Corporate Design.

Corporate design, or CD for short, defines a company’s visual identity: logo, colors, fonts, imagery, and the rules governing how these elements interact. The goal is for customers to instantly recognize your business wherever they see it—whether on a delivery van, an invoice, on Instagram, or on your website. For a small business, this isn’t a luxury—it’s a sign of trust. A consistent brand image conveys a sense of care, while a haphazard one comes across as random.

How Corporate Design Works

At its core is a set of guidelines, often referred to as a style guide or design manual. It specifies the exact color values for print and screen, the fonts and their sizes, the logo variants with their clearance and minimum size, as well as examples of correct and incorrect usage. For the website, additional rules apply to buttons, spacing, and images.

Corporate design is part of corporate identity. Corporate identity describes a company’s entire self-image: what it stands for, how it communicates with customers, and how it conducts itself. Corporate design is the visible aspect of this. A company that sees itself as fast and straightforward should therefore not have a fussy or cumbersome appearance.

Visual appearance can also be important from a legal standpoint. Under trademark law, in addition to words, images, colors, and color combinations can be protected as trademarks if they distinguish a company’s goods or services from those of others.

What Your Business Should Keep in Mind

Adhere just as strictly to the color guide on the website as you do in print. In projects, we often see that letterhead and vehicle branding are designed consistently, but the website features different shades, unfamiliar fonts, and an outdated logo. Many customers see the website first, and that’s exactly where the inconsistency stands out.

Check your brand colors for readability. The W3C’s WCAG 2.2 guidelines require a contrast ratio of at least 4.5 to 1 between text and background for normal text at Level AA, and 3 to 1 for large text. A light corporate yellow on a white background will quickly fail this test. The BFSG Check will show you whether your website meets accessibility requirements.

Choose a screen version of your logo. A logo that looks good on a company sign may be unreadable in a browser tab. For that, you'll need a simplified version, such as a favicon.

Frequently Asked Questions About Corporate Design

What is the difference between corporate design and corporate identity? Corporate identity is a company’s self-image, while corporate design is its visible expression. Identity also includes language, values, and behavior toward customers and employees.

Does a small business need an entire design manual? No. To start with, all you need is the logo in all its variations, two to three colors with specific values, and one or two fonts. It’s important that everyone who designs for you works with the same files.

Do I need to revise the corporate identity (CI) for a new website? Not necessarily. Often, it’s enough to adapt the existing CI for the screen—for example, by choosing colors for buttons and labels that provide sufficient contrast. A completely new visual identity is called rebranding. The differences are explained in “Redesign, Relaunch, Rebranding, and Refactoring.”

If you want your website to finally match the look and feel of the rest of your business, we'll take care of the web design—from the style guide to the finished site.