June 18, 2025//Design, Insights//Christa Jourdan

How to create a singular visual identity in an omnichannel world

After 25 years in the creative industry—from the early days of static brochures and billboard design to today’s ever-present, omnichannel brand ecosystems—I’ve seen it all. All along, one truth has remained: A strong, cohesive visual identity isn’t just “nice to have”—it’s the heartbeat of any successful campaign strategy.

But in an era when brands are expected to communicate across a plethora of formats, appeal to a variety of different audiences, and achieve a range of goals (such as building awareness or driving conversion), the challenge is creating a compelling identity and extending it consistently and effectively across everything you do.

Why visual consistency matters

Picture a sports team that changes the color, logo, and design of its uniform every game. Fans would not only have a hard time spotting their team on the field but also may stop trusting them and coming to the games. Having a consistent visual identity for the team plays a significant part in creating familiarity with the fans. And that familiarity builds trust and loyalty.

The same rules apply to any brand. When your audience sees a consistent color palette, typography, photography style, iconography, and motion language—that is, how a brand’s visual elements move and animate—they start to associate those elements with your values, message, and quality. Over time, that consistency becomes a mental shortcut: A viewer knows what to expect and how to feel before they even process the campaign message.

Once your visual identity is established, the next challenge is making it work across audiences, formats, and campaigns.

The modern challenge: Fragmentation

Today, brands are managing dozens of campaigns across digital, social, print, video, in-person experiences, and internal communications, all while speaking to different audiences with different needs and expectations. To accomplish this successfully, you need more than a beautiful brand guideline PDF. You need a living system that can adapt.

Here’s how to make it work.

1. Build a flexible brand system

To build a flexible brand system, you need to start with a strong brand foundation and design it to evolve. Your brand system should include:

  • Core elements: Logo, color palette, typography, graphic language, imagery, tone of voice
  • Modular components: Layouts, icon sets, design patterns, templates
  • Behavioral rules: How to use motion, transitions, or interactions across digital media
  • Contextual flexibility: What changes are allowed across verticals or audiences

The goal is to create a clear structure that provides creative teams with guidelines, not limitations.

2. Establish a North Star across campaigns

No matter what a campaign’s objective is—launching a product, raising awareness, or driving engagement—the brand’s purpose should be your North Star, communicating your core story and brand values to your audience.

Design and messaging should help the brand’s purpose shine. For instance, if innovation and passion are core to your brand, that should be clear whether you’re talking to B2B tech clients about workflow automation or Gen Z consumers on TikTok about content creation tools.

Great brand design is about expressing the same truth in a thousand different ways without losing your direction.

3. Tailor for audience without losing identity

One of the biggest mistakes I see in campaigns is when teams overhaul visual directions for each audience or campaign vertical. It might feel like personalization, but this approach often fractures recognition and weakens the brand.

Instead, think of campaigns in terms of three layers:

  • First layer: The core identity stays fixed. This includes logos, color anchors, type hierarchy, and brand voice.
  • Second layer: The modular assets adjust. This includes photography style, messaging tone, and layout emphasis.
  • Third layer: The content adapts. This includes specific stories, cultural references, and media choices.

This approach allows your audience to still feel like they’re engaging with your brand, even if the message or mood shifts to suit them.

4. Design across formats from the start

Designing for a single hero image or video and “cutting it down” for other formats is a recipe for inconsistency and inefficiency. Instead, think about how each campaign will look across different formats from day one.

What will this idea look like on a social carousel? In a podcast ad? On a landing page? In a trade show booth?

Bring in specialists such as copywriters, developers, and motion designers early in the process so the creative concept is informed by what’s actually doable. This approach will not only strengthen the idea but also ensure the visual identity can adapt without falling apart.

5. Audit and evolve

Even the best visual systems need regular maintenance. Schedule periodic brand audits to evaluate how your identity is performing across campaigns and platforms. Are teams following the brand guidelines? Is the brand still recognizable across all touchpoints?

You might discover you need to update templates, refresh your image library, or introduce new guidelines for emerging formats such as augmented reality, AI-generated content, or interactive media.

The goal isn’t perfection—it’s consistency over time, with room for growth.

LEFF’s real-world application: The 2025 Content Trends Report

A recent example of successfully navigating these challenges is LEFF’s 2025 Content Trends Report. Recognizing the need for a cohesive visual identity across diverse content formats, LEFF developed a comprehensive strategy that included a flagship report, social media assets, and a live event. This approach ensured consistent branding while effectively engaging multiple audiences through various channels. The outcome was a unified campaign that showcased LEFF’s expertise and also reinforced the company’s brand presence across different platforms.

Final thoughts

Visual identity is not just a design task; it’s also a strategic asset. When done well, it amplifies your message, builds trust, and creates clarity in an increasingly chaotic content landscape.

As someone who’s been in this game for a long time, I can tell you that the brands that endure are the ones who understand this. They treat design not as decoration but as an extension of their values and voice. They build systems that empower teams, not constrain them. And above all, they stay true to who they are—even as the world, and their audiences, continue to change.

Stay bold. Stay consistent. And never underestimate the power of great design.

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