How Do Mood Boards Fit Into Our Branding Process?

All of us here at The Mug love a good mood board! A mood board is a place to cultivate ideas and form a “theme” of sorts. 

We don’t find it necessary to get technical about what is or is not a mood board, if you can use it to formulate your ideas – let’s call it a mood board! Whether you use Pinterest, Canva, Adobe, or old-school paper, in our book it’s not really about what you use, it’s about how you use it. 

So, how do we use a mood board?

When we work with a new branding client, we need to determine what kind of look we’re going for. Typically, we will have several points of contact with our clients prior to creating a mood board. We speak with clients on a design call and we have them take a quick branding questionnaire to give us a bit of direction. We use this to determine what type of *vibe* or feeling the client would like. 

With a bit of guidance, we can set forth to curate a couple of mood boards that can give the client a visual of the direction we’ve taken based on our previous discussions.

What is included in a mood board?

There is really no limit to what could be included within a mood board, however, ours are typically in a digital format. 

We use a mood board to showcase color schemes, photographs, textures, and text that we think evoke a certain brand expression for the client to see. We may include icons, inspiration, and ideas. 

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How do we go about creating a mood board?

Once we’ve gathered enough information from our conversations with our client, we’ll move forward to do some research.

We want to know who is out there doing what our clients are doing, how can our clients stand out among the crowd, and what is their target audience looking for. 

Once we feel that we have enough information, we can begin gathering assets (photos, text, graphics, etc) to put together a mood board that will represent our inspiration and game plan for their brand. 

What does a mood board do for me (the client)? 

Once we create a mood board – or two – we consult with our client once again. We use the mood board to give you a visual representation of the direction we plan to take your brand. We can use this as a way to further develop our ideas. Whether eliminating colors or refining imagery, we can use a mood board to gain clarity along the way of the branding process. Cultivating a mood board to your liking gives a visual of the clear goals we have for your brand as a team, ensuring that we’re all on the same page during the design process.

Interested in working with us to brand your business? Contact us to work together! We’d love to create a mood board for your business as we work to develop unique and strategic branding.