Implementation of Brand Guideline in PPT Presentations
Before discussing brand guidelines & consistency, it is important to define what it means. Essentially, it involves a consistent element on each slide, indicating that it is part of a company’s communication. Identifying which company it belongs to can be as simple as including the company name on each slide, but there are more effective methods. The following sections will explore how to subtly indicate brand identity without compromising design or repeatedly writing the company name on each slide.
Designing presentations that maintain brand consistency isn’t just about aesthetics—it’s about reinforcing brand identity and building trust with your audience.
Here is what research shows
Image 1.1 Shows how many companies use Brand Guidelines in their communication
But what happens when you don’t have formal brand guidelines to follow? Presentation Design Evolution suggests this is a best practice that has long been followed.
This practical checklist will help you maintain brand integrity across all your presentation materials or other corporate documents, even when working with minimal guidance.
What is a Brand Guideline?
Brand Guideline: A comprehensive document that outlines how a company’s brand elements should be used across all media. It typically includes rules for logo usage, color palette, typography, imagery style, tone of voice, and more.
Image 1.2 Brand Guideline Sample
Before we begin, let’s clarify some important terms:
Key Definitions of Terms
Brand Consistency: The practice of presenting a unified brand image across all touchpoints, ensuring all visual and messaging elements align with the brand’s identity.
Visual Identity: The visible elements of a brand (such as colors, design, logo) that identify and distinguish the brand in consumers’ minds.
Style Guide: A reference document detailing the specific design rules and elements for a brand, often a subset of the larger brand guidelines.
Why Brand Consistency Matters
Before diving into the checklist, let’s understand why consistency is crucial:
- Recognition: Consistent branding makes your company instantly recognizable
- Professionalism: Cohesive presentations appear more polished and credible
- Trust: Consistency builds trust with your audience over time
- Clarity: A unified visual language helps communicate your message effectively
One example of a company that excels in brand consistency is Coca-Cola.
Recognition: Coca-Cola’s consistent use of its iconic red and white color scheme, along with its distinctive logo, makes the brand instantly recognizable worldwide.
Professionalism: The cohesive presentation of Coca-Cola’s branding elements across all its marketing materials, from advertisements to packaging, appears polished and credible.
Trust: Over the years, Coca-Cola has built trust with its audience by maintaining a consistent brand image, which reassures consumers about the quality and reliability of its products.
Clarity: Coca-Cola’s unified visual language, including its typography and imagery, helps effectively communicate its message of refreshment and happiness.
The Essential Brand Guideline Checklist
1.Logo Usage
Definition: Logo usage refers to the proper application of a company’s primary visual identifier, including placement, size, and treatment across materials.
[Logo Usage Examples: Side-by-side comparison showing proper vs. improper logo placement, sizing, and spacing]
- Placement: Position the logo in a consistent location (typically top left or right corner of slides)
- Clear space: Maintain adequate white space around the logo (general rule: at least the height of the logo on all sides)
- Size: Keep the logo at a consistent, proportional size throughout all materials
- Version: Use the appropriate logo version (full color, monochrome, reversed)
- Resolution: Ensure the logo is high-resolution and never appears pixelated
- Do not: Stretch, skew, rotate, or alter the logo in any way
2. Color Palette: An important part of Brand Guideline
Definition: A color palette is a set of specific colors chosen to represent a brand, including primary brand colors and supporting secondary and accent colors.
[Color Palette Example: A visual representation of primary, secondary, and accent colors with their hex codes]
- Primary colors: Identify 2-3 main brand colors from existing materials
- Secondary colors: Develop 3-4 complementary colors that work with primaries
- Color ratios: Apply the 60-30-10 rule (60% primary color, 30% secondary, 10% accent)
- Consistency: Use identical hex codes/RGB values across all slides
- Background/text contrast: Ensure text remains legible on colored backgrounds
- Save swatches: Create and save color swatches in your presentation software
3. Typography as a Part of Brand Guideline
Definition: Typography refers to the selection, arrangement, and styling of fonts used to represent a brand, including font families, sizes, weights, and spacing.
- Font selection: Identify 1-2 fonts used in existing brand materials
- Hierarchy: Establish consistent heading and body text sizes
- Weight usage: Define when to use bold, regular, light, or italic styles
- Spacing: Maintain consistent line spacing and paragraph spacing
- Alignment: Decide on consistent text alignment rules (left, right, center)
- Accessibility: Ensure minimum font sizes for readability (16pt recommended)
4. Visual Elements as supporting elements in Brand Guideline
Definition: Visual elements are the supporting graphical components that enhance a brand’s presentation, including photography, illustrations, icons, and decorative features. It is one of the challenge in PPT Designing
- Photo style: Develop a consistent photographic style (bright/dark, saturated/desaturated)
- Illustration style: Maintain consistent illustration or icon styles
- Image treatments: Apply consistent filters, frames, or crops to images
- Charts/graphs: Use brand colors consistently in data visualizations
- Backgrounds: Create a set of compliant background options
- Shapes and lines: Establish rules for decorative elements (rounded vs. sharp corners)
Image courtesy Turner Duckworth
[Visual Style Comparison: Before/after examples showing inconsistent vs. consistent visual elements across slides]
5. Layout Principles as suggested by Brand Guidelines
Definition: Layout principles are the rules that govern how content is arranged within a page or slide, including grid systems, spacing, alignment, and content organisation. You can use some AI PPT designing tools, but usually, they are poor choices when you need high impact in your PPT
- Grid system: Create a simple grid system for slide layouts (a structured framework of invisible lines that guide content placement)
- Margins: Establish consistent margins around all slide content (the space between content and the edge of the slide)
- White space: Maintain adequate breathing room between elements (the empty space that helps organize and separate content)
- Slide templates: Develop 5-7 templates for different content needs (pre-designed slide layouts for specific purposes, including bar, graphs)
- Content density: Determine maximum content per slide guidelines (how much information should appear on a single slide)
- Consistency: Apply the same layout principles across all presentations including bullets
Image Courtesy EATemp
What to do when you do not have brand guidelines supplied by the client?
6. Creating a Mini Style Guide Without Guidelines
Definition: A mini style guide is a simplified reference document created when formal brand guidelines don’t exist, capturing essential brand elements for consistent use. You can take the help of PPT Experts to do this for you
- Screenshot collection: Gather screenshots of existing brand materials
- Color extraction: Use tools like ColorZilla or Adobe Color to extract exact colors
- Element library: Create a slide with all common elements (buttons, icons, etc.)
- Template slide deck: Develop a master template with all approved styles
- Documentation: Note all decisions made about logo, colors, fonts, etc.
- Share: Make this mini guide accessible to all team members creating presentations
Conducting a Brand Audit
Definition: A brand audit is a systematic examination of presentation materials to ensure they adhere to brand standards and maintain consistency. Read McKinsey style presentation blog to understand it’s practical implementation
- Consistency check: Review all slides for visual cohesion
- Logo verification: Ensure logo appears correctly throughout
- Color compliance: Confirm all colors match your established palette
- Typography review: Check for font consistency across all text elements
- Layout alignment: Verify all slides follow your layout principles
- Comparison: Place your slides alongside existing brand materials to ensure harmony
When in Doubt: Best Practices
If you’re still uncertain about brand elements:
- Simplicity over complexity: When uncertain, choose cleaner, simpler design solutions
- Research competitors: See how similar companies in your industry present themselves
- Ask questions: Reach out to colleagues who might have institutional knowledge
- Start small: Begin with a minimal color palette and design system, then expand
- Document everything: Create your own resource as you make decisions
Conclusion
Brand consistency doesn’t require elaborate guidelines—just thoughtful attention to detail and systematic application of visual elements. The purpose is just not to create beautiful slides but make it engaging. By following this checklist, you’ll design presentations that feel cohesive, professional, and authentically aligned with your brand, even without formal guidelines to follow. You can select any affordable PPT design agency for this job as it is basic for all agencies and they all follow this philosophy
