What is this?

Our brand essence is our mantra. It’s our reason for being. In a few words, it embodies are mission. We want to create a better, modern homebuying experience for everyone.

Our products free consumers from collecting physical statements and filling redundant forms; removing the worst part of the home-buying process. They empower lenders with accurate credit decisioning data, a more streamlined lending process, and propel them in their careers.

At the end of the day, our work isn’t about the data we verify, it’s about the lives we impact. Our compassion for others informs every customer interaction and guides how we treat one another inside FormFree.

As people, we all have our own personalities and they each come out in the way we communicate. For our brand’s written content, we refer to that as our voice.

In the same way that your personality never truly changes, our brand voice is always consistent.

We are conversational.

When we’re writing for our brand, it’s always worth taking a minute to read that content out loud. Sometimes technical writing needs to be crafted a certain way, but everything else should sound like it came from someone’s mouth.

We are clever.

We’re intelligent and wity. We have the right answers to any question, and recognize the right opportunity to make people laugh. We never want to be rude, but we’re brave enough to be funny.

We are empowering.

We always have one eye on the prize: our mission is to empower consumers and lenders with direct-source credit decisioning data. We want to stay focused on the benefits we deliver and how our data helps people achieve great things.

We’re straight-forward.

One of the biggest obstacles we have is how people think adopting our products is hard. If our wording is complicated or overly fluffy, it suggests our user experience is, too. So, keep it simple and get right to the point!

While our brand voice is always the same, our tone can change depending upon who we’re taking to.

Think of it this way: you wouldn’t speak to a close friend in the same way you’d speak to your boss. That is the difference in tone we’re talking about.

For Executives and Managers

This audience is ambitious, analytical, hard-working, results-driven, and focused on how FormFree can help their organization.

• Present quantifiable results.
• Show how we’ve helped similar clients.
• Outline benefits concisely.
• Show how we’ve helped similar clients

For Top Producers and Loan Officers

Regimented, competitive, and sometimes stubborn, this audience is focused on their career and controlling everything that goes into their loans.

• Explain this will close more loans.
• Show how we offer a competitive edge.
• Show how this improves the borrower experience.
• Show how we reduce time-to-close.
• Explain how we eliminate the paper chase of manual verification

For borrowers and other consumers

All these people want to do is enjoy their new home, skip through the work involved in collecting forms, and live their lives.

• Keep it simple.
• Offer them a helping hand.
• Let them know we’re here to help.
• Talk them through progress.
• Touch on security when appropriate.

We always want to make sure that our logo has enough negative space around it to ensure it’s treated respectfully and other design elements aren’t confused as being part of our logo.

Area of Exclusion

As a rule of thumb, the letter “F” (at the size it appears within the logo being sized) can be used to determine whether or not the logo has enough clearance. This area of exclusion surrounding the logo should be free of all other design elements.

Color Variations

The color configurations shown above are the only approved variations of our full logo. The white background version (shown above over a light gray for contrast) is our preferred version, however, we have three other options:

• Aside from our official FormFree Gray, we occasionally use a particular shade of off-black in our brand. When a creative application calls for it, our logo can appear over this color as a knockout.
• Our brand uses a variety of formless shapes (called Forms) that appear in our layouts. As long as a Form is sized in a way where it does not interfere with the legibility of our logo, our logotype can appear over top of it as a knockout.
• While it is an application we want to use very sparingly, our logo can appear over our signature purple as a knockout.

Sizing

In digital applications, our logo should never be smaller than 140px wide, or 1.25 inches in print.

The diagrams above are showing common examples of improper logo use. These examples are not acceptable and they degrade the visual integrity of our brand.

• Do not use another color for our logo other than those shown in the Logo Use section of our guide, even if that color is part of our brand system (Figure o1).
• Do not tilt or rotate our logo so that it isn’t in a normal, horizontal orientation (Figure 02).
• Do not stretch or distort our logo so that it uses incorrect proportions (Figure 03).
• Do not pair our logo with our legacy brand mark. Mickey is dead, long live Mickey (Figure 04).
• Do not apply special effects to our logotype, including drop shadows, lens flares, and glow effects (Figure 05).
• Do not apply gradients to our logotype or mask one of our Forms within the type itself (Figure 06).
• Do not place a Form behind our logo in a way where its shapes disrupt the legibility of our type. Don’t allow our logo knockout to pass outside of the boundaries of a Form onto white (Figure 07).
• Do not place our logo over a photo without ensuring its legibility (Figure 08).
• Do not use our logo in a way where the quality or resolution of the file isn’t appropriate for the application (Figure 09).

When we need a logo to represent the FormFree brand and space is limited, our wordmark is what we rely on. Our wordmark should always be our go-to selection, but the monogram is our “plan b.”

We have three versions of the monogram:

• “Monogram” is the name we use to describe the double-F’s enclosed within the outline container.
• The Vertical Monogram is when this mark appears center over the FormFree wordmark. In this option, our wordmark is a bit larger than the monogram.
• The Stacked Monogram is when our monogram appears centered over the FormFree wormark and both elements are the same width.

Just like our primary logo, every version of the monogram needs enough negative space around it to ensure it always displays well.

Area of Exclusion

As a rule of thumb, the letter “F” (at the size it appears within the square outline of the monogram) can be used to determine whether or not the monogram has enough clearance. The letter “F” as it’s sized in the wordmark for the vertical and stacked monograms isn’t sufficient.

The area of exclusion should not contain any other design elements.

Color Variations and Sizing

Just like our primary logo, our monogram can appear as a white knockout or in our signature off-black. The same color guidelines applied to our full logo in the Logo Use section of this guide also apply to the monoram.

• In digital applications, our monogram should appear no smaller than 31px wide. It should be at least .5 inches in print.
• In digital applications, our stacked monogram should appear no smaller than 45px wide. It should be at least .75 inches in print.
• In digital applications, our vertical monogram should appear no smaller than 65px wide. It should be at least 1 inch wide in print.
• In print applications,

Use Cases

As mentioned before, the monogram lockups are secondary options for situations where our primary logo isn’t appropriate. Some of those scenarios include:

• Apparel or promotional merchandise where the wordmark doesn’t capture enough attention.
• Situations where a logo needs to appear in a tiny area that the primary logo sizing guidelines don’t allow.
• App icons, favicons, or applications where a graphic mark is the only suitable option.
• Supplemental placements where our primary logo has already appeared.
• Uses that are purely internal, and there’s no possibility of external visibility.

All of the guidelines featured in the Logo Misuse section also apply to our monogram. Additionally, the diagrams above show unacceptable applications that are specific to this set of logos.

• Do not create new monogram versions by changing the way the graphic mark locks up to our wordmark (Figure 10).
• Do not change the shape that the double Fs are enclosed in (Figure 11).
• Do not stretch, distort, or adjust the monogram. Also, do not adjust the proportions of the enclosure, the type within, or the relationship between those elements (Figure 12).
• Do not create a new logo by combining our monogram and wordmark in new ways (Figure 13).
• Do not use the monogram’s enclosure to mask images. Do not place the monogram over an image in a way where it makes our logo challenging to identify (Figure 14).
• Do not use an unapproved color for our monogram (even if that color is within our system). Do not change the color of the letterforms without also changing the color of the enclosure. (Figure 15).
• Do not replace the double Fs for the primary logo (Figure 16).