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Why should digital brand creators understand design systems?

Unlock the secret weapon of top brands! Design systems aren't just pretty UI kits—they're the backbone of seamless, scalable digital experiences. Ready to level up?

Long Truong

/

Oct 10, 2024

Why should digital brand creators understand design systems
Why should digital brand creators understand design systems

The brand rollout process can be a bit of a messy process. One minute you're riding high on creative inspiration, the next you're drowning in a sea of "working files, filename_final and filename_finalfinal and filename_finalfinal_FINAL" files.

Introducing Figma into our workflow was like finding the holy grail of brand management. Suddenly, we had a single source of truth for all our brand assets, a “brand asset repository”. No more frantic Slack messages asking, "Does anyone have the latest logo?" It's all there, neat and tidy, like Marie Kondo herself organised our digital workspace.

Of course, we still have our moments. There's always that one team member who misses the memo and uses last year's colour palette. But hey, that's what keeps us on our toes!

At the end of the day, seeing a brand come to life is incredibly rewarding. It's like watching your child take their first steps. And when we see our work out in the wild, doing its job? That's when we know all the late nights and coffee-fueled brainstorming sessions were worth it.

Build your digital brand faster on Figma with a Design System

I remember having to spend hours going through PDF guidelines when starting a new project. These old processes were time-consuming and often led to inconsistencies across various brand elements. When I can’t be bothered to go through the brand guidelines to find the exact brand colour, I'd eyedropper the colours from outdated design files, which is sometimes not 100% exact, and it led to colour shifts over time. Maintaining brand consistency across a team or agency was not as straight forward as it seems.

This is where Figma design systems have become a game-changer for designers, especially those involved in digital-first branding and marketing designs for SaaS companies. If you're looking to streamline your brand building process, better safeguard your brand consistency, or enhance your digital marketing efforts, allow me to share how Figma design systems can support you.

Understanding Figma Design Systems

Figma design systems can serve as a centralised hub for all brand assets and guidelines, accessible to the entire team. Think of it as having a box of Lego bricks designed for brand management. Each piece—logos, colours, fonts, and templates—is readily available and up-to-date. This setup allows designers to grab and use these components and piece them together to build new designs.

Key Benefits for Brand Designers

  1. Improved Efficiency: Figma design systems can help you complete design works up to 34% faster. With all components centralised, you spend less time hunting for assets and more time on creative problem-solving.

  2. Enhanced Collaboration: Figma's real-time sharing and editing ability allows for great teamwork, essential for SaaS branding and marketing where there are remote teams across continents working on the same goal.

  3. Consistency Across Platforms: Shared libraries ensure brand consistency across various digital touch-points. Within Figma, you eliminate the need to eyedrop colours from old files, therefore speed up processes and maintain consistency.

  4. Scalability and Adaptability: The flexibility of Figma design systems allows quick adaptations for different campaigns, platforms, and use cases. This is invaluable when building a brand for a SaaS product as it allows for quick iterations and adjustments.

  5. Faster Prototyping: Drag-and-drop components from shared libraries speed u the creation of mockups and prototypes. This speed is beneficial in the fast-paced world of SaaS marketing, where quick turnarounds are often required.

  6. Streamlined Handoff: Design-to-development transitions are 50% faster, reducing miscommunication and errors. This efficiency is crucial for SaaS branding, where the alignment between design and functionality is key.

  7. Cost Reduction: By saving up to 27% on design work and 30-35% on tech-related costs, Figma design systems offer significant financial benefits, especially for startups and growing SaaS companies.

  8. Easier Onboarding: New team members and contractors can quickly understand and contribute to projects using the established system, which is particularly helpful for rapidly scaling SaaS companies.

How has it changed Brand Building and Marketing

For digital brands, especially those in SaaS and tech, Figma design systems have been a breath of fresh air. With the explosion of digital platforms over the past five years, brands need to reach their target audience by creating engaging content and building a strong presence on their own platforms. This means more work for content creators and designers.

Figma design systems can streamline this process, making it easier to build a brand presence for a SaaS product online. The faster time-to-market and improved brand consistency enhance digital marketing efforts, leading to better brand recognition and customer trust.

Best Figma Design Systems for Digital Brand Marketing

Bettermade Brand Building Design System

Free version | Pro releasing Dec 2024

Brand Building Design System (BBDS), created by Jolene and Long of Bettermade Design Agency, is a design toolkit tailored for B2B SaaS companies to streamline brand building and marketing. BBDS offers a comprehensive Figma library packed with over 1,000 components, including brand guidelines, logos, typography, colors, and social media templates. Unlike most design system UI kits, BBDS focuses exclusively on brand and marketing needs, allowing designers to quickly create consistent and professional marketing materials.

Currently offering core brand components for free, with a Pro version launching in December 2024, BBDS is set to expand with even more components like website blocks and email templates. Built by designers for designers, BBDS aims to streamline the brand building process, saving hours of repetitive design tasks and allowing you to focus on big ideas.

Bettermade Brand Building Design System

UntitledUI

Free version | From $129

Untitled UI, created by Jordan Hughes, is a comprehensive design system that excels in brand building and marketing. It offers a wide range of colours and gradients, a well-thought-out typographic setup, and numerous marketing components like landing pages and email templates. The system's strength lies in its robust library of components and attention to detail, making it easy to create consistent and professional-looking designs across various marketing materials.


Shipfaster UI

Free version | From $90

Shipfaster UI, developed by Michael Wong from Designership, is a robust design system that caters well to brand building and marketing needs. It features a full colour system, flexible typography, and a wide range of marketing-focused components that will help you design your website quickly. The system's main advantage is its efficiency, allowing designers to quickly create marketing materials while maintaining brand consistency.

Relume Figma Kit

Free Figma File | Webflow components from

Relume Figma Kit is a design system that's particularly well-suited for brand building and marketing. It offers a vast collection of marketing-specific layouts and components, including over 1,000 unique desktop and mobile layouts. The kit's strength lies in readily built Webflow blocks, where user can piece together to build a website quickly, and use their style guide to style the landing page.

UI Prep

Free | From $69

UI Prep, created by Molly Hellmuth, is a comprehensive design system that focuses on teaching Figma best practices alongside providing design resources. It offers a well-structured set of components, styles, and templates that help designers create consistent and efficient designs. While UI Prep excels in providing UI components for product design and dashboards, it doesn't specifically highlight marketing-focused components like email templates or landing pages.

Real-World Applications

Many successful SaaS companies have used Figma design systems to speed up their branding and marketing efforts. For instance, Dropbox uses a Figma-based design system called Odyssey, which has dramatically improved their design consistency and efficiency. Similarly, Uber's Base Web design system, built and maintained in Figma, has streamlined their product development process and ensured brand consistency across their various services.

Getting Started with Figma Design Systems

Here are some steps to get started with implementing a Figma design system:

  1. Audit your existing brand assets and guidelines.

  2. Set up a Figma account and duplicate the new design system file.

  3. Follow the instructions in the design system to customise it for your brand.

  4. Create documentation within Figma to guide usage.

  5. Train your team on how to use and contribute to the design system.

There are numerous resources available for learning Figma, including official tutorials, community forums, and online courses. The initial setup might take some time, but the long-term benefits for your brand building and marketing efforts are well worth the investment.

Potential Limitations

While Figma design systems are incredibly powerful for digital branding and SaaS marketing, they may not be ideal for print-heavy brands. However, even in these cases, Figma can still serve as an excellent central library and source of truth for digital assets. There is also a learning curve involved, especially if you're transitioning from traditional methods. Yet, in our experience, the time invested in learning pays off quickly in improved efficiency and consistency.

Conclusion

Figma design systems give digital brand designers a powerful way to create more in less time, collaborate in real0time, and maintain brand consistency. By managing brand assets in one place and streamlining production workflows, these systems let designers focus on what they do best—crafting compelling visual stories and pushing creative boundaries. Whether you’re into brand building, digital marketing, or SaaS branding, now is a good time to explore Figma design systems.

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TRUSTED BY

Australia's Top Marketers

Are you ready?

Bring your tech brand to life

If shaping a game-changing tech brand sounds like your ambition, don't wait.

Start the conversation

Free 30 min call, no obligation

Clara photo
Lara photo

TRUSTED BY

Australia's Top Marketers