Business Builders Podcast

What Your Brand Says About You—Without Saying A Word

• Brenton Gowland & Ron Tomlian • Season 4 • Episode 69

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In this episode of the Business Builders Podcast, Brenton Gowland and Ron Tomlian wrap up their communication series by spotlighting the silent yet powerful language of visual branding. Imagine walking down a supermarket aisle, scanning for the perfect snack, only to be drawn to a particular package—not because of words, but because of color, design, and imagery. This split-second attraction exemplifies how brands communicate before a single word is spoken. Brenton and Ron unpack the science and strategy behind visual cues, showing how thoughtful choices in color, imagery, and typography can set a brand apart and instantly convey its essence.


Key Highlights:

1.The Story of Color: Brenton shares his own temptation in the chocolate aisle, captivated by Cadbury’s iconic purple—a color so intrinsic to the brand that it’s legally protected. This story highlights the power of color in brand recognition and loyalty.

2.Brand Examples:

•Apple – Minimalism and creativity at its core, designed to let the user take center stage.

•Microsoft – Professionalism and efficiency, communicated through its distinct “business blue.”

•Tiffany & Co. – Sophistication embodied in “Tiffany Blue,” synonymous with timeless luxury.

•Nike – A masterclass in empowerment with its iconic “swoosh,” a symbol of achievement and motivation.

•Disney – Evoking wonder and magic, bringing childhood dreams to life.

3.The Framework for Visual Strategy:

•Define Your Visual Message: Understand what emotions or associations your brand should evoke.

•Audit and Adjust: Examine current visuals, assess their alignment with brand goals, and make intentional adjustments.

•Test & Gather Feedback: Seek out honest reactions from unbiased sources to ensure your visuals hit the mark.

•Iterate Consistently: As brands evolve, so should their visual expressions. The ongoing refinement ensures continued relevance.

4.Consistency in Branding: Ron emphasizes that consistency builds trust. Whether it’s a logo, color scheme, or typography, using these elements reliably across all platforms tells customers they can count on you.

5.Challenge for Listeners: Brenton and Ron encourage listeners to choose one visual element—logo, color, or imagery—and assess if it truly reflects their brand’s values and vision. A small tweak can align visual branding with business intentions, giving customers an authentic experience of the brand’s promise.


With vivid stories and actionable steps, this episode provides a roadmap for business owners to harness the hidden language of visuals, ensuring that every color, font, and image conveys their brand’s true message—without uttering a word.

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Thank you for tuning in to this episode of the Business Builders Podcast. Until next time, KEEP ON BUILDING !!

Brenton Gowland:

Hey, there, Business Builders, when you've been wandering through a supermarket, scanning the shelves to make a choice, have you ever wondered why one product just feels right? It's not about the words, rather, it's something about the colors, images and design that guide you. Today, we're exploring the power of these visual cues and how they can make your brand unforgettable in the time it takes to make a split second decision before we jump into today's episode, we'd love for you to check out our new YouTube channel, Business Builders Network, while we're still getting into the swing of things on YouTube, we'd love your feedback. It'll really help us improve the show. Just search for Business Builders Network on YouTube and look out for our new eye catching yellow branding and the business builders symbol. We're looking forward to your thoughts. They'll help us make the show better and better each week. Well, welcome to the Business Builders podcast. We are your hosts. I am Brenton Gowland,

Ron Tomlian:

and I'm Ron Tomlian,

Brenton Gowland:

and today, Ron, we're going to be talking about what your brand says about you without using any words,

Ron Tomlian:

yes. So it's all about visual communication, and it's just as important, in my opinion, probably more important, because most people are visual more important than the words you use. It's the images, the colors, the fonts, all the graphic elements will say something about you, whether you intend it or not.

Brenton Gowland:

On that, I'm going to share a little story. I'm actually a chocoholic. It is my literal kryptonite. When it gets to about 11 o'clock at night, if I'm still working, I start getting the urge to go down the supermarket and get one of my favorite chocolates to eat while I'm working. Or if I'm going to the supermarket, either have to avoid the chocolate aisle. Or if I go down it, it's pretty much a foregone conclusion that I'm going to grab something. And the thing about chocolate Isles is the color. When you go near those chocolates, there's an array of color across all the different packaging that really is designed by the brands to attract us. And in Australia, there's a brand called Cadbury that is synonymous with the color purple. And in fact, that color is, for those of you who are into Pantone colors, it's Pantone, 268, 5c, and they've been around for more than 100 years using that color. And why am I bringing this up? Well, what was it about 10 or 20 years ago? Ron was that 10 or 20 years ago there was a court case where another company in Australia, I think it was Darryl Lee was It was started using purple in their chocolate packaging, and Cadbury sued them because they claimed that they owned purple, and Cadbury actually won that lawsuit, that they were the only chocolate company in this country, in Australia, that could use that purple, or anything close to it, In their packaging. And why is that so important? Because that speaks volumes about how color type imagery really becomes synonymous with our brand. And in this case, in Australia, if you show the color purple in relation to chocolate, people will think Cadbury chocolates, because they've done such a good job of making themselves recognizable just by a color. And so today we're going to be looking at that, how the visual elements of our brand, like color, font imagery, speak and what they say about our brand.

Ron Tomlian:

And that lines up with, of course, the final episode of our communication series, but he because here we're talking about how you say something without saying a word. That's right. And so just a quick recap. This is the final episode. Episode One was the launch of our effective communication series. We did then the idea of listening, the power of Smarter questions in leadership, being prepared for a crisis. And we had Mike Williams from us, pi helping us with that, having difficult conversations, which is always a challenge, mastering non verbal communication, presenting with impact and authority. And finally, last time, the five steps to avoid send regret and improve your writing. So this is episode nine of O Series, and the final one, and it's about how you talk to your customers and to anyone, yeah, without having to say a word. And it's visual.

Brenton Gowland:

Yeah, and let's be frank, so many of us like speak constantly through our brand messaging, and some of us don't even realize it, but we'll get into that in the episode, and we're going to give you a few challenges in this episode, to apply to your own brand and to question your own brand, to see if it's actually communicating what you want it to communicate. So to set the context for today's episode, maybe let's start with some examples, and I'm going to. To throw a couple of names at you brands and just and you our viewers and listeners to think, what do you think about how this brand communicates visually and what it says about it? So one that we're all going to know very well is the Apple brand, and that's because they do it so well, yeah. Well, they've been doing it really, really well since, I think it's the 1980s isn't it? Yeah, some amazing advertising, but some amazing brand imagery. So what do you think their brand imagery and visual communication style says about them?

Ron Tomlian:

Well, to me, it's minimalist. There's the very clean logo of the apple with the Binar of it. Everything about their their design, everything about their graphics, everything about the actual products themselves. Says clean, simple. It's sort of like a blank canvas for me to be creative, yeah, and I think they do it an exceptionally good job in communicating that we're not the center. You're the center. It's all about you and how you use these products and services that you know they because they've got into the service area as well.

Brenton Gowland:

And they also use a really clever array of color and personality types. So for instance, the people, the kind of styles of the people in their ads, very creative type. So to me, that whole Apple brand is really appealing to unlocking the creative potential of the people who are using it, or appealing to that creative industry.

Ron Tomlian:

Yeah. And again, it's all about the people who use it, not necessarily the products or services themselves.

Brenton Gowland:

Yeah. I think about Wow. Remember the iPod advertising that they do. Boy, that was good stuff.

Ron Tomlian:

Well, I think about all their advertising, I often use their images in talking about marketing, because they do it so well, and it's all about being on song with that one message, creativity.

Brenton Gowland:

Okay, so everyone's really familiar with Apple. What about Microsoft?

Ron Tomlian:

Okay, same sort of company, very different, very clinical. I know they use multiple colors, but it's primarily blue. It says business,

Brenton Gowland:

and it's a very business blue. It's not, it's not really that efficiency or that computer blue, right?

Ron Tomlian:

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, very much so.

Brenton Gowland:

So the the whole Microsoft kind of ecosystem is all about productivity and business, whereas Apple is about creative. And you can see those when you think about that, you can see those huge differences, right? Microsoft is we're all about business and productivity and getting things done. Apples, we're all about releasing the creative potential of every person and business that they're involved with. So very, two very different approaches to brands. Okay, so what about Tiffany and COVID?

Ron Tomlian:

Okay. And another one that uses color. I think if the Tiffany blue to me, it's definitely all about luxury and not, not sort of ostentatious luxury, stylish luxury, yes, and style. And again, clean, simple, elegant, elegance, the word I would use.

Brenton Gowland:

I think of breakfast at Tiffany. I know it's a movie, and it's kind of outside of our remit here today, but wow, what a great movie.

Ron Tomlian:

Yeah, but, but again, it fits with the brand. It's all about, um, aspiration.

Brenton Gowland:

Well, that's interesting, right? Because I think about Audrey Hepburn and her style. Because whether they did it by accident or on purpose, you could argue that, because the movie was done quite a while ago.

Ron Tomlian:

Well, which one leveraged off, which one wonders?

Brenton Gowland:

Well, yeah, but, well, now you think of Audrey hep Well, I think of Audrey Hepburn. Yeah, she's been in some great movies, but I think of Tiffany's, because that was so well done, damn. So there's an imagery, right? There's there's a personality. And they've done heaps of personalities, but,

Ron Tomlian:

but I think as soon as you see that color, I call it green, you call it blue?

Brenton Gowland:

What do they actually call it? We looked this up.

Ron Tomlian:

Robin egg blue.

Brenton Gowland:

What is a robin egg blue?

Ron Tomlian:

Well, I mean, no, I haven't seen the Robin Eggs since I was. No. Robin. The egg of a Robin is supposed, supposedly that colour. So it doesn't matter. It's now called Tiffany Blue because it's become so synonymous with that brand.

Brenton Gowland:

And Tiffany is a master class in color application, because they've been that blue for as long as I've known the brand, and when you see that blue in relation to jewelry, you don't even need to see the name of the product. This is like Cadbury in Australia, right? So Cadbury is a master class in color, 100 years more than of that color, and it stresses the importance of these visual elements of our brand, like color, that people sue over that, and Tiffany would probably do the same thing if anyone crossed their path in the jewelry. And absolutely, absolutely because they own that blue and I think that has happened. Oh, yeah. Oh, I'm not. Wouldn't surprise me at all. So let's move down a different track. Okay, what about Nike? What is Nike? You who are listening? What is Nike? What? What imagery comes into your mind when.

Ron Tomlian:

Immediately start thinking about all the images that they use of athletes and so on and and enabling, empowering, getting people to think of themselves as an athlete, being able to enable them to be athletes, in a sense, just do it. You know the swish, it's positive. It's well, you can do it.

Brenton Gowland:

They have moved away from having their name anywhere. They just have the swish now, because they've done such a good job of making that element mean something. And think about it. It's a tick. What does that mean?

Ron Tomlian:

Well, it's positive.

Brenton Gowland:

Yeah,

Ron Tomlian:

I'm on the right path. I'm getting the big nod of approval.

Brenton Gowland:

So when you think about Nike, Nike is a master class in brand building like they have. The others are great as well, particularly Apple, Tiffany, Microsoft, have done okay, but I don't think they've really focused on their brand. From what I can see, they've become something that we go, oh yeah. Well, that's Microsoft, but I think some of these other brands, like Nike, are just, again, a master class in how to make a brand become something in people's mind. All you got to do is see the tick occupy a space in people's mind. With Tiffany, all you got to do is see a color in relation to jewelry with Nike, all you've got to do is see a tick. Give me another one. Well, this will be the last one, because we got to move on. But this one's really special. And I think I've met people from this company, and they say, this has been my dream. This has been my dream to be in this company. Okay, company is Disney. Why? So what comes to your mind about the Disney imagery?

Ron Tomlian:

I mean, it's all to me, it's all about magic. It's all about something special, something that is is not quite easily explainable. It's all about the experience in a tingle, you know, it's, yeah, the magical kingdom. I think, you know, the young days when I used to watch Disney on television and they they refer to as the Magic Kingdom, fantasy, fantasy,

Brenton Gowland:

I think, of wonder and imagination and just adventure. Yes. So Disney's done an amazing job with this.

Ron Tomlian:

It's not clinical like Microsoft, even the use of Disney's original signature, yes, their symbol is all about personality.

Brenton Gowland:

Yeah, great, yeah. All right. So that's some examples of some amazing brands that have done really, really well with their branding. So what happens if we ignore the visual side of how our brand communicates Ron?

Ron Tomlian:

Well, what's interesting is if what we do in terms of the visual communication says something, whether we like it or not. That's right, we're either going to be in control of it, yeah, which is intentional, or victims of it, which is unintentional. So if we don't get this stuff right, and this is the important thing that I think we need to emphasize today, your the way you present yourself in your market speaks to your customer whether you like it or not, yeah. So you can either be in control of it or you can be a victim of it, like I said before. So if you get this wrong, you're going to get disparate messages about what you want to say, going out to your customers and maybe saying things that you don't want to say.

Brenton Gowland:

So a bit like this. You walk into a restaurant, yep, you sit down and you have one of the best meals of your life, yeah, but the staff are rude, yeah, but you go to the toilet and it's dirty,

Ron Tomlian:

yeah, but you and the decor of the place is, you know, sort of dated or messy, or is actually unclean. Doesn't matter, because you've had the best product you've ever had, yeah. But the product is only part of what you're getting correct, yeah. And the the the whole experience culminates in what you think about what you got, the value you got correct, yeah?

Brenton Gowland:

So therefore, because we know that we go into some restaurants and we'll walk in and the decor and the way staff act, we think, Wow, this is going to cost a bit. Oh yeah, it's going to be a fantastic experience. Yeah, you walk into a place like that and you've got very low expectations. Sure you get great food, but you feel like you're you've been a second rate citizen. When you go in there, you might not be likely to go back, but these are very similar to the way we present ourselves. What imagery do we use? What imagery do we put out?

Ron Tomlian:

What expectations do we create in the minds of our customers

Brenton Gowland:

through visual cues?

Ron Tomlian:

Absolutely,

Brenton Gowland:

and we really need to reinforce that point, because it's the visual cues. This is what we our brands say when they say nothing at all, so visually.

Ron Tomlian:

Well, in fact, they're communicating without having to use words, that's right. And, and that's the emphasis of today that we communicate because of the way we present ourselves visually. And most people, I think, are visual people,

Brenton Gowland:

yeah, and so I think that point that you've brought up, you know about the fact that our brands will say something about us whether we want them to say something or not. Well. It means that we really need to look at how we manage that, so we can either ignore it and it's going to say something about us, or we can actively and with intent, manage those visual cues as a business owner, even if it's our own brand. So if it's our personal brand, let's go back to basics. What does the way we dress say about us. What does the way we smell say about us? What does the way we talk say about us? These are all cues that other people pick up about us and the way we are, yeah, and what are the cues that the brand, that the visuals that we put out about our business, saying about our business?

Ron Tomlian:

Well, just think about the way you go into a bookstore, for instance, how do you buy a book? Now, is it just pick a book off the shelf, or is it the visuals that you use as an indicator of these are type of things that I'm interested in,

Brenton Gowland:

and often it's the cover. You know that full well, like if, unless you go in for a specific book, you walk up and down those aisles and you look for something, an interesting title and an interesting cover, so and

Ron Tomlian:

the typeface makes a difference. Let's go down a different path, supermarkets. How do you buy food?

Brenton Gowland:

Well, it's how do you buy food? But what if, all there's not a lot of difference in price between a whole lot of products that are of similar let's take spaghetti, for example, right? Or soup, yeah, they're all pretty similar in price,

Ron Tomlian:

yeah, and, and, quite frankly, they might argue that they're different in terms of the product itself, but really are they not my in my experience.

Brenton Gowland:

We'll take another one. We're asking for your practical example. Let's go for dog food. So there was a client that we worked for way back when, I think I was in my 20s, where we created this pet food for a particular client, the packaging. So we did a whole heap of research. When we actually created the packaging is that we went into a supermarket, took photos, of course, of the pet food section, and looked at all the color blocking, as in how all the colors look on the shelf. So you go to different supermarkets and you look at how they do different color blocking, and then one thing is, what color am I going to choose? So the color needs to tick a few boxes. So it needs to make sure that it signifies that this is a quality product, and that it's for animals, and that it's safe, and that it's yummy, and then it's all these things, but then it also needs to differentiate from the other products on the on the shelf. So as we heard with the Cadbury example at the start, if we picked the same purple in the chocolate section as Cadbury, we wouldn't be allowed to do it because they've trademarked it. They will sue. They will protect their space. So we need to find a compelling color that can become synonymous with our brand, and then we need to look at the imagery on there to make it appealing. And then we need to look at the words we use. So when we're talking about not using words at all, we're talking about verbal audio kind of things here, slogans and so forth, even the name of the brand very important. So there are a whole heap of considerations as to how to make that product, because then we end up as consumers standing in that aisle going, which one do I choose? Which one do I choose? And how do you pick?

Ron Tomlian:

Yeah, and, you know, I'm just thinking about dog food, Chum, Pal. You know, all those brands, and now people were getting a little bit more sophisticated. It's about health associated with your dog. So those brands were appropriate when I just need to think about this for a second. Now, it's becoming a lot more about a healthy version. You know that there's health brands associated with with dog food. So again, all the imagery has to point towards what's my point of differentiation?

Brenton Gowland:

100% and it has to help us make a decision. But we're talking here about products now. Products are part of a brand, and so we're saying, what does our brand say when it's not using words, right? When? What does our brand say when we don't have a chance to speak about it, when we're not around? So products are an extension of that. The way the product looks speaks about our brand as well.

Ron Tomlian:

Yeah. So what are the what are the elements? What are the elements associated with visual communication?

Brenton Gowland:

Well, there's three elements, and the elements really are imagery, color and font,

Ron Tomlian:

or topography, if you like

Brenton Gowland:

typography, yes,

Ron Tomlian:

yeah. So those three elements, tell me, tell me more about color. So

Brenton Gowland:

color, this whole psychology behind choosing color, and you can just Google it, um or search, ask chat GPT about color psychology. And there's reams of information you can get about how maybe purple and blue can relate to royalty, and green can relate to sustainability. We all know that one and then other colors can mean different things. Like, back in the day, Blue was definitely meant boy and pink meant girl, and yellow means happy. Yeah. Well, I had a boss that used to say this ridiculous thing. Used to say, every other color is just a color. This is my first job into. Design when I was 20,

Ron Tomlian:

And that's why I'm deferring to you, because this is your bailiwick.

Brenton Gowland:

So he used to say every other color is just a color, but yellow is a state of being Brenton, it's a whole world of its own. And I used to think, wow. So yeah. So we might choose colors for a variety of reasons, like so the blue and Tiffany that we spoke about earlier, blue is often related. It goes well with gold. Blue. If you look at all the series, like Downton Abbey, there'll be blue and gold matched together, and it's synonymous with wealth and luxury, right? Whereas we talked about Blue earlier as well with Microsoft, where there is a very corporate blue. So a lot of people will say, if you're doing anything corporate, you use blue so control an interesting one. I remember it was actually one of my bosses. His wife bought a red car. And when she bought this red car, she got picked up by the police much more often, like, you know, just random, but red scares go faster. Everyone knows, that's what everyone says. But the red car attracted more attention from the police, and she said it was weird how people just pulled her over and often. And she said, I want to rari red. Well, she said, I want to change the color of my car. So color really does speak, right? That's evidence of it. So color will say something about your brand. There's a whole, whole color theory that we can get into, not for today's episode, but you get the point. So the second point, the second point, was imagery. So imagery, you know, you said it earlier, an image speaks 1000 words. Imagery will instantly make us feel something, see something. So in design, especially when we were coming up with concepts, we would have what we would call like the one second test. So we'd print the design out, we'd put it on a board, and we flash it up, put it down, and go, What did you see? And if we got the message across in those few seconds, then that design had merit, right? So if you couldn't understand it just by holding something up and putting it down, wouldn't use it. Now, in the same vein, if you look at YouTube, take Mr. Beast, for example, right? If you know who that is, Mr. Beast is probably the biggest YouTube star on the planet, and they have a whole team that just do some nails, and they spend weeks and then months optimizing and re optimizing thumbnails for best performance, because the thumbnail and the headline on YouTube is what will attract the clicks, clicks then get you through to watch the video. You know the drill, but they spend massive amounts of time getting these thumbnails right. Okay, so that's speaking about the imagery,

Ron Tomlian:

The imagery symbols, I associate with.

Brenton Gowland:

I go back to Tiffany and Co and Audrey Hepburn. What does Audrey Hepburn, as a person, say about that brand?

Ron Tomlian:

luxury, but elegance?

Brenton Gowland:

So what if I put Chris Hemsworth in front of a brand? What would that say?

Ron Tomlian:

Not so elegant? No, no offense to Chris, but not so elegant. Maybe a very powerful, masculine.

Brenton Gowland:

Fit. He's got this whole fitness thing going on. What if I put Robert Downey Junior, different again.

Ron Tomlian:

More cerebral, much more maybe lyric and like, which is associated with his personality and personal brand. Completely different again.

Brenton Gowland:

And we had this thing where we would do workshops with people, and we'd say, if your brand is a car, what kind of car would it be? Because just saying that would say a lot about the brand. And the third element, typography. Well, typography says all sorts of things about your brand, yeah. And so give me some examples. Well, very basic. You've got serif and sans serif text. So serif text is where you have accents at the end of the characters, you know, where a T looks like. It's a bit oldy Weldy Times New Roman. Perfect example. It's got accents, or what they're called, serifs, at the end of the font. And they're a much easier font to read. So I think Garamond, I'm getting really silly now, going into too much detail, but Garamond is the book font because it's easy to read, because serif based fonts are easier to read, whereas sans serif, where they do not have a serif at the end, yep, a much more direct, powerful business kind of fonts. Yeah, they're not, they're not generally a body copy kind of font, because they are much more abrasive in the fact that they're sleek up and down, they can be much they can come across as much more modern, yes, and then the personality in the font. And there's a lot of personality in the font, and a trend nowadays is to incorporate serif and san serif in the same headlines. So you have a sans serif font with right in the middle of it, one or two words that are with serif and that that's kind of a modern look and feel. But what? What can these fonts say about you? Well, if it's a cursive font, it can be relaxed. If it's a really bold font, it can mean pay attention. If it's a more modern looking font, you can say you're a modern kind of company, please. Yeah, there's, it's a lot of person. Reality stuff. So in particular with typography, headlines, body copy, yes, but not so much. But those headlines, the font, it really says a lot, and then sub heads and all these kind of things, they they give a personality to your communications and will either be inviting, or it might be a font that's got all sorts of different shapes, what we call x heights and y heights and all these kind of things. And there might be a youthful font, because it's got stuff going on.

Ron Tomlian:

Now, something that's not an element. Those three elements that we talked about is consistency. You know, when you think about just topography, if you're using one style of font, and then you start using a different style of font. And I sometimes see this in in the reports that my students provide. Yeah, you get the impression that, even though it's still communication, you get the impression that their thoughts are a bit muddled. Consistency, I think, is incredibly important. Consistency of imagery, consistency of colors doesn't mean you have to be boring. If you we talked about Apple before, they use a palette of colors that are quite bright and imply creativity, but they consistently use them. I think consistency in terms of your brand is an incredibly important, often overlooked element.

Brenton Gowland:

Well, we talk about, what is these visual elements saying about your brand, what are they communicating? Well, what does consistency communicate about the business that you can rely on it, it's dependable. Yeah, it's going to be something that you can come back to and know what you're going to get?

Ron Tomlian:

Predictable, and then predictable in the sense that I know what I'm going to get and I'm going to get it consistently.

Brenton Gowland:

Yeah, absolutely. So when we create these styles, you put these elements together they should be intended for our target market. And what we're going to share with you right now and and go into is is a framework for how you can put these elements together and create the visual cues within your brand imagery that will be able to communicate effectively the message you want to convey. So with that framework, Ron, where do we start?

Ron Tomlian:

Well, it all, it again, all states with who you're trying to talk to, but defining the message

Brenton Gowland:

Always the base block, right?

Ron Tomlian:

Absolutely.

Brenton Gowland:

So that comes back to our business strategy.

Ron Tomlian:

Absolutely. And it has to be consistent with that business strategy. But start by setting clear intention. I think this is really important. What are you wanting to say? Ask yourself the question, What would people think, feel or remember about our brand as a result of what we put in front of them? Visual? That's a really good question. Yes. So that's number one, yep. Create the intention. Yep. Okay, so number two.

Brenton Gowland:

Number two is then assess your current visuals. So if we've created the attention intention, sorry, we need to go. This is what it wants to say, then we need to basically do an order and go. So what do our visuals say about us now? Are they aligning with the message that we want to create? Yeah, and there's a bunch of ways we can work out how to do that. Firstly, we ask ourselves, then we can put it in front of other people. Remember the test I said when I was back in the creative agency days, you know, holding up the visual, and in one second, can I communicate? What does it communicate? Get test subjects, talk to other people, show them your visuals. Do those tests with random people who aren't associated with the brand, if you don't understand, and people who will tell you the truth, yes, and I would say, this is where you get expert help from designers, branding experts.

Ron Tomlian:

You made it very clear before this entire body of knowledge associated with this and people like graphic designers and so on are schooled in that body of knowledge.

Brenton Gowland:

Well, when you think about building a business, and I have this conversation frequently, you're paying money for an office, you're fitting the office out, you're putting staff in it, you're trying to make it attractive, so that when clients visit you, that it gives a certain impression. Because we talked about walking into a restaurant, right? Yes. How much do people spend on getting the decor of restaurant to reflect the intent of the product that they're serving you on the plate. So in the same way, think of your brand as you are creating that environment, that perception. So what intent Do you have? And the audit part? So of course, we define what we want to say based on the strategy that we're wanting to implement, and we assess, we audit it to see what it's saying, to work out, where is it now? So point one is basically, then where are we going to take it?

Ron Tomlian:

So where do we want it to be?

Brenton Gowland:

What's the third part of that? So there's five parts to this framework.

Ron Tomlian:

Okay, so make adjustments, and test and adjust what you said. So you preempted, yes, what I'm going to say, and that is be willing to say it's what we're doing at the moment doesn't say what we want it to say. So how do we have how do we modify it so that we start to get that message across in the visuals before we start talking about anything, before we say anything to customers, before we say anything to. Suppliers before we say, what do these visuals say to people before we even get a chance to say a word?

Brenton Gowland:

This is I remember there was okay. It was Telstra. So I watched this when I was young and learning graphic design. I remember watching this long documentary on how they built the Telstra logo that was about two iterations ago, and it took a lot of time, but they they had umpteen designs, and I think it was hundreds. They only threw them on sketch paper, and they showed lots of stakeholders, because everyone wanted a part of the decision. They got it down to a few, and then they would build presentations on these logos and what brand extensions they could have until they got it down to a core, was a very expensive exercise back in the day,

Ron Tomlian:

and yes, but it's paid off because they're the most well recognized brand in that field, in Australia.

Brenton Gowland:

Yeah, that's true, and that just talks about the importance of it. Now that's one element of the brand, the logo, which then goes into well, what surrounds the logo, and that is the brand infrastructure, if you want to use those that kind of terminology, and this is why I often say, we can. We can test these things and try these things on our personal brand and on our business. There might be a bit more testing to do, but my whole point of talking about that restaurant piece and the digital infrastructure piece is, if you can afford it as a business, if you're doing well, prioritize and put budget behind how you resource your brand, because your brand and the visuals as they either make your job harder or make your job easier.

Ron Tomlian:

Well, to my way of thinking, the brand is the the element of stickiness about whatever you put in front of it, whatever you offered to a customer? If you've done a good job with the brand, your offer is sticky. Yes, it will stick to the customer's thinking, yes, if you've done a bad job, it slips right away and people don't remember it. Okay, so, but it's about gaining a place in people's heads.

Brenton Gowland:

so you adjust and test, yeah. So the first point again was we define our visual message, then we audit our current visuals, and then we adjust and test. So the fourth point is we then go out, once we've put that into market, we gather audience feedback. So once you put something in market, gather feedback, get feedback on it and and work out whether it's actually doing what you want it to do, or like the teams on YouTube, they refine and they tweak and they refine and they tweak, and then they go, Well, we've got this about where it wants to be, and there's no hard and fast rules back. And I think, like I said, I think we can learn a lot from YouTubers, right? So people with brands today, they will spend a lot of time researching and resourcing something till they get out in market. And the way the market moves now is these things, the market changes. So by the time you've I know one company has been working two and a half years on their website, it's been sitting there. It's been sitting there. And I'm like, Guys, by the time you launch this, it's, it's gonna be almost out of date, right? Because they're trying to put every single product and make it perfect. I'm like, Just get the thing live. Like, make it live.

Ron Tomlian:

The only way that you're going to get things better is to do something, put it out there and put it out there and get feedback.

Brenton Gowland:

Yeah. Now there can be some risk involved with that. You gotta, you gotta weigh up what you're putting out. But my point is, don't ruminate and ruminate and ruminate, put it out test, get live feedback and adjust.

Ron Tomlian:

I mean, it's part of the design. Principle is to iterate, iterate and then.

Brenton Gowland:

look, just to finish off the framework. So we've got basically define your message, assess your current visuals, make adjustments and test. And the last thing is loop back and refine. So once we've got something out in the market, we've refined it. It's working. Okay? We're going to stick with this and do versions of it, etc, eventually and at regular intervals. You need to, you need to test it again. Tweak, yeah, tweak or change the message and all

Ron Tomlian:

I mean, the best example I've always used in refining is Coca Cola. People think the Coca Cola symbol is the same, or the Coca Cola, yeah, the Coca Cola symbol is the same as it was 100 years ago. No, it's not on a regular basis. They tweak it. They tweak it to look more relevant to their target audience now.

Brenton Gowland:

There's something really interesting about that, though, if you look at the evolution of the coke logo, it started a certain way over the years, changed a whole lot, and then it looped back to the way it used to look, and then it modernized a little bit. So it's been a really interesting evolution for Coke and that particular brand mark you're talking about now. So that's basically one of those elements. That's the, you know, the imagery? Yeah, what imagery are using? We talked about that. There's imagery, color and typography. So the imagery of that logo has evolved quite a bit, but not too far from the starting point,

Ron Tomlian:

The core of what they want to say, which is, we've been around for a while.

Brenton Gowland:

Yep. So. To apply this framework to your own brand, whether it be a personal brand or whether it be your business brand. And I think the challenges that we want to lay down for people today, what are they, Ron, give us?

Ron Tomlian:

Okay, well, I just want to

Brenton Gowland:

What challenge are we going to give to the listeners and viewers?

Ron Tomlian:

I would like people to take one element of their visuals, their brands, visual, whether it's a logo, whether it's the colors you're using, whether it's the imagery that you're using, I don't really care, but take one element of that and say is this, does this element match with what I'm trying to get people to think about my brand? Yeah, sure, that's good. And be and be intentional about that. Does the images that I'm using or the logo that I'm using say something, or is it consistent with what I want to say to my customers and what I want or think about?

Brenton Gowland:

Or the color. You could take colors and say, What does this color say to you about my brand? Put your logo in the middle of it, yeah, whatever else. But test one element is what you're saying. That's right. And what's the relevance of testing one element?

Ron Tomlian:

Well, one element you can change. So you can modify, you can improve it to if you find out that's not saying what you wanted to say, okay, then you can stay again. It's goes back to that auditing idea. You can do that to other elements so that you start to get some closer alignment and, most importantly, consistency.

Brenton Gowland:

Yeah, and I guess that leaves us with the question, so that's the challenge, to start changing things. But the overarching question is, what is your brand saying about you right now? And is there anything negative that's being said? Is there anything that's that you're not intending for it to say that it is saying based on the way it looks? And it's worth going out and asking people, What? What does this imagery? What does this say about the brand? As Ron was saying, because you'll learn a whole bunch. And I think that's pretty, pretty insightful and helpful for your business, if you can actually get your brand aligned with what you want to say. So we've covered quite a bit.

Ron Tomlian:

Yeah. So I think the key elements of what we've talked about today, visuals say something about you, whether you like it or not correct. You can be intentional or you can be a victim.

Brenton Gowland:

And that's my biggest takeaway from our discussion today, that you know, and like you said, intentional a victim. I want to control my destiny. I want to control what these visuals are saying about my myself and my business.

Ron Tomlian:

So every color, every font, every image that you use, contributes or detracts from what you're trying to say, be very clear about what you're trying to say, and then use those elements to consistently say that same thing over and over. You'll get bored with it. There's no question you will get bored with all this stuff. In terms of, I've said the same thing over and over again, aren't my clients, aren't my customers, or aren't my stakeholders bored with this? No, they're not, because you don't occupy that much in their mind. Very important to you, and it should be important to you, but it's not so much a part of their life. So consistency in saying the same thing over and over again, really important and visually, that's going to help you say what you want to say more than anything.

Brenton Gowland:

Well, okay, Business Builders, there was a lot in today's episode. We will see you in the next episode, which I believe we're going to do on networking, as this was the end of our communication series. So until next time, Business Builders, keep on building you.