You probably already know a cool habit we have at Latitud: building in public. (If you didn't, hey, join our next Public All Hands this Wednesday and see what all the buzz is about!)

Our marketing team is no exception to this rule – and that's why we decided to share Latitud's brand guide. We hope that it will provide some inspiration for you to create your startup's own rules for designing marketing materials. Here we go!

Latitud Brand Guidelines

If you missed the memo, marketing’s toxic trait is wanting everything at 120% perfection. But we're not here to slow anyone down and we don't mean to be an agency, but rather a strategic ally – we know it’s important to give the team more tools so everyone can become a Latitud brand ambassador and create their own pretty things.

Does that mean they're all gonna be 120% perfect? No. But hopefully, you can get closer on your own and count on us to run the last mile with you.

Why is brand important anyway?

Well, my dear Padawan, I’m glad you asked. Branding is how we communicate our identity and control how we want to be perceived. When it comes to it, consistency is everything! People value what's familiar to them, so deviating from our established visual components, voice and tone, and quality standards breaks a pattern of recognition and trust.

But even if they aren't familiar with Latitud yet, it works the same way. Think of any email, for example: it’s easy for people to have an inbox full of trash. When they see a compelling subject line, with copy that engages them, graphics that are pleasing, and all packed into an easy-to-understand message, there are higher chances we'll stand out enough for them to open, consume it, and then associate us with positive adjectives.

The opposite will happen if the text is poorly written and the images have a low resolution or a chaotic composition.

To put it bluntly:

• Information overload is real.
• No one remembers boring.
• People like aesthetic things.

We make sure to always go the extra mile so everything we make is top-notch and people can recognize us for it.

This brand guide will help you understand a little bit more about Latitud’s brand applications and get tips that might help you when designing.

But remember, even if you have the freedom to create your own assets, the marketing team should still approve them BEFORE they're public.

Design 101

You can create your own designs using Canva! Need some quick tips on how to make your designs better? You’re in the right place.

• Don’t use blue background when using images in the slides.
• Make sure everything is aligned.

• Don’t use gradients.
• Leave breathing spaces - it helps on directing attention!

• Always try to keep your text short and straight to the point (unlike you). If you’re talking over your slides, people won’t read them (and if there’s too much text, they won’t listen to you).
• Still too much text? Don’t be scared of breaking slides into more if you feel there’s too much information in one.
• Don’t use underline when using Playfair Display as a font.
• The text should not overlap with graphic details in the background.

• When resizing images, choose one of the four anchors on the corner and hold “shift” to not cause distortion.
• Don’t use black in texts or details - it's not a color we use for Latitud’s brand. Want to use something close to it? Try #001226.
• Going to add logos to your slide? Make sure to find versions with a transparent background!
• While we're on the topic of logos, always try to organize them and try to make them all the same size. It makes it easier to absorb information.

• Using a lot of our colors in one slide? Try to use the color sequence (Navy, Sky, Aqua, Green, Orange, Yellow).

How to use our brand elements

Logo

There are two main versions of it: white and navy blue. They have a transparent background to be applied on any background as long as it's not too busy – the entire logo needs to be readable and have enough contrast. Not to state the obvious here, but if the background is black, that means you use the white version, not the navy.

Icon

Our icon is a shorter version of our logo. While the icon can exist without the wordmark, the wordmark should never exist without the icon.

Exclusion Logo Zone

The logo and the icon’s exclusion zone are equal to the height of the icon. That means other images, logos or text should not come closer to it than this total area. Give it space to breathe, people.

Color usage with logo

The don'ts of Latitud’s logo

Colors

Want an easy copy + paste of our colors? Check this out!

Long Text (depends on background color)

Titles, links, and long highlights

Highlights

Subtones

The subtones should only be used as details in a design, such as graphics in backgrounds or details in an illustration.

Good & Bad Color Contrasts

Typography

You can download our official fonts here:

Titles: Playfair Display

Body: Inter

Preferred usage of fonts

Titles: Playfair Extrabold + Playfair Extrabold Italic for word emphasis. It's not the most readable font, especially in smaller sizes, so Playfair can be used in the middle of the text only for emphasis in a few words. ⚠️ Don't abuse it: if it's in more than 5-6 words in a row, you're overdoing it.

Body: Inter Regular + Inter Bold for word emphasis. Inter can be used in titles when they are too long.

✨ Are these fonts not available on the platform you're using? 🙀 If you can't import downloaded fonts, go with Arial or Helvetica.

Animation

The logo animation should not be used with anything else on the screen.

Illustrations

Illustrations are used as a visual break. Don’t reduce the opacity or use them as a background.

If you’re thinking about adding some pictures of the team/founders/investors in your design, feel free! Try making the corners rounded, that usually makes them look much better.

But if you thought about going to Adobe Stock to get a generic picture, I have to stop you right there. 🔫 We do not use stock photos for our brand, so go search for an illustration instead.

Graphics

Download them here.

• Can be used as background or visual elements.
• Be aware to not make the reading difficult.

Videos

Subtitles

• Font: Inter
• Color: White or Navy Blue (#002560) if the background is too light.
• Weight: Medium
• Type Size: 45px
• Line Size: Auto
• Projected Shadow: Up to video editor criteria. Recommendation: two shadows of the same type.
• ⠀⠀⠀Shadow 1: black; 50% opacity, 135º, distance 3, smoothness 4
• ⠀⠀⠀Shadow 2: black, 100% opacity, -41º, distance 0, smoothness 0
• Background color for the subtitles: We don’t add background to the subtitles unless the video makes it difficult to read. In that case, use #1d1d1b with 70% opacity for the background.

Video edits

Titles: Appearing + disappearing after a few seconds.

The time it stays on depends on how long the title might be, i.e. we need to give people time to read it.

Use Playfair Display Extrabold for titles + Playfair Display Extrabold Italic if you want to highlight any words.

If the video calls for a background in the title, make it Navy Blue (#002560) with 100% opacity, text in white, and highlights in either Aqua (#59D3CA) or Green (#ACDD36).

⚠️ Very important

• Don’t apply frames to the video unless requested.
• Don’t apply filters to the video unless requested.
• Don’t color-correct the video unless requested.

It's very easy to make it look unpolished, so let's not risk it.

Presentations

You can check a full Presentation Masterslides here!

Kindly use this as your template and avoid deviating from the pre-made graphics too much.

⚠️ Need something special and very different from the master slides? Please ask in advance!

Preferred Background colors

Leave the other Latitud Colors for Title Backgrounds or details on the slide!

Usage of fonts and sizes

Title: Playfair Display Extrabold (with Italics for emphasis words)

• Minimal Title size: 20px
• Maximum Body Size: 46px

Body: Inter Regular (with Bold for emphasis words)

• Minimal Body size: 8px
• Maximum Body Size: 13px

Graphics

Use them in either Navy Blue or White.

Full page Graphic

Corner Graphic - Blue

Corner Graphic - White

Icons

You can find tons of icons here!

💡 At the top right corner of FlatIcons, you can “Edit Icon” and change the color to whichever you want, then save it as PNG 512px.

You can find previously used icons here: Icons. 

Make them either White or Latitud Colors.

💡 Inside Google Slides, you can make it White inside Format Image - Recolor - Negative.

Gifs

Feel free to leave a comment on which type of gifs you’d like when asking for a design!

Some previously used gifs can be found here:

Animations

If you want to be independent, you can find gifs here! Make sure to apply Latitud colors to the gifs.

Other good practices

• Feel free to search for slide ideas in SlidesGo and link something you think fits with the theme.

Social Media

We welcome any ideas you might have for Latitud's channels! If you're keen on producing something to communicate your idea better, or want to design something for your own channels, here's something that might help:

Most common size for social media:

1. Instagram Post & Linkedin Carousel: 1500x1500px
2. Instagram Stories: 1080x1920 px
3. Linkedin Banner: 2000x500px
4. Twitter single image: 2048x1024px
5. Luma Banner: 2000x1000px

Hubspot e-mail

Setting up emails on Hubspot can be tricky, but there's no need to fear it.

Here's a cheat sheet:

• Font: Arial or Helvetica
• Size: 15px or 14px for text; 20-24px for titles
• Make sure the style on EVERY LINE is set to Div instead of Paragraph - ALWAYS. We stress this out a lot because Paragraph can make spacing weird, and make emails look longer and poorly formatted.
• If you have a button: disable the full-width option so it is NOT taking the whole horizontal space of your page + set the corner radius to 8
• Are things looking too tight between blocks? Always edit padding (by adding 10px on top and bottom, for example), instead of skipping lines – this guarantees the email stays responsive and beautiful when read on mobile.
• Colors:
• ⠀⠀Button: navy #002560
• ⠀⠀Links: sky blue #058ed9
• ⠀⠀Font: black #000000

Paperform

Making it look good

• Templates, titles, and colors:
• ⠀⠀You can find a simple paperform template under the title “Design Template”!
• ⠀⠀Titles: Use H1 for your titles. Remember that the only thing coming before a title is Latitud’s logo.
• ⠀⠀Subtitles: H2 is what you can use for subtitles. Remember to keep it simple and direct.
• ⠀⠀Use bold and colored bold (available on the drop-down menu) for your text or description.
• Have a simple and short description that may help people understand the value that THEY GET from completing that form. E.g. Fill out our NPS survey → Help Latitud build an even better community for you and other LatAm founders
• Only use help text if it's actually helpful (like an example of an answer, or if it explains a concept). Avoid repeated information.

Configure tab

When creating a new Paperform, make sure to always edit settings in the “Configure” tab:

1. Make sure your title is concise and makes sense to your audience (wf{”path”:”seo-title”} isn’t very self-explanatory).
2. Do you wanna add a description? That’s totally up to you, and it isn’t mandatory at all, but remember anyone can see it.
3. Customize your URL to match the title – no one wants to go to f5d14v15.paperform.co or latitud-explore-fellowship-applications-waitlist.paperform.co, so keep it short and clear. That way, if you need to say the link out loud or type it in a message, you can easily remember it.

Success page

Don't forget to edit your success page!

1. Give people clear submission confirmation and next steps – e.g. You're all set! Please check your inbox for a confirmation email.
2. If applicable and related to your topic, encourage them to do something else, like staying tuned for updates by subscribing to the newsletter or following us on social media.