MY GO TO BRAND & WEB DESIGN TOOLS
Disclosure: Some of the links in this post are “affiliate links”. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission, which helps me continue to bring you valuable content. All reviews reflect my honest opinion, regardless of whether an affiliate relationship is in place or not.
Branding and web design can be made a lot simpler, when you know where to find the tools that can help you along the way. That’s why I’ve put together a list of my favourite branding and web design tools, to help you build a coherent brand identity and a website that converts!
MY GO TO BRAND AND WEB DESIGN TOOLS
1 | BOOKS
How to Style Your Brand by Fiona Humberstone – This book will have you falling in love with branding. If you have little to no knowledge of branding, this book will open your eyes to a whole new world, you will start to look at everything differently and if you are caught up in brand confusion, things will really start to come together after reading this book. If you are ready to take on the challenge of DIY branding this book is not to be missed – it is one of the best brand design tools you will find! Fiona covers branding basics, planning and creating your vision, designing your logo and much more.
Why Fonts Matter. by Sarah Hyndman – This book is a fun read and a great design tool if you are interested in typography. Similarly to ‘How to Style Your Brand’, this book is very eye-opening and will make you see fonts in a completely different way. A worthwhile read if you are interested in how fonts can evoke emotion and what your favourite fonts reveal about your personality.
The Beginner’s Guide to Colour Psychology by Angela Wright – One of my favourite books, if not my favourite. This book explores Colour Psychology in depth, with a particular focus on the Four Seasons Theory of Colour. A real eye-opener (of course… I love Colour Psychology). If this is an area of interest for you, you will not want to put this book down. Angela covers the biological basis for our physiological responses to colour and why our colour choices really do matter. The book also covers personal colour styling as well as using colour in business. A must read in the world of Colour Psychology.
The Non-Designer’s Design Book – Can I say another eye-opener? But no, honestly this book completely strips design back to basics, starting with the four main design principles: proximity, alignment, repetition and contrast. An amazing design tool for beginners. Once you understand these basic design principles, you will start to internally criticise or commend every piece of design work you see thereafter. Ever wondered how your fellow entrepreneurs have designed such perfect looking business cards? Or why their marketing materials always look amazing? This book explains it all. This book also covers colour and collateral design in detail, so well worth reading if you are interested in DIY’ing your own brand!
2 | BLOGS
Elegant Themes – Elegant Themes are the creator of Divi (my favourite WordPress theme). Whilst many of their blog posts cover how to use Divi, they also post tutorials and guidance on popular plugins and WordPress in general.
Mott & Mallow – Can I recommend my own blog? My goal is to inform female entrepreneurs about the world of branding and web design, so that they can be confident that they are making the right decisions. Over the coming months my goal is to answer your questions and give honest objective advice to help you make the right decisions at such an important time in your business. For this reason, I am always eager to find out what you would like to hear more about, so please email hello@mottandmallow.com with any suggestions and we will schedule these in for future content creation
HubSpot – HubSpot have a really excellent blog for all things marketing. They even have their own free Inbound Marketing course which is a really valuable tool, if you want to understand more about digital marketing, content marketing and SEO.
3 | FACEBOOK GROUPS
Brand Savvy Startups – Mott & Mallow’s own Facebook group. This group is designed to help female entrepreneurs make informed decisions when it comes to branding and web design. The Brand Savvy Startups Facebook group operates to alleviate brand confusion and help business owners gain clarity in the world of DIY brand and web design, whilst being supported by other likeminded entrepreneurs. Home to the #7daystobrandsavvy challenge and hub of brand brilliance.
The Tech Angel Club – A group of likeminded female entrepreneurs who are looking to launch their businesses online. From social media marketing to web design, this group is great for startup businesses and long-term business owners alike. Kelly Cairns (group owner) runs challenges every once in a while, such as the #iheartfblivechallenge to help female entrepreneurs get comfortable with going live in Facebook groups.
4 | FONTS
Google Fonts – A good selection of fonts that can be used for free for personal and commercial use.
DaFont – A HUGE selection of fonts. Probably my favourite website for free fonts. Licencing options do vary, so you should check each font individually.
Font Squirrel – Another huge directory of fonts. Similarly to ‘DaFont’ licencing options can vary so be sure to check each font individually.
Creative Market – Probably the most sophisticated fonts out there, Creative Market sell premium fonts only. These can be perfect if you are looking for a font to use for your logo, as you will find something completely unique and identifiable here.
5 | COLOUR PALETTE
Design-Seeds – Beautiful pre-made colour palettes, perfect for a bit of inspiration. Colour palettes can even be filtered by hue or by season, which is great for those interested in Colour Psychology.
Coolors – A simple website for designing a custom colour palette. Hit the space bar to generate a colour palette at random, lock in colours and randomise the rest or create your own colour palette completely from scratch.
Adobe Colour Wheel – A little bit more technical, but a really nifty tool if you are trying to identify complementary colours, or colour triads. Adobe also have an ‘Explore’ section where you can scroll through tons of pre-made palettes for inspiration.
6 | GRAPHIC DESIGN
Canva – Canva is a great tool for inspiration when designing your logo, social media graphics, business cards etc. However, do be aware that Canva is not capable of producing vector graphics, which can be resized without losing quality. Therefore it is advisable to work with a designer to convert your design into vector format, especially for collaterals like your logo where you are likely to need this resizing.
Affinity Designer – This is the best tool I have found this year. Affinity Designer is a graphic design programme, similar to that of Adobe Illustrator, BUT there is no monthly fee and a one-off cost of about £50. You absolutely cannot go wrong with this product, if you are looking for a graphic design tool that is a bit more sophisticated than Canva. I use Affinity to design all of my graphics, logos, brand boards etc. Serif (owner of Affinity Designer) are due to release their version of InDesign next year and I cannot wait.
A FINAL NOTE
So there you have it – my favourite, go to brand and web design tools. What are your favourite tools? Can you recommend any tools that you could not live without?
