Brand guidelines and brand book: what they contain

Brand guidelines (also called a brand book or brand style guide) are the document that explains who a brand is and how it must present itself everywhere: mission, values, tone of voice, logo, colours, typefaces, images, with examples ready to copy. They help everyone who writes and designs for the company work the same way, including people who join later.

What they’re for

In a company many people write and design: marketing, customer service, agencies, freelance designers, creators. Without a shared guide, everyone does it their own way and the brand frays: a stretched logo, a different green on every post, a formal email and an emoji-filled post. Brand guidelines:

• make the brand recognisable, because the same elements keep coming back;
• save time, because whoever creates new material doesn’t start from scratch;
• make working with external suppliers easier;
• protect the trademark, because they explain how to use it correctly.

What brand guidelines contain, section by section

1. Core identity

• Mission (why we exist) and vision (where we want to go).
• Values, with concrete behaviours: “we reply within 24 hours”, not “we’re close to our customers”.
• Positioning: who we’re for and what makes us different. How to write it is explained in brand positioning.
• Personality: if the brand were a person, what would it be like.

2. Verbal identity

• Name and how to write it (capitals, spaces, never abbreviated?).
• Tagline: the short phrase next to the name.
• Tone of voice: who we are, who we’re not, rules, before-and-after examples. More in tone of voice.
• Words to use / words to avoid, date, price and number formats.

3. Visual identity

Element	What to specify
Logo	Versions (full colour, reversed, single colour), clear space measured with a unit from the logo itself, minimum size on screen and in print, what not to do (stretch, rotate, recolour)
Colours	Main and supporting colours, with HEX and RGB for screens, CMYK and Pantone for print, readable text/background pairs
Typefaces	Fonts for headings and body text, weights, sizes, line height, fallback fonts, usage licence
Images	Photo and illustration style, do and don’t examples
Icons and graphics	Icon style, recurring patterns, layout grids

4. Accessibility

Text and background colours need a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1 (3:1 for large text), as required by WCAG 2.1. It’s best to list pre-checked combinations in the guidelines, so nobody picks white text on light yellow.

5. Applications

Ready-made examples: social posts and stories, covers, email signature, newsletter, business cards, packaging, presentations. They’re the most used part of the guidelines.

6. Practical rules

Where to download logo and fonts, who approves new material, contacts, date and version number of the guidelines.

Public brand guidelines examples

Some companies and organisations have published their guidelines, and they’re worth studying:

• NASA Graphics Standards Manual (1975): the manual for the famous “worm” logo, reissued in 2015 and now considered a design classic.
• Mailchimp Content Style Guide: a public guide to how the brand writes, with tone and grammar rules.
• Google’s Material Design (since 2014): a system of visual rules and components for apps, an example of a design system.

How to create brand guidelines in 8 steps

1. Gather what already exists: logo, colours in use, copy, posts, emails.
2. Write mission, values and positioning in a few sentences.
3. Define the tone of voice with 3-5 rules and before-and-after examples.
4. Fix the visual elements with exact codes and logo versions.
5. Check contrast and licences for fonts and images.
6. Prepare applications: ready templates for the most used materials.
7. Publish somewhere easy to find, with one link.
8. Update: every time a rule doesn’t work or a new channel arrives.

How to make them genuinely useful

• Short: the important rules in a few pages; details in an appendix.
• Concrete: “we use first names” is a rule; “we’re friendly” isn’t.
• With examples: one before-and-after is worth more than a paragraph.
• Easy to find: a shared page, not a file lost in a folder.

An example

The guidelines of the fictional tea shop Five Leaf fit on one page: mission (“helping people who aren’t experts discover good tea”), three values, the tone with five rules and two examples, the logo in three versions and three colours with HEX and CMYK codes. Positioning was missing: everyone in the company described the shop differently. In Peacchy’s Brand Simulation you write it yourself, starting from the data.

To understand what to put in the guidelines, read what brand identity is.

Sources

• WCAG 2.1, contrast (minimum) (W3C)
• Mailchimp Content Style Guide
• Material Design (Google)