Aesthetics come last
This is probably the most important piece of advice in branding:
Behavior is everything. You may be very well-educated and experienced in what you do, hire competent team members and partners, and have a stunning visual identity, but all of them are powerless if your behavior does not align with how you look or how smart you are.
Humans are certainly attracted to beauty and aesthetics. We like seeing beautiful things, and we tend to choose things that look better than others. However, feelings are even more powerful. Let me give you a personal example. I come from Greece. In Thessaloniki, but also in smaller cities and villages, you can see many small businesses, decades-old businesses, or self-employed professionals thriving, growing, and keeping their customers for decades. Most of them are unfamiliar with terms like “branding” and “visual identity” and have no visual system at all. But they know the most important thing: how to behave to make people feel good, heard, and respected. What is common among them is that they enjoy what they do, care about the people they serve, set high standards for themselves, and are more interested in serving people and solving problems than in making money and selling. All these things make them attractive.
Sometimes we focus so much on picking the most appropriate font, the perfect color combination, and the perfect words for our ad. All these are great. However, we always need to remember that they are just tools. They help us communicate our identity; they are not our identity. Identity is our values. The same is true for the product or service we offer. They just reflect our values. No perfect product and no visual identity can cover a lack of values in the long term.
So how do you learn that? First, you need to consider your values. This is also the foundation of your branding. A well-defined set of values gives you a strong foundation to sustain you in the long term. It also helps you communicate them to others, whether they are your audience, team, or partners. You need to understand why you do what you do, what drives you, what your boundaries are, and which values are non-negotiable for you. You need to know what you want for yourself and others, what is accepted, and what’s not. Set your priorities and your standards based on your own beliefs, what makes you feel good, and how you like to work.
Having your values articulated, you can then translate them into actions. For example, if honesty is one of your values, you need to understand what honesty means practically for you. What does it mean for your behavior in your day-to-day tasks? For your relationships with your team and partners? For the people you choose to represent you or collaborate with? For the quality of your products or services? For the way you deliver them? For your digital and personal communications? For your aesthetic choices? See, any interaction with people—verbal or visual, online or offline, and any aspect of your product or service—should carry this value.
Eventually, behavior is about small choices. Choose how to behave according to your values. Not every choice is going to be perfect, but over time, more and more of them will be optimal, because you will learn how to choose. If most of your decisions are wise, then growth will follow.
If you are considering or are currently working on building your personal brand or starting your business, remember to start with your values first. Focus on doing the best work you can with a big smile rather than having a perfectly aligned logo. Aesthetics can wait.
