This update is published for documenting purposes.
After realizing there was another stats report from 
Since this would basically be all there is to say, I'll dive a bit deeper into the "why" I made this, which you can read more about down below. For those who are interested in the process of creating or contributing to a brand.
Building a brand
Most of the communities here on Hive are, or should be considered to be third-party dApps. Whether the name of that community does or doesn't include "Hive", it is a project that is run by another entity. Treating one of your projects on Hive as a brand is one important step to stand out from the competition, and is especially important when there is no competition at all. By making a brand out of your idea, you'll notice that you will start to have control over the narrative that you're going to tell and share with others. It is so much easier to think of a narrative for an idea that is already decided for, than to share your own narrative (as a human being), which is constantly developing as you read more and more, besides that, that narrative is also heavily depending on personal experiences.
Imagine three friends starting a business and all three of them are going to decide the narrative for that business. Not impossible, but I expect plenty of situations that aren't going to be about the narrative (disagreements for example). Now, imagine that these three friends are sharing the narrative of their idea instead of their own-selves. You catch my drift?
While this isn't the only benefit of why you should start with branding as soon as possible. You literally are creating a entity that people can identify themselves with. It is so much easier for people to go to your brand once they realize what your brand stands for. When creating a brand, you're simultaneously creating a place for others to connect.
Consistency
The power of consistency is highly underrated when it comes to working on a brand or image. If you look on the internet and search for something that explains how to boost your profile on Facebook/Instagram/LinkedIn/TikTok, you'll find that most, if not all, answers tell you that you need to be consistent. "Post every day, post three times per day, or post once a week/month on the same day".
Being consistent isn't making your own life easier, it also makes it easier for your readers, followers, and fans. They know exactly when you're publishing anything, so they know exactly when to visit your blog/channel/profile/account.
In this case,
UI/UX
In case you don't know what UI or UX means, it stands for User Interface and User Experience. This is mostly applied when designing mobile apps and/or website designs. But it is certainly not limited to just that. As a brand, you want to be guiding your audience as easily and as smoothly as possible to the right place. It is important to take the role of your audience from time to time, so you get a better understanding of the "customer journey". You want to eliminate any possible annoyance there is, and make life easier for them.
Fundamental Design
This is where fundamental design comes into play. As a brand you want a design that can be used over and over again. Usually, the main assets consist of just a logo, font-type and a color palette. A good designer will create something what you ask for, a great designer will tell you what to use. Great designers will ask questions so they can build a better understanding of your brand. They actively want to work together with you, and eventually become an extension of your brand that translates the vision and mission of your brand in clever and powerful designs. Fundamental designs are usually designs like any other design that are born inside your head. The difference is that these fundamental designs didn't see broad daylight until they have been through multiple debates, endured a firestorm of questions, and doubted at until there was nothing left but the core message.
Not saying that I am a great designer, but this is the reason why I question my own designs quite often. What does it do, and what should it do? I try to think before publishing, and this isn't always the case. But I do try to do my best to keep things more than one thing in mind, and think ahead when I create something.
Unity
So, if we think about creating fundamental designs that require the following:
- Needs to be for a brand
- Needs to be consistent
- Needs to be directing/guiding
- Needs to be easily recognizable
- Needs to be durable and for longterm
What part are we missing? Yes... Unity. We need unity in our communications and designs. We can find unity also in a brand book. This way it will be much easier to start with designing, and much easier to implement the designs if it unifies the communication. In other words, don't just illustrate what is being said, illustrate what needs to be said. While the first GIF that I made (POSH STATS) just contained two circulating coins, I actually created it to showcase the two tokens POSH and PROMO. So, from my own standpoint; I'd say this was just a design and could or should be replaced at some point. It was just a fun project where I wanted to learn a new technique, and wanted to create "something cool" for @Poshtoken. The second GIF illustrates Delegation Stats, I think this was the easiest way to animate (delegated) Hive tokens in relation with Posh // Hive in, Posh out.
Both GIFs look the same, or at least it looks as if they come from the same maker (obviously...). Same background color, same coin, same font-type, same logo. Different animation. The different animation will guide the audience, and will become a point of recognition to click on in the future. For example: Ah, black Hive coin moves from top to bottom and changes into posh equals Delegation Stats, whereas, Two spinning Posh tokens equals Posh Stats.
Just an idea
Below you'll find an idea on how to utilize the GIFs in a different way. This is what makes some designs extremely useful since they can be used for more than one thing. Or, it could create more ways to use valuable content elsewhere.
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Hope you learned something :)
There is much to say about branding, and how to create assets for a brand. But I'll leave it here for today, and I hope you learned something about branding. I've written a bit more about branding here (Let's brand Hive together). Check it out if you enjoyed reading this.
Cheers,
Ruben
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