Could you have imagined ten years ago that you would be logging in and out of virtual meetings all day? What once seemed like something out of a sci-fi movie is now one of the most common interactions in the workplace. You’ve likely had one in the last week!
But even with all that experience, you may not have considered an element that could make a difference in your meetings: the background. Taking care of what goes on behind you can be a powerful strategy for your brand. Don’t miss out on it!
Here’s the what, why, and how you should reap the benefits of digitally branded Zoom backgrounds!
Benefits of Branded Zoom Backgrounds
If you’ve never thought about branded Zoom backgrounds, you may not be familiar with the many benefits they can bring. Still, there are a slew that you could be taking advantage of:
- Professionalism. Especially when having virtual meetings in a professional setting, your background can make or break your credibility and authority.
- Focus. Busy backgrounds can take attention away from you. Boring backgrounds can put others to sleep. A well-thought-out background can help retain focus on you.
- Standing Out. Most people use whatever is in the background already. By using a branded background, you’ll be unique and more captivating.
- Opportunity. You’re already speaking in front of an audience, so why not ensure all eyes will be on your brand as well?
- Communication. Taking control of what you’re communicating with your background can make your meeting and message more impactful.
- Brand visibility. Brand awareness is crucial for growing your business. Putting your brand in the background will make others pay attention to it.
- Consistency. Coherence is crucial for people to take your brand seriously and know what to expect from it. Plus, it asserts your visual identity.
- Marketing. Marketing is about keeping your brand top of mind and convincing others to act. Calls-to-action in your background can help with both.
- Privacy. Finally, using a branded background will keep your home or office private.
Tips for Effective Branded Backgrounds
By now, you may be convinced that branding your Zoom backgrounds is the way to go. But, for this to work in your favor and become an efficient strategy, you must dip your toes in a few essential concepts. As you’re putting together your digitally branded backgrounds, consider the following:
Including Main Branding Elements
To brand your Zoom backgrounds, you first need a strong brand visual identity. Once you have that, deciding what colors and fonts to use, the logo to display, and the imagery to show becomes a far easier task.
Needless to say, consistency is key here. You want to maintain a set personality and promote brand awareness to get the desired outcome. Find the main elements of your branding that will allow you to be instantly recognizable.
Visualizing Visuals
Striking the right visuals is one of the most important parts to take care of. This refers to how you’ll be presenting the elements discussed above.
A low-quality, cluttered background can be overwhelming and off-putting, having the exact opposite effect of what you’re trying to achieve. Instead, think long and hard about what you’ll include and how. As for tips:
- Go minimalist. A minimalist design could be a smarter approach, as it will help you reduce the visual cues and avoid distracting clutter.
- Plan placements. Be mindful of where you’ll be placed in the frame and where you’ll set your branding elements to create a harmonious image. You should also allow space for subtitles or captions in your Zoom meetings.
- Choose quality. It should go without saying that you should include the highest-quality assets (logos, images, etc.) to guarantee an elevated Zoom background.
- Think responsively. Responsive design focuses on ensuring optimal visual experiences regardless of screen sizes. As you work on your background design, guarantee it’ll look great and adapt to any device.
If design is not your area of expertise, look into Zoom backgrounds that you can customize to your needs and likes. This will help you be certain that you’ll have a professional and beautiful result. A top item, such as a premium sleek black background or a textured background photo, will immediately add visual interest, and enhance your design and message.
Conveying the Right Message
A branded background is the perfect opportunity to send a message to your audience. You can stick to brand and logo awareness, but you may also want to include a CTA, tagline, slogan, or other tidbits of information that could be useful to your purpose.
On that note, delimit your intention. In order to send a message, you should first understand what it is you’re trying to transmit or get out of your background. For example, a branded “Subscribe” CTA with your socials could do the trick if you're looking for new followers.
Keep in mind the design tips mentioned above to ensure your messaging fits your brand and the visual aspects of the background.
Contextualizing
Not every meeting is the same. You don’t talk to the same people about the same things all the time. For instance, catching up with the Marketing team is very different from addressing potential customers.
For this reason, you may not want to use the same background for every encounter. Be flexible with your design and tweak it to produce a couple of branded backgrounds for different types of meetings.
Putting It to the Test
Creating a highly effective branded Zoom background may not be a one-and-done thing. Mistakes can be made. Even if you think the design is cool initially, trying it out a few times can let you know if it’s performing as expected.
To help you out, test with a few backgrounds until you find the right one(s). You can seek feedback from coworkers to understand what areas you could improve. Then, make the appropriate changes until you get the perfect match to accurately represent your brand and message.
Implementing Branded Backgrounds
Finally, have a strategy for implementing digitally branded Zoom backgrounds with the rest of your team. Here are a few areas to take into account:
- Create Guidelines. Put down the rules and share best practices so that others can learn how to use the branded backgrounds, how to customize them, what to avoid, the context, etc.
- Go Through Training. If you decide your team may need assistance to fully grasp the idea behind the branded Zoom backgrounds, put together a quick training session. This can also be helpful to teach your coworkers about the technical aspects of using branded Zoom backgrounds.
Conclusion
A speaker in front of a bland or cluttered background during a Zoom meeting is a missed opportunity. Digitally branded Zoom backgrounds are a chance to move your business goals along.
When designing yours, the main things to remember are that you should create Zoom backgrounds with purpose to relay a fitting message and maintain brand identity.
Preparing for a Zoom meeting can be daunting at first. However, top tools such as the ScriptMe subtitle generator or an Envato subscription can make your life much easier.
