There are many components of a brand identity: logo, color
palette, font choice, and the Visual Vocabulary. There's a
lot of information available about the use of logos,
colors, and Visual Vocabulary, but not much on the
effective use of fonts. So, here's some information on the
creative, practical, and technical aspects of fonts.
Font Basics A font is a set of all the letters in the alphabet,
designed with similar characteristics. This is also known
as a typeface. Fonts are usually designed to include several style
variations. This can include styles like light, regular,
bold, semibold, ultra bold, and italic. Some fonts also
include "Expert" versions, which are fonts that include
fractions and mathematical symbols. Font families are typically packages of fonts that include
all of the different versions of a font. Using fonts with
large families will give you a wide range of fonts to use
in your materials, for variety and emphasis. There are many basic classifications of fonts. Four of the
most common classes of fonts are: - Serif fonts, which have little "feet," called serifs, at
the ends of the lines that make up the letters. Some
examples of serif fonts include Times, Palatino, and
Garamond. These fonts are more traditional, elegant, and
old-fashioned. - Sans-serif fonts don't have those feet. "Sans serif"
means "without serifs." Arial, Verdana, Tahoma, and
Helvetica are some of the most common sans-serif fonts.
These fonts are more clean and modern. - Script fonts are calligraphic or cursive fonts. Brush
Script and Nuptial Script are two common script fonts. - Display fonts are decorative and often used for logos or
headlines. There are other types of fonts as well, including
handwriting fonts and all-caps fonts. However, the four
listed above are the most common and useful in business
communications. Creative Font Usage Guidelines Each type of font has certain characteristics that
translate into that font's personality. A font might be
serious or light-hearted, traditional or modern, legible or
decorative, or any number of other personality traits. The
traits of the font that you use in your marketing materials
and business communications should reflect and enhance your
company's brand. Your company should have designated fonts to use in the
following situations: - A logo font, which is typically not one of the fonts that
come installed on Windows machines: it should be more
unique and interesting. Some logos will have two or three
different fonts in them. If this is the case, then consider
using one of those fonts as the secondary font as well.
- A secondary font, used for headlines, sub-headlines,
taglines, special text such as graphics and captions, and
decorative text such as pull quotes, which are the large
quotes that are used decoratively in articles and
documents. This can be the same font as is used in your
logo. This is typically an interesting and unique font as
well. This may also be used as the font for your contact
information in your stationery, depending on its legibility. - A tertiary font is optional and may be used when the
secondary font is not always legible, for mid-length texts
such as pull quotes and contact information. - A serif text font, for lengthy printed documents. Printed
materials are more easily read if they are in serif font
rather than sans-serif font. - A sans-serif font, for shorter printed documents and
on-screen use. Text on a computer monitor is easier to read
in a sans-serif font than in a serif font. - A website font, which may be the same font as is used as
the main sans-serif text font, depending on how that font
translates for online viewing. All of these fonts should have similar or contrasting
characteristics. Choosing fonts with similar
characteristics will make your fonts match and create
consistency throughout your documents. Choosing fonts with
contrasting characteristics will build visual texture and
interest into your materials. For example, you could pick
all thin, sans-serif fonts such as Arial and Frutiger to
create a harmonious, matching suite of fonts. Or you could
pick fonts with contrasting characteristics to create
greater interest, such as using a serif font like Palatino
for the headlines and then using a sans-serif font like
Verdana for the text. Each piece of marketing material or document created should
have a maximum of three or four families of fonts on them.
(A font family includes all of the bold and italic
variations of a particular font, so using bold or italic
effects does not count as additional fonts.) Using more
than three or four fonts is confusing, and it looks
unprofessional.
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Erin Ferree is a brand identity and marketing design
strategist who creates big visibility for small businesses.
Through her customized marketing and brand identity
packages, Erin helps her clients discover their brand
differentiators, then designs logos, business cards, and
other marketing materials and websites to reflect that
differentiation, as well as to increase credibility and
memorability. http://www.elf-design.com
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