Building a brand ecosystem across a variety of marketing assets for campaigns, from logos and colors to illustrations, motion graphics, and product videos for our client MonthlyCup.
Intro:
We believe branding is a puzzle. Of which the logo is just a piece. Branding is about creating a feeling.
Branding is a promise. It's the consistency in messaging, visual identity, and customer experience that reinforces that promise. And under that premise, we helped MonthlyCup.
In Sweden, a menstrual cup brand faces challenges like strong competition in an eco-conscious market, lingering stigma around periods, and the need to prove genuine sustainability.
To overcome these hurdles, consistent branding is key. It builds recognition and trust, positions the brand as professional and credible, and helps it stand out from the crowd. Our approach involved defining core brand values, creating a unified visual identity across all fronts (illustration, photography, packaging, video, printing), and crafting a clear brand voice.
We started developing styles for the simpler version possible of illustrations the brand would use.
Those are the illustrations they would require for instructions in product packaging: tiny, quick to read, understandable, sufficiently accurate as to be useful to instruct users, and still not very "this-is-a-vagina" loud, for we have viewers of all ages on the shelf of convenience stores.
After having a set of the simpler draws to be used for Monthly, we went onto other scenarios in which illustration was likely required. These would be scenarios such as media publications, marketing assets, and even video ads. Illustration would play an important role for communications.
Setting the tone for animated illustration work.
Expressing ideas with motion would be key to the brand. Either on GIFs or 1-minute ads, illustrated work would communicate concepts or whole stories.
Therefore, the complexity and variety of scenes and characters would increase. Not only women characters would make part of the roaster, but also many other objects.
We developed as well styles for motion graphics, meaning how elements would move in the scene and how to frame them out.
Above the latter, we worked on shaping a tone line for storytelling, music, voice-over narrative, color, among others, that would be consistent across the brand's ads.
Brand consistency is key, and that's especially true when it comes to illustrations and animated ads.
Consistent visuals across all platforms and mediums help customers instantly recognize and remember your brand. When having distinctive styles of illustrations – people know what it is immediately.
Our guidelines mean efficiency for upcoming creative teams.
Clear guidelines provide a framework for illustrators and animators, saving time and reducing revisions.
Guidelines ensure that everyone, from marketing to product development, is on the same page when it comes to visual representation.
Having guidelines and samples to look at make it easier for new hires to quickly understand the brand's visual identity and create assets that align with it.
Another Puzzle Piece: Illustration For Printed Materials.
Illustration would not only be used across motion graphic scenarios. Static ones would be seen everywhere as well: website, emails, social posts, posters, banners, calendars, on-store walls and glasses.
Stablishing Guidelines to Consistently Mix Illustration and Photo.
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