Your company likely has a brand style guide complete with fonts, colors, logos and more that you share with various creative teams. This keeps your visual brand consistent no matter the channel, agency, team or vendor. Brand books have been the standard for years, but with increasing demand for video from a wider range of requesters, are you doing all you can to keep your videos on brand?

We hear all the time about sales uploading an entirely off-brand video to YouTube, or an intern posting something out of character to Instagram Reels. If you’re looking to keep your videos in line, here’s how to get started creating video brand guidelines that align with your corporate brand book.

What elements should my company include in our video style guide?

A comprehensive video guide covers an extensive list of elements from fonts, to use cases, to video sizes. It can be overwhelming to pull it all together so let’s start with a few key elements.

• Intro and outro: these may vary by use case or channel.

• Lower thirds: name, title, and relevant information of speaker on screen.

• Thumbnail template: how someone identifies an online video as yours.

• Transition types: smooth and modern (together we can prevent star wipes).

From there, variations of brand guidelines can be created for different types of videos.

How does the style guide work? What more should it include?

Your video style guide is essentially a tool that includes project files as editable templates plus individual elements so anyone can easily create on-brand videos. It should also include instructions that walk you through each element like where to place lower thirds in an internal context. Guidelines should be provided for videos with different aspect ratios, channels, and use cases.

Tips:

• You need to have a basic brand style guide before you can start your video style guide.

• Be prepared to spend some time—this isn’t something you can complete in a day.

• Be open and collaborative with your colleagues to align on the best look for video elements.

What are the benefits of a video style guide?

Style guides ensure that no matter who works on your videos, all of the pieces will fit together and represent your brand consistently. An effective style guide also takes the pressure off formatting, so you can stop worrying about the packaging and focus on the content, messaging and overall experience of your videos. And finally, it provides a structure that can enable an efficient approval process, helping you get the work done faster.

Lightswitch Video is an IHAF member company, helping in-house agencies produce high-quality videos anywhere in the world. We also work with teams like yours to establish video brand guidelines. Want help developing your next video? Contact us.