No matter how small your business is, design is important. Sleek and clear design will get your company noticed but, more importantly, it will make your documents easy to read. A consistent brand identity is essential for ensuring customer loyalty and increasing your business.

So how do you go about creating a brand identity? By consulting with your staff or company designers you can initially gain and idea of how they perceive the company and how they think it should be perceived. Some people's visions can differ greatly so this can be a positive way of looking at your company from a different perspective. Once the ideas have been collated then they need to be passed onto your designer so that they can produce some design proofs.

If you do not have a designated graphic designer in your company then it is a good idea to commission an external designer to create letterheads and style guidelines that incorporate your company's logo and are evocative of its ethos. Collaboratively, between you and your designer you can create an image that you think best represents your company. Once you have received your finished designs then you will need to distribute the new style guidelines and accepted image policies to your staff to ensure that each correspondence with customer or stakeholder is consistent and strong.

Imagery can have a significant effect on corporate documents. If you carelessly use clipart in your corporate documents then it risks looking unprofessional. This is the same with hand drawn features or flowcharts. Consider investing in software that can produce professional looking diagrams with minimal fuss.

Commissioning an illustrator to produce and set of digital images which both reflect your company and are multi functional can be a cost effective way of creating consistent corporate documents. This bank of stylised digital images will be unique to your company and will increase brand recognition.

You may think that is all does not matter and it is the content of a document which is most important but good design can affect how people feel and respond to your documents. Poor or inconsistent design might influence a less favourable reading of your documents. A well set out page with discreet, high-resolution images will boost how the reader feels about your company even if they just skim or glance at it. As impressions are formed in the first few seconds this could be the difference between receiving a commission or losing a potential customer.