Before you pay anyone to build your brand, get to know your future customers first. Let’s be real for a minute. If you’re about to drop a stack of cash on a logo or a branding package without talking to your customers first—stop right there. Seriously. There’s a reason so many businesses miss the mark with their branding: they create what they think looks good instead of what their customers actually connect with.

Your brand isn’t about you—it’s about them.

Start with your customers

Before you even think about colors, fonts, or logos, you need to think a few things, like who is your customer, what do they like, what do they need to hear and how can you build a brand that they see themselves represented in.

It’s less about creating something that looks cool or trendy and more about designing something that feels familiar and meaningful to them. The goal isn’t to create a brand that reflects just you—it’s to create a brand that reflects how your customers want to feel when they engage with you.

Step 1: Start with a vibe

Before you talk to customers, figure out what you’re putting out there. Start with a mood board that reflects the vibe you want to give off. If you had to visually describe your business, what would it feel like? How do you want people to see you? And whatever you do—don’t fake it. If you’re a budget bathroom company, don’t fill it with luxury bathrooms. If you’re a small business, don’t try to look like a big international brand. If you’re all about warmth and connection, don’t build a cold, corporate identity just because it looks “professional.” And if you’re not feeling very creative—that’s okay. Just start. Everyone has creativity in them, but judgment tends to get in the way. Treat this as a messy first draft—it’s not about being perfect. It’s about creating something you can put in front of your customers to test and build from.

Step 2: Think about your ideal customer

There’s a lot of work ahead when it comes to understanding your ideal customer, but this is just the beginning of building your business and brand. Large businesses and marketing teams dive deep into this by developing detailed personas, but we prefer to go even deeper with behavioral archetypes. This means understanding what your customers think, feel, and what drives them. And remember, this information isn’t for pushing inauthentic sales—it's about creating a business that genuinely helps and contributes to people’s needs. If your goal is quick, spammy sales, that’s not the direction we’re going. These are short-term fixes that won’t build a real, lasting brand or business. But for now, as we explore your brand, just have fun with it. Think about who your customer is, what their needs are, what are they feeling, what is it you are doing that can help them, and how —it’s enough to get you started and begin reaching out to test your ideas with a few potential customers.

Step 3: Test it with real customers (not just family and friends)

Now, find at least six of these customers. If you’re really struggling, the bare minimum is three. Remember—not your friends, not your partner—real customers. And not just a quick “What do you think?”—you need to dig deeper. You do this by doing what we call a ‘Customer Interview.’ You’ll create some questions to get their opinions with a real sense of curiosity to learn who your customers are. Using what you created in Step 1, you will show them and explore how they feel when they see it. What does it remind them of? Don’t tell them what you do—can they guess? Then, maybe explain what you do or what you want your brand to feel like, and ask if what you’re sharing matches what they’re expecting.

Here’s the tricky part: If you’re the founder, people will be hesitant to give you honest feedback. Even if you tell them to “be brutal,” most people don’t want to hurt your feelings. That’s why it’s often better to have someone else (like us) handle this process. We create a space where customers can be honest without worrying about upsetting you. You find out what you really need to know so you don’t go down a path that isn’t going to attract customers in the end.

You can also do this with a small group of people, also called a focus group. This can be a bit more challenging as people feed off each other.e honesty 1:1. In saying that it can be nice to invite people over, have a cuppa and facilitate a group. Do what feels best, and maybe do a bit of both!

Step 4: Refine and align

Once you’ve gathered feedback, you’ll start to see patterns. Maybe your colors are off, or the vibe feels too formal for the type of customer you’re attracting. Or maybe you’ll realise that the name you love doesn’t actually make sense to anyone else. That’s the point—you’re learning what works before you commit to printing business cards and setting up a website. This is the step most brand agencies skip. They’ll create a logo, make you a shiny deck, and hand it over—but they rarely test it with real people first. That’s how you end up with a brand that looks amazing on paper but doesn’t resonate with the people who are supposed to buy from you. At this point you can jump into any program that is easy to use, and start choosing colours, images, fonts and designing a logo that will align with you, but also your customers. There are different programs out there that you can use yourself to do this, or alternatively, we can use those same tools, teach you to use them and do it for you.

Step Four: Build with confidence

Once you’ve got feedback and refined the direction, you can confidently move forward with creating your brand identity and presence:
Business name
Logo
Colors and fonts
Overall brand vibe
Brand guidelines

This process doesn’t need to be expensive or complicated. If you’re working with a small budget, you can absolutely do this yourself with the right tools and a bit of guidance. But the key is that customer insight comes before the design work—not after. Even if you do decide to invest in using a branding expert or agency, don’t invest any money unless you do this research. Ever!

Why this matters

At the end of the day, your brand isn’t about looking pretty—it’s about building trust. When your brand reflects how your customers feel and what they need, they’ll connect with it on a deeper level. That’s how you create customers that come back—not just one-time buyers. So before you hand over any money to a designer, do the work. Talk to your customers. Understand them. And build a brand that feels like them.