Visual Continuity Archives -

Awhile ago I wrote a blog post about the importance of visual continuity. In “Visual Continuity in Print & Digital” I said “When designing creative executions, visual continuity is key – especially in today’s media cluttered world.” I still believe that is true, but sometimes change is good for a company as well.

In the post I talked about the Pepsi Refresh Project. Another example is Target. They have been very successful and they have kept the same red logo and target symbol on white backdrops for a long time. This is an equation for success and a great example of visual continuity. But this made me think of a question. Can a brand be successful without visual continuity?

The one brand that immediately came to mind is Burton Snowboards. The only consistency about Burton’s visual design has been its inconsistency. Since 1977 the company has had a lot of different logos. How many? They basically have totally redesigned their logos – yes multiple logos – every year. See the picture for a retrospective. In the early 1990s Burton Snowboard rarely used the same logo twice in their print ads.

Is this a smart move? A SAP case study on Burton describes the company’s success coming from how they are able to remain as nimble as their riders. The business is unique because they have professional athletes who drive the product development process and have a tremendous amount of input into the look, feel, and functionality of the product lines. They also take rider feedback to heart — whether the comments come from a pro rider, a customer email, or a random snowboarder the company president runs into on the mountain. Being a rider-driven company, the business has to be dynamic and adaptable.

Burton is playing in an ever changing snowboarding, surfing and skate culture that thrives on fads and trends. So I would say it is okay for their visually identity to change rapidly with the times. The other example is Jones Soda.

For years Jones Soda has had fans upload their photos to be voted on and possibly featured on the company’s ever changing soda labels. I uploaded a photo once, but never made it to the label. Have you ever send in a photo to a brand to be featured in their marketing? Can you think of another example of a successful brand that has thrived by consistently changing their visual identity?

When designing creative executions, visual continuity is key – especially in today’s media cluttered world. Alex White in his book The Elements of Graphic Design says the goal of graphic design is to achieve visual unity or harmony. In an individual piece this applies to the organization of all the parts into a unified whole. All the parts no matter how different must be reconciled so they support each other. This also applies to individual pieces in a campaign. White puts it another way when saying that the “elements must work together with the greatest interest to the reader and with the least resistance from the reader.

I believe maintaining that visually continuity is especially challenging between traditional advertising mediums and the expansion of new digital forms. But I think I found an example of a brand that is doing it very well. I once again point to the Pepsi refresh project.

This was a brilliant integrated campaign built on a social media strategy but they use many traditional and non-traditional forms of marketing. And as I think you can see in picture below the visual elements of the campaign are all tied together well.

What you should notice in the examples is the design of the campaign is very simple and brilliant because it starts with the product – package design. From there they pull colors and the logo to make a simple and very appealing design in magazines/print ads, billboards, microsite, blog, Twitter, YouTube and a toolkit brochure.

Do you think it is too simple or is that where the brilliance comes? Even across traditional and digital mediums Pepsi is achieving harmonious, unified design.

Digital unity is so important these days that it has literally changed the way we work. The traditional creative team has expanded from a copywriter and art director to include a web designer as well. Throw in a PR person and you’ve got a real integrated marketing team.

Visual Continuity

Visual Continuity: Is It Always A Good Strategy?

Visual Continuity in Print And Digital