
managers and business owners, hear me out. Business without a brand style guide is going to
fail, it’s only a matter of time!
Now, if you don’t know where to start or you’re worried about a big budget or that you’re wasting
your time on overly theoretical stuff. Stick with me and I will show you a simple, easy and
clear step by step guide on how to create a brand style guide.
As a startup or even scaling a legacy business, knowing how to create a brand style guide is the
strategy that’s sustainable and future-proof so let’s start with the basics by refreshing your
memory on what a brand is.
Key Points
● What’s a Brand? The Image and impression your business creates in someone’s mind.
● What’s a Brand Style Guide? It’s your brands playbook.
● Content of a Brand Style Guide Includes: Brand overview, tone of voice, image and
graphics etc.
● Step by Step Guide of Creating a Brand Style Includes: Define your brand core, know your
audience, visual identity etc.
● Conclusion
What Is a Brand?
A brand is not what you say your product or service is but what your customers believe it is. As
branding expert Marty Neumeier puts it:
“A brand is a person’s gut feeling about a product, service, or organization.”
You can also say that, it’s the image and impression your business creates in someone’s mind.
Like your business’s personality, how it looks, talks, and acts. What do people remember about
you, even when you’re not in the room? That’s a brand.
It’s everything that makes your business unique and recognizable. A brand is how people see
and feel about your business. Now imagine yours, how do people feel about your business?
What are they saying about it? If it’s not recognizable, then let’s fix that now!
What Is a Brand Style Guide?
A brand style guide is simply your brand’s playbook. A detailed document or toolkit that explains
how your brand should look, sound, and feel across all platforms starting from your website to
your Instagram, emails, even product packaging. It helps keep everything consistent.
For instance, Imagine someone wearing mismatched clothes, talking in three different tones,
and switching accents mid-conversations yelling at the top of their voice everyday in your face!
First you would think the person has a mental disorder so you would probably ignore, and could
of course keep ignoring for as long as possible ( or simply punch them in the face! Just kidding)
Without a brand style guide, that’s exactly what your brand looks like, mismatched
colors, changing tones and never consistent with your style while always yelling without
making any sense.
Why does having a style guide matter? Because it keeps your brand:
● Recognizable – people know it’s you at all times, even without seeing your
name.
● Professional – it will always show you care about details.
● Trustworthy – consistency builds the confidence you need in your audience.
● Scalable – new hires and freelancers can pick it up easily and properly represent
your brand.
What Does a Brand Style Guide Usually Contain?
Since it’s your brand’s playbook that documents how your brand should look, sound, and feel all times. Here’s basically the content:
- Brand Overview
○ Mission, vision, values
○ What your brand stands for
○ Your story - Logo Guidelines
○ How to use your logo correctly (and incorrectly)
○ Logo variations, spacing, placement - Color Palette
○ Main brand colors and their exact codes (HEX, RGB, CMYK)
○ How and where to use them - Typography
○ Fonts used for headlines, body text, etc.
○ Font sizes and spacing rules - Imagery & Graphics
○ Photo style, filters, illustration style
○ Icons, graphics, brand patterns - Tone of Voice
○ How your brand “talks”
○ Personality of your brand
○ Example words, phrases, and sentence styles
○ What to say, what not to say - Brand in Action (Use Cases)
○ Examples of branded social posts, email templates, packaging, or ads
○ Do’s and Don’ts
Think of brand style guide as your brand’s GPS that helps:
● Your designers create connecting visuals.
● Your copywriters easily represent how your brand sounds.
● Your team communicates consistently.
● New employees to easily understand the brand.
Step-by-Step Guide on How to Create Your Brand Style Guide
Open your google docs now and answer the questions I would be asking below on a personal
level on behalf of your brand. It’s really the first actionable step on how you can create a brand
style guide for your brand. Ready? Let’s go.
Step 1: Define Your Brand Core
● Mission: Why do you exist?
● Vision: What future are you trying to create with your solutions?
● Values: What principles guide your team?
● Voice: What kind of personality do you want to express?
Step 2: Know Your Audience
You can’t speak to everyone. You shouldn’t try.
Build out a customer persona:
● Age, lifestyle, pain points
● What do they value?
● What tone do they respond to?
As Lovely & Lively beautifully phrase it, “You don’t speak louder to stand out. You speak clearer
to the right people.” Talk with your audience not at them, you would be surprised how much they
want to talk with a brand that actually listens, sees and understands them.
Step 3: Visual Identity
Now, get visual but you have to stay strategic.
● Logo usage (primary, secondary, spacing rules)
● Color palette (primary, accent, background use)
● Typography (header fonts, body fonts, usage styles)
● Imagery style (photography tone, illustration rules)
Step 4: Tone of Voice & Copy Guidelines
Martin Newman emphasizes the power of tone in creating brand trust so your brand voice
should be consistent, even if the content is different.
Decide:
● Is your tone formal or casual?
● Do you use contractions?
● Do you write in first or third person? (You should always try to use an active voice)
Add samples of actual copy from your site, newsletters, or ads. Think of this as training material
for future writers or marketers.
Step 5: Brand in Action (Do’s and Don’ts)
Real-world context helps your team stay on-brand.
Include:
● Email templates
● Social media captions
● Website headers
● Sales brochures or pitch decks
Show what’s on-brand and what isn’t. These real-life applications are often where brands can
fall apart.
Conclusion: Your Brand Is a Living Identity
As Kennedy of RedWorks once said,
“Without brand consistency, even the best product gets lost in translation.”
A well-crafted style guide doesn’t just maintain consistency but it also saves time, protects your
image, and empowers your team to deliver with confidence.
Now, as your business evolves, your style guide should too. Revisit it quarterly. Test new
directions. Grow intentionally. Start small, stay intentional, and build from the heart of your
brand. And remember, clarity is what separates a brand that stands still from one that scales.
Lastly, passionate creatives are always protesting about clone brands everywhere so you can
also hire a skilled one at any time you feel stuck or overwhelmed to save time. Tell a friend to
tell a friend that their brand needs to be unique because every human on earth is.
FAQs
What are the Stages of Creating Style Guides?
● Conduct research for inspiration and ideas
● Audit the existing brand
● Define the core brand personality
● Create a great brand story
● Clarify and document all specific guidelines and rules for each brand element
● Create a brand mood board for visual elements.
What are the 5 Stages of Style?
The fashion life cycle generally consists of five phases: Introduction, growth, peak,
decline.
