Here are 5 tips to build a cohesive wedding vendor brand that connects with your ideal clients.

Your wedding business is so much more than a single logo. As a wedding vendor, your brand is often aligned with your personal brand, and just like the age-old advice to “be yourself”, there are key ways for you to make your wedding vendor brand stand out. 

Here are 5 things to add to your wedding vendor branding checklist, including a bonus and a freebie at the end!

1. A unique logo that expresses the personality and strategy behind your wedding vendor brand.

A templated logo from Etsy can only cut it for so long. As a wedding vendor brand, your clients want to work with a trustworthy human who they can connect with on a personal level. This is one of the reasons I stress working with a designer one-on-one, rather than buying a templated logo or investing in a jack-of-trades on Fiverr. 

Adding in illustrative or custom typographic elements to your logo can give it that extra touch to move your logo from “regular” to unique or luxury.

2. A consistent font selection that you use across all platforms.

I recommend sticking with no more than 2-3 fonts that you use across all of your wedding business’s marketing. For my own clients, I like to choose a unique or strong serif font for headlines, an easy to read serif or sans serif for body copy, and an accent font. The accent font can be a script font or a unique, custom font that stands out. Your headline font doesn’t always have to be a serif font, either, but I find that this is common in the wedding industry. With this brand I designed for Darlinghurst Events, a wedding planner in the D.C./Maryland area, you can see that we chose a font that almost borders the world between serif and sans serif fonts. 

3. Secondary logos and submarks.

Secondary logos and submarks are essentially extensions of your logo that can be used in different real estate, like as your website favicon, in your website header, on business cards, and in the corner of social media graphics. It’s important that you have a horizontal version of your logo and a more vertical version in order to be able to apply your brand to a variety of different uses. The difference between investing in a single logo and a full, professional brand is in these details – a new business might have one logo that they use everywhere, whereas a truly established business will have a cohesive logo suite that expresses the same personality across all platforms and uses.

An example of where this is done well is Carats & Cake. See how their website has a horizontal version of their logo in the header, but their Instagram profile image is a stacked version of their logo. You’ll see these kind of applications in big brands, like Starbucks, Coca-Cola, CBS, and more.

When you’re going into a brand design, even though you’re a small business owner, I highly encourage you to imagine your business as its future self – how big could you be someday? Then, work with a designer who can bring that vision to life within your new brand.

4. A consistent copywriting voice – your writing voice should sound consistent across all platforms.

Did you know that your brand is actually so much more than just visuals? I know that I stress that it’s more than just a logo, but it’s also more than design! Our full-service package includes copywriting, because it’s important to infuse the same personality and strategy into your visuals and your words in order to have one cohesive wedding vendor brand.

In order to establish a cohesive copywriting voice for your wedding vendor brand, think through keywords (not really the SEO kind) that you use when you describe your business to your ideal clients. Simple words like “elegant”, “adventurous”, or “colorful” can be pulled together by a talented copywriter to consistently represent your brand.

It’s also important to have a tagline or phrase for your business. This is another way to create presence and permanence in the minds of your potential and current clients. Think of something simple but catchy that grabs attention and is easy to remember.

I could write about copywriting for hours, but the best way to ensure it’s done well is to work with a professional. If you’re interested in starting a brand project and want copywriting, drop us an email.

5. Branded visuals like high-quality photos, icons, or illustrations that represent the personality of your brand.

If you’re a photographer, I know you already know the importance of photos in storytelling. It’s important that your brand – even your photography brand – has a consistent visual feel amongst photography. If you’re trying to refine your wedding vendor brand, this can look like being really selective about which weddings you choose to highlight in your portfolio. Try to choose images that have the same quality, editing style, and vibe to them. It’s ok to have a little variety, but your potential clients will feel even more trusting when all your work seems to have a really cohesive feel.

In addition, when we work with clients, we often draw custom icons and illustrations to represent the wedding vendor’s brand. These are great ways to highlight services, benefits, or timelines and also add a high-quality touch to your wedding vendor brand.

6. BONUS: consistent brand colors.

For a guide on how to choose your brand colors, download this freebie that will walk you through color psychology and how to choose your brand colors for your wedding vendor brand. When I talk with people who aren’t designers, they recognize that this is one of the essentials of branding, so I didn’t bring it up first. It’s an obvious one, but colors are also an afterthought for so many wedding vendor brands. Here are some incorrect assumptions I hear about brand colors:

To appear high end, your brand has to use only black and white and neutrals. 

Your brand automatically comes across as high end if you’re using black, white, and other neutrals (believe it or not, I’ve seen some black and white brands that have a low quality feel!).

Your brand can include your favorite color. While I encourage clients to have a brand centered around a unique personality, that doesn’t always factor in your favorite color. However, just because your favorite color is hot pink or chartreuse, doesn’t mean that you can’t be successful with a brand that includes one of those colors!

How do you feel about creating a custom, cohesive brand? If you’re overwhelmed, just take a deep breath. Building a cohesive wedding vendor brand takes time and thought. If you don’t want to go it alone, send us a note.