How to Find A Font for Your Brand: Step-by-Step Guide
Selecting fonts for personal use is easy and fun, but when it comes to choosing fonts for a brand, it feels overwhelming. Maybe because fonts can add personality to your brand, set a visual hierarchy, and help you fix the tone of your brand. Also, using the wrong or unsuitable fonts can give a bad impression if you are not careful. Thus, using the right brand fonts is Important. If you don’t know how to find a font for your brand, here is a simple step-by-step guide for you!
When you start finding the font for your brand, it may seem like a hard nut to crack, especially if you have no design experience. This guide will help you find the right fonts for your brand, but first, let’s understand why it is important to choose the right fonts for your brand.
Why Do You Need the Right Fonts for Your Brand?
We all know that the Right fonts are crucial for better content engagement, but many have doubts about whether the brand needs to consider the fonts as well. Does it matter? Yes, the fonts do matter for brands. For instance, you may think a cute, fancy font will show your brand in a friendly manner and increase your popularity and appeal, which might be possible. However, in most cases, using a font without research and customer consideration can drive off potential customers, as it can make you seem unprofessional.
Furthermore, choosing unsuitable fonts that do not reflect your brand and vision can form a wrong impression and repulse your target audience. Therefore, it becomes essential to use the Right font, as it can help polish your brand visuals and strengthen your marketing. Besides, using consistent fonts can add an immersive visual tone and mesmerize, presenting your brand within your niche.
Things You Should Consider While Choosing a Font for Your Brand
When selecting a font, you should consider things like its purpose, legibility, visual impact, etc. Factors such as intended use case, personal branding, and message tone also play a crucial role, so take them into consideration as well. To give you a clear idea, let’s discuss this in detail-
Purpose and Message
Intended Use: Is the font for body text, headlines, logos, or something else?
Brand Identity: Does the font align with the brand’s personality and message?
The Tone of the Message: Does the font convey the desired emotional impact?
Legibility and Usability
X-Height: A high x-height (the height of lowercase letters like “x”) is Important for readability, especially at smaller sizes.
Distinguishing Glyphs: Distinctive glyphs (the shapes of letters) make the font easier to read.
Kerning and Tracking: Proper kerning (space between letters) and tracking (space between words) are also crucial for readability.
Font Functionality
Language Support: You should also consider whether the font supports the necessary languages and special characters.
Font Files: Are the font files reliable and consistent across different systems?
Weights and Styles: Does the font family offer a range of weights (bold, medium, regular) and styles (italics, condensed) for different applications?
File Size: Minimize file size for optimal performance on websites and apps.
Visual Impact
Personality: Does the font have a distinct personality that enhances the design?
Harmony and Consistency: Does the font work well with other elements in the design (e.g., images, colors) and is consistent across different mediums and platforms?
How to Find the Right Font for the Brand?
To choose a font suitable for your brand, you need to do thorough research before and after selecting the font while considering the things and factors that we have mentioned above. Here is a step-by-step guide for you on how to find a suitable font for your brand.
1. Determine Your Brand Identity
First, you need to define your brand identity or personality to find the most suitable font for its logo and content. For this, you can consider brand dimensions and personality traits like sincerity, competence, excitement, etc. You can write down 3-5 words that best describe your brand. Based on your brand personality, look for fonts that communicate your company’s tone nonverbally.
2. Think About Licensing and Budget
You may already be aware that some fonts, such as Google fonts, are free, and others are licensed for a fee. Thus, you should have an understanding of font licenses. You should choose fonts that fit your budget; consider the cost of fonts, especially if you plan to use them across multiple platforms.
3. Choose Fonts that Reflect Your Personality
Once you have defined your brand personality and decided on a font budget, it is time to select fonts that reflect that personality while ensuring legibility and readability across various platforms. The selected font should match your brand personality with the typeface. For example, an “authoritative” brand might choose a transitional serif, while a “quirky” brand might consider a script font.
Most brands use fonts from common categories such as serif, sans-serif, script, etc. You can also use them and add a contrast element, like pairing a sans-serif with a serif for a balance of modern and traditional. However, you should limit the types of fonts to 2-3 fonts, including a primary font for the logo and headings, and a secondary font for the body copy.
4. Try Different Font Pairing
Always start with a primary font as it will be used for the logo and important headings. Give your time and effort to find the most suitable primary font. As for the secondary font, it should complement the primary font and be used for the body copy. You can also add an accent or custom font if you like, not mandatory though. You can use a display or a handwritten font sparingly for emphasis.
5. Ensure Legibility and Readability
After deciding on a font, it is time to test its functionality and reliability. You should test the selected font on various platforms to ensure it works well on websites, print materials, and mobile devices. Always prioritize readability, so check that your selected fonts are easy to read, especially for body copy. Besides, you should also test font loading speed, as heavier fonts can slow down websites. So, try selecting lightweight or balanced fonts that are optimized for performance.
Conclusion:
The right fonts are a crucial aspect of branding, and individuals and businesses often have personal preferences regarding typefaces. However, due to the availability of many font options, it is not uncommon for new brands and individuals to choose fonts that are either unprofessional or excessively flashy, which may lead to building a negative reputation.
Besides, it is essential to avoid hastily selecting a font based solely on personal affinity. Instead, you must objectively evaluate whether a particular typeface aligns with the image and values of your business or brand. On the other hand, this does not imply that you forgot aesthetic appeal in favor of professionalism; rather, a harmonious balance between the two is Important.