How to Create an Inspiration Board for Branding

Yay! It's finally Friday! I'm so excited for a relaxing weekend as this week has totally kicked my butt. Just a few more hours and a few more project to get through and I'll be sitting on my patio and kicking my feet up. Today's blog is going to be about creating an Inspiration Board for your brand. Whether you have a brand, are currently working on one or are just starting, an inspiration board can be a really fun idea to just see where your style is. The first time I branded Twila & Co, I did not do a Pinterest board. I simply took a font and color that I liked and just kind of went with it. In hindsight, that was a really big mistake. I didn't take the time to think about who I was as a company or how I wanted to represent myself. And by not doing that, I never really determined who I wanted to be as a small business.

When I decided to rebrand myself, an Inspiration Board was the very first thing I did. While it was hard determining some of th0se big questions about myself, I enjoyed the process of looking deeper at who I was and how I wanted my business to developed and I loved how it came together. Branding is more than just a logo or a color palette: it's a representation of who you are both as a person and a business.

Today's blog I'm going to share some tips on how I built my inspiration board.

First of all, if you don't already have a Pinterest account, I would suggest that you start one. It is a great place to hold these types of ideas and inspirations. Pinterest has become my creative search engine; I use it for EVERYTHING. And it is a really great resource. I am a little bit crazy in that I have to keep everything organized and I have over 80 boards. But just a 'Branding Inspiration Board' is a great place to get started.

Start with your Pinterest Home Page

Once you get into your account, make sure you follow people whose style you like, companies or other brands that you like or things that interest you. This provides a great feed for you to start from. If you're like me and have been on Pinterest for a while, you already follow a pinners that have a similar style to you. When I was doing my rebrand, I just started by pinning a few things from my main Pinterest feed and I immediately started noticing a pattern, color palette and style.

Use Keywords to Search

Part of the branding process is also about discovering who you are as a business, what kind of client you want to attract, and what your goals are. As I'm brainstorming ideas, I write down words that I like that are associated with the project I'm working on. Those words are great to use in searches, especially descriptive ones. For my brand, I used words like vintage, sea, weathered, and blues. Other keyword ideas could be: florals, bohemian, classic, rustic, bright, bold, beauty, etc. Even combining words 'like bohemian florals' or 'vintage florals' got me some awesome results for a recent project.

Search Specific Colors

Ahhh. I LOVE colors. All colors. And second to that, I love matching colors. Putting color palettes together is probably one of my favorite parts of branding. I made sure to search for very specific colors such as 'cerulean' or 'sky blue,' to ensure I didn't just get all things that were blue. Don't know color names? You can also search Pantone Colors for specific shades.

Where Do You Like to Shop?

For me, one of my BIGGEST inspirations was Anthropologie. I am obsessed with that store. I love the uniqueness, the vintage feel, the weathered-ness (I don't think that's a word, but I'm hoping you'll understand what I mean) and most importantly, the quirky clothes. I feel totally at home and like myself whenever I walk into their store. And this was a feeling I wanted to capture in my brand.

The biggest thing to remember...

Be you! Your business, logo or branding is about you and what you want to represent. Be true to yourself and determine YOUR style. As a logo design and brander, my job is to create a logo and brand that are specific and personal to you. And I want to learn as much about you in the process by what you tell me and what you show my through your inspiration board.

You can view my whole Branding Pinterest board here.

Here's my original Pinterest board.