How to Create a Brand Mood Board
Mood boards are a great way to bring to life your brand positioning in a compelling way. They telegraph what a brand is about. They convey your brand character in a way that words alone cannot. In essence, mood boards elevate your brand story.
Mood boards are useful in many areas of life. One time I was helping a friend gather inspiration for her upcoming wedding. She had an idea of the kind of wedding she wanted, but was feeling overwhelmed by the myriad of choices she had and the looming decisions she had to make. Where should she have her wedding? What type of food should she serve? What color will the bridesmaid's dress be? What kind of flowers? I suggested that she do a mood board to capture the essence of her event. When she created her mood board, it became clear that she wanted a wedding that felt more like a sophisticated, intimate dinner party with friends. Her mood board was instrumental in helping her create the perfect atmosphere for this important event and throw a wedding that reflected her personal style.
Mood boards are useful because I believe that every brand has a character. In a previous post about Brand Character, I wrote about the importance of bringing your brand to life with descriptive words and images. A mood board can help marketers visualize a brand's positioning and, as in my friend's case, it can even help solidify and further define a brand and its point of view.
Here are some tips on how to create a brand mood board:
Pick images that express the feeling your brand wants to convey. Find images that evoke an emotion or a mood. If you are a family brand and togetherness is one of your brand values, use images that convey the feeling that happens when families get together. It could be a family traveling together in a car or a family snuggling under blankets watching a fireworks show. Though you might have limitations due to the stock photos you have access too, do your best to pick images that are realistic, and not too posed or not too perfect. Your images also don’t have to be literal. For example, if you want to convey that your brand is highly accurate or engineered, you may want to use images of gears. If you use abstract images, just make sure the average person can tell what the image is.
Use color to help set a mood. Your brand may have a color palette for its logo and other communications. But even if you don't have a brand style guide, you should use color to communicate your brand's tone. If your brand is optimistic and playful, like Gymboree, your mood board will have vibrant and bright colors. If your brand is seductive and understated, like Calvin Klein, then perhaps the mood board will be in black and white or have strong silhouettes. If it’s feminine, use soft hues and textures. Whatever your brand character is, use color to help tell your story.
Play with words and fonts to convey your brand message. For brand mood boards that I test with consumers, the brand imagery will also be accompanied with a statement about what the brand means. This can be a short statement that encapsulates the brand positioning, or it could be a tag line. Whatever words you use to capture the essence of your brand, use fonts that are encapsulate the feeling of the words. If your brand is playful – then a kid-like font is appropriate. If it’s modern – then a sans-serif font like Helvetica Neue Light or TW Cent MT is appropriate. If it’s romantic or whimsical, try a script font. Experiment with different size fonts and the leading of your words as well. Make sure the words are legible and add dimension to the words you’ve used to describe your brand.
Hire a designer to help you lay out the imagery. Designers are experts at visual expression and visual storytelling. They’ve been schooled on how to layout words and images in a way that communicates the relative importance of each. They understand how images and words are interpreted and processed by the brain. Designers also have computer skills that are far more comprehensive than the average marketer. If you want a customized look to your mood board, consider hiring a designer. They can add texture, dimension and that 'extra something' will make your mood boards really stand out.
Here's an example of a mood board I created for a fictitious brand - Jake's Boots. I made it in under 10 minutes using a stock template and stock images from Canva.com.
So how do you use mood boards? Mood boards are a great way to articulate your brand and its essence for both new and existing brands. Sometimes, when I am working to reposition a brand or to position a new brand, I might write several concepts to describe the positioning of a brand and create a mood board that’s specific to each positioning. Then I test the concepts and the mood board with consumers. I will usually first expose the concept to the consumer and have an in depth conversation about the positioning. I’d ask consumers to communicate the main idea and then dissect the components of the brand statement – like does the benefit resonate, is it believable, and so on. Then I expose the mood board to see if the visualization fits the positioning and if the emotional aspects of the brand are conveyed in the images.
I typically test concepts and mood boards separately so consumers don't get hung up on the visuals. There are several reasons why you should consider this approach. Some images can be polarizing and sometimes people get stuck on an image and reject the idea because of that image. Here are some common pitfalls that can be avoided if you test the boards and the concepts separately.
The images don't fit with the brand positioning. Sometimes consumers might reject the brand positioning if your words and the images don’t match. I was working on the repositioning of a liquor brand that’s been around for years, but was considered old-fashioned. We tested three concepts monadically in a quantitative test, exposing the concept first and then following up with the visuals. While all of the concepts did well, one of the positioning concepts had stronger diagnostic test results. What was interesting is that once the mood board was shown, the concept idea plummeted. The imagery for the brand was too juvenile and consumers thought the brand was more sophisticated. Given that we tested the concept and mood board separately, we knew we just had to tweak the images to make them more appealing. If we had tested the copy alongside the imagery, the positioning would not have been given a fair shot because the imagery wasn’t right.
The product design or assortment is not liked. Sometimes the product execution that’s used on a mood board can be polarizing. I once worked on an innovation project for a new-to-the-world jewelry brand. The designers did a beautiful job of creating compelling brand imagery boards that brought to life the positioning areas that we developed for testing. Included on those boards were examples of the type of jewelry that could be created as part of this new brand launch. When the images were shown together with the brand concepts in focus groups, it was hard to get a read on what consumers really thought of the idea. The women just kept pointing to which pieces of jewelry and designs they liked under each line. The products were getting in the way of the positioning discussion. Once we decided to show the concepts separately from the mood board, we got a cleaner read on each area and knew how to refine each of the concepts based on their feedback. This is particularly true for technology and fashion brands where the design or the innovation are unique, but it's also true for many other new products.
After you’ve tested and refined your concept and mood board with consumers, its time then to translate it to something inspiring for your brand ambassadors. There are many ways to do this. You could create a brand book that captures the brand's positioning and imagery. You could pick out a great soundtrack to go along with your brand and create a video that brings the brand to life. If you don’t have a big budget, you can DIY a brand video in PowerPoint. Break down the concept or your brand strategy into separate phrases, and lay them out on different slides. Then use imagery from your mood board and other related images, and lay them out with your words. You can add music to your PowerPoint slide and then put the presentation in slide show mode. Voila, you have a brand video.
While mood boards are great tools to help you visualize your brand’s message and its character, they are also great tools to use in life as well as in business. I use them when I am stuck on a creative challenge – like planning an event or designing a room. But more consistently, I use mood boards at the start of every year. I create a vision board of what I want to invite into my life during the year. The collage usually starts with a theme and then it’s peppered with images and words. It helps me focus on my intentions for the year. Try it out for size! It’s a great way to practice for when you need to make your brand mood board. And it will help you get one step closer to your own goals for the new year too.