It was time for us to put a bit more thought behind the brand of our small startup
Like a lot of early startups, Local Measure spent the first couple of years finding itself – searching for the right market and messaging. The product, features and company evolved quickly so the visual identity moved with it. In late 2015, we started to find a level of maturity and stability—in product and customer—that I felt confident enough to develop and solidify a brand and identity system that would represent us for the next phase of growth.
As the company expanded into offices across the world, we had to find a way to scale the design resources to serve the needs of the satellite teams. This involved empowering sales staff to serve themselves using templates, or engaging local agencies or freelancers to help out when needed. In order to maintain consistency, we had to formalise and document the key aspects that made up the visual identity of Local Measure.
The new brand was more of a gradual shift rather than a brand new vision. This was a practical choice more than anything. I knew we wouldn’t have the time and budget to change everything at once so it was important that the new aspects of the brand could sit next to any old collateral without looking like a different company. This would allow us to gradually rollout changes in new collateral while slowly reviewing and updating existing items.
The product had evolved and the target market had shifted into the enterprise space. We needed to appear professional and trustworthy but it was important not lose the playful startup feel. To achieve this we use bold, oversize headings with interesting treatments like the ragged edge highlights and heavy coloured underlines. We also expanded the colour palette to make more use of bold bright colours.
Part of the new marketing strategy involved producing more long-form content such as a article and eBooks. We decide to add a serif typeface that could be used for body text to aid readability both on the web and in printed collateral. Calluna from exljbris paired well with Proxima Nova and provided flexibility at various sizes and weights.
The coloured triangles is used as a background element to provide colour and movement without needing photography. The concept is inspired by mosaics. The idea that little things make up a bigger, complete picture relates back to the core of our product which provides insights from social data. The mesh is a variation that can be used as a more subtle overlay over images or solid colours.
We use both. Illustrations are generally used to simplify more complex concepts or when illustrating product features. Photography is used for hero or background elements.
By designing and developing reusable components we are able to quickly iterate and build for new devices or landing pages. We use Pattern Lab to develop and maintain these components first which allow us to easily transfer the components into different CMS implementations.
Page weight, load times, and perceived performance is a big consideration when designing for web. By using type, colour, iconography and illustration we can create excitement and interest in the design without including lots of images.
Handing control over to content creators means increasing the risk of inconsistency creeping in. Giving editors easy ways to use brand elements when creating articles, as well as providing clear guidelines and training has helped ensure consistent and performant articles pages.