Blog Branding: 6 Steps To Start Branding Your Blog

[A collaboration post – all thoughts are my own.]

Blog branding is a key aspect of your growth and success. With millions and millions of blogs actively producing new content regularly, you kind of need to know what you are doing to see success.

When getting yourself involved in blogging, a general understanding of blog structure and search engine optimization is more than enough knowledge to get you moving forward. There is one other important thing that you should take into consideration; it’s called “branding.”

Color palette

Before creating a blog, you need to pick the color palette for your brand. It’s to show who you are and make your work recognizable to others. Somehow, you might be stuck on how to choose your color palette. You can’t just choose one exact color because you need to mix them up to create your own blog branding.

I’ve made a lot of different changes to the colors. Sometimes, you will find that your color didn’t go with the content in your posts and they didn’t establish who you were as a blogger. By choosing your color palette, you want this color to make your blog very memorable.

So, here are the steps to determining your color palette:

• You need to find a photo that you love – inspiring you. It could be a photo that you found on Instagram, Pinterest, Google, Twitter, Facebook, or anywhere. It needs to have what you and your blog are all about. The color should show the whole vibe, feeling, and something ‘click’ for your blog. For example, if your niche is about food, I don’t think dark colors are fit for your blog, right?
• Go To Adobe Color CC – a website that creates a color palette. Click on Extract Theme to upload the photo you love. It will automatically create a color palette from your photo.

• Screenshot that page, crop the palette only, and open it in Photoshop or Canva (or a free image editing site).
• So now you have five-set colors which you can use with. However, if you feel something missing or don’t quite like the color set, you need to do some adding and subtracting.
• If your palette doesn’t have a neutral color, I suggest you add it. You need to have neutral colors, one or two, and I always choose black and grey (white is given). Generally black is your text color, so it’s good to see how it blends with other colors. You can also add metallic colors, such as silver, gold, and bronze (this is optional). 

You may need to remove or change one of the colors that Adobe selected for you in order to find the ones that are truly yours. Sometimes, you already have a picture in your mind of the color you want to use for blog branding but need some help to deliver it. So, here you can try adding and subtracting colors.

And, that’s it!

Now, you have a color palette for your blog branding. So, whenever you need to change the color of your blog design (drop-down menu, links, sidebar), logo, or social media, you will know exactly what colors to use.

And if you need the color code or hex value (e.g., #FFFFFF) of your color palette, you can use Photoshop or just upload it to Image Color Picker and click on each color to get the code.

Blog theme

The first step is to create a strong brand image by using a unique design throughout your blog. You don’t need a web design expert for this: a busy blog is not something that is favorable, and it can be the reason why your readers don’t stay longer on your blog. Your blog design should be simple and elegant enough to make audiences click on your post.

If you’re starting a blog to showcase your professional skills, there are many elegant and professional WordPress or Blogger themes available on Etsy. Because I’m showing my writing skills as a translator, I picked a clear, simple, and professional blog theme. Etsy has many professional templates to enable your audience to have a good experience while on your blog. Nothing beats premium themes.

Here are some recommendation themes that I used before:

Blog logo

Once you’ve settled on your theme and color palette, it’s time to design a logo!

When I’m offering my translation service, having a logo or brand is really important. If you have a long-term vision for your blog, you need to invest money in a reliable and recognizable logo design. If you’re artsy, you can totally do this yourself. On the other hand, there are also free tools that you can use to get creative and craft your own, like Canva.

However, if you have little time and no budget to invest, pick a cool font, and your blog name could easily be your logo. There are multiple solutions when it comes to the logo, just make sure that it is clean and retina-friendly.

You will see many awesome blogs out there whose logos are nothing special really; simple and to the point.

Once your logo is done, you can use it on your social media accounts, business cards, and anything else you want to put your logo on.

About page

Well, most bloggers have a hard time writing an “about” page. If you take your blog seriously, you should include your blog’s mission, vision, and objectives. Your visitors are interested in knowing who’s behind a website or blog.

The about page is very important in the process of building a brand image for your blog. Using my previous experience, I wrote a very strong about us page for my blog.

Stick to your own writing style

When it comes to blog branding, your writing style plays a significant role because your content is the voice of your blog. To build a strongly branded blog, you have to find your own writing style.

First, you need to find your blog’s structure. Are you going to write long or short posts? Are you going to write how-to content or news content? Answering these questions will help you find your writing style.

Stick to your posting schedule

After finding your writing style, the next thing to pick is your posting schedule.

How often are you going to post in a month?
Are you going to post twice a week or four times a month?

You must figure this out and stick to it. The schedule of posting has a pretty important influence on the overall of your blog branding. Your audiences should know when to expect your next post.

You don’t need to post daily when you also have other responsibilities in the office. It’s okay to post twice a week or more in a month – as long as it’s high-quality content that helps or solves problems for your audiences.

Here is a custom branding package to help you style your brand with custom-made ones.

In a nutshell, making a brand your blog isn’t an easy task; you should be patient, hardworking, and optimistic. Don’t forget, be positive!

Have you branded your blog? Are you satisfied with your brand’s image now? Let me know your opinion below!