What goes in a set of brand guidelines.
The 8 sections a workable guidelines document needs, what to write in each one, and the mistake to watch for in it.
Brand guidelines are the written rules that let someone who wasn’t in the room apply your brand correctly.
A workable set covers 8 sections: overview, logo system, colour, typography, imagery, voice and tone, applications, and correct and incorrect use.
This page sets out what belongs in each one, and the mistake to watch for in it, in enough detail to write the document yourself.
It’s a structure guide you can follow section by section.
The 8 sections
1. Brand overview
Gives everyone who opens the document the context they need before they start making decisions about artwork.
What to write: A paragraph on what the business does and who it's for. A short positioning statement. Between 3 and 5 values, written as behaviours rather than adjectives, so they can be applied.
Watch for: Writing a mission statement nobody can act on. A line belongs in the guidelines when it helps someone choose between 2 options.
2. Logo system
The asset used most. This section keeps it intact when other people apply it.
What to write: The primary logo plus every approved variation (horizontal, stacked, mark only, single-colour, reversed). Clear space expressed as a proportion of the logo itself, not in millimetres. Minimum size for print and for screen. Where each variation is used.
Watch for: Supplying a single file. A reversed version is what keeps the logo readable on a dark background.
3. Colour palette
Colour drifts easily, because every tool the business uses has its own colour picker.
What to write: Primary, secondary and accent colours with HEX for screen, RGB for digital artwork, CMYK for print and a Pantone reference where the brand is printed on materials that need matching. Rules for which colour dominates and which are accents.
Watch for: Listing HEX codes only. CMYK and Pantone values are what keep the printed colour matching the screen.
4. Typography
Type carries a lot of the brand's character, and it's the part easiest to swap for whoever is in a hurry.
What to write: Heading and body typefaces, the weights actually in use, and the licence position for each (including web font licensing). A hierarchy from H1 down to caption with sizes and line heights. A documented fallback for anyone without the licensed font.
Watch for: Naming a font nobody outside the design file has a licence for. Name the fallback in the document and the substitution stays controlled.
5. Imagery and photography
Businesses can share a logo style and still look nothing alike, because of the pictures they choose.
What to write: The subject matter that's on-brand and the subject matter that isn't. Treatment: colour grade, contrast, whether people look at camera. Cropping rules. Where stock is acceptable and where it isn't.
Watch for: Leaving this section out. It's the one that keeps the photography consistent.
6. Voice and tone
The written half of the brand. It governs far more surface area than the logo does: emails, quotes, invoices, social posts, signage copy.
What to write: Pick 3 or 4 tone attributes and give a short do-and-don't example under each. Vocabulary the brand uses and words it avoids. How the tone shifts between a sales page and a service update. A worked before-and-after rewrite of 1 real sentence.
Watch for: Listing adjectives with no examples. A line like “friendly but professional” means something different to every person who reads it.
7. Applications
Shows the system working rather than describing it, which is the part people copy from.
What to write: The brand applied to the things this business genuinely produces: business card, email signature, invoice, social profile, vehicle, uniform, signage. Real examples beat mockups of items you will never print.
Watch for: Filling the section with impressive applications the business never produces. A cafe's examples are a menu and a shopfront.
8. Correct and incorrect use
Correct and incorrect use of the logo, colours and type side by side, so it reads at a glance.
What to write: Side-by-side correct and incorrect examples for the failures you can already predict: stretching the logo, recolouring it, adding effects, placing it on a busy photo, retyping the wordmark in a different font.
Watch for: Writing the rules as prose. This section works when it can be understood at a glance without reading.
How to turn this outline into a document
- Create the document in whatever tool your business already uses. The best format is the one your staff can open without asking for access.
- Use the 8 headings above in that order. It moves from why, to the marks, to the rules, to the proof, which is the order a reader needs them in.
- Fill each section with your real assets: actual files, actual colour values, actual font names and licences. Real content is what makes people trust the document and apply it correctly.
- Add screenshots of the brand on real material you have produced. This is the part people copy from.
- Put a version number and a date on the front page, and store it where the current version is obvious. A single current copy keeps everyone working from the same rules.
- Review it whenever the brand changes, and otherwise once a year.
How long should it be?
A sole trader can cover all 8 sections properly in 6 to 10 pages. A business with several people producing artwork usually needs 20 to 30, because the applications and correct-and-incorrect sections carry more weight. The measure is whether a contractor you’ve never met can open it and produce something correct without asking a question.
What the structure guide needs from you first
It works from assets you already have.
Section 2 documents the logo as vector artwork with single-colour and reversed versions, so those files come first.
Section 3 needs colour values set for print and screen, beyond a HEX code someone liked.
Guidelines record decisions, so the decisions come first.
That’s the practical order of work: settle the identity first through brand design, then write the rules that keep it intact. If you’re documenting a brand that’s about to change anyway, a brand refresh comes first and the guidelines follow it. Where the guidelines are being written so that a third party can produce collateral without supervision, that collateral is graphic design work and worth scoping at the same time.
Having them written for you
A set of brand guidelines I write for you differs from a self-built one in 2 ways: the rules are specific to your brand, and the document shows the brand working as well as describing it.
Brand guidelines on their own start from $500+GST.
If you want that priced against your actual situation, send the brief through the quote form, or call me on 0403 454 199, and I’ll quote on the real scope.
The cost calculator shows how a guidelines document sits against the rest of a project.
Frequently Asked Questions
At minimum: a brand overview, the logo system with every approved variation and its usage rules, the colour palette in all the formats you'll actually need, typography with a licence note, imagery direction, voice and tone, real-world applications, and a clear correct-and-incorrect section.
The 8 sections set out on this page cover that.
Anything beyond it is useful but optional.
It's the structure written out in full, with what belongs in each section and the mistake to watch for in it.
You build the document in whatever tool your business already uses, which is also the tool your staff can open without asking anyone for access.
A short version is still worth having.
Written down, your colour values and type choices stop drifting between the tools you use, and you stop re-deciding the same things.
The moment anyone else touches the brand, whether that's a contractor, a printer or a first employee, the document becomes essential.
When the cost of inconsistency is higher than the cost of the document.
That usually means several people producing artwork, more than 1 location, franchise or reseller use, or a brand being handed to a printer and a sign fabricator at the same time.
Written for you, the rules are specific to your brand and show it working.
Brand guidelines on their own start from $500+GST.
Keep exploring
Brand guidelines
What a professionally written guidelines document involves and when it earns its keep.
Branding cost calculator
See a range from my starting prices for a project that includes a guidelines document.
Brand audit checklist
Score 12 criteria to find out where your brand is already drifting.
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