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More Information on Branding and Identity Design

If you are curious to delve deeper into the worlds of brands, branding, brand strategy, identity design, etc, I’m posting two texts that might be of interest.

First is The Designer’s Guide To Brand Strategy, which is a PDF book that was published and written by M. Damien Newman. Although the author claims that his book “…is by no means the definitive text on the topic…”, it is a very readable, thorough, and helpful introduction. He makes the point that branding “… is a marketing term that came about largely in the last decade to mean the marketing of products.”, and is something different that brand strategy, but this might just be semantics. He presents a thorough analysis on the terms: brand, brand identity, brand personality, and strategy. The focus of the text is skewed a bit corporate, but without much effort the ideas presented can be applied to pretty much anything.

At the end of the book is a link to a website that seems to no longer be associated with the author. This document is re-distributed several places online, but if you are curious to learn more about the Damien Newman, see his Linkedin profile or check out his consultancy, Central.

The second is an excerpt from the book Designing Brand Identity, by Alina Wheeler. This text analyzes some critical success factors to consider when designing a brand identity. This too is a very readable and helpful reference if you are considering developing a more deliberate “personal brand”. Even more so than in other text, much of the material here is directed at sizable corporate projects. Some of what is presented might not really be relevant to the individual, but it does provide an idea of the many variables one often needs to consider when taking this kind of work on. The author, Alina Wheeler, has a brand consultancy business and describes her work as “…managing perception…strategic imagination”

Another great source for information, analysis and inspiration related to brand identity is Brand New. It’s a frequently updated blog that focuses specifically on the topic of identity design, and they do a great job of presenting new work in the field, while offering authoritative criticism. A highlight is their annual best and worst lists.