Ece recently posted a photo of her next to something she loves, and all I could think about was how on-brand it was for her and all her community efforts.
Ece loves yellow. And now when I see something that is very yellow I think of Ece.
Branding in community isn’t a perfect logo, photos or typeface. It is about sharing what we love and the people around us embracing it.
Rosieland’s branding is about nature and weather things. My original logo was a cloud, but when I added a rainbow it felt more alive. It felt like I could play a bit more. It brought spark and colour. I also introduced thunder, snow, and rain. It helped my efforts stand out and also smile along the way.
Community branding makes decision making easier.
What coasters and decoration did I get for our Rosieland Retreat? They had to have rainbows, of course. Any style of rainbow was fine. It wasn’t about the perfectly style and on-brand rainbow, it was more about rainbows that were ethical and eco-friendly.
What did I call the “community” part of Rosieland? Glitter. Because it aligned with shingy and rainbow things I had been joking about. It also sounds a bit like ‘Twitter’, so there’s that. 🤷🏻♀️
Community branding is emergent. We can encourage things and build upon what makes us all feel good. It’s not about perfect pixels nor some perfect strategy, it’s more about creative community contribution.
Branding evolves over time too. Whilst Rosieland has weather fun, I can fully imagine a whole ‘land’ of fun things to play upon. I envision a map, like Disneyland. I also would love to have fun creating passport that you could get stamps on.
Some of this may never happen, but to me, it makes community creative and playful. It enables an evolution of how we think and to shine light on who we are.
We can go further. Branding is not just what we see, it is what we feel. The words and images we choose impact who we are too. The way we treat people. The who we choose to work with. The projects we choose to work on. The people we invite to as contributors or speakers.
Community branding is not just about presentation, it’s so much more than that.
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