The word brand has evolved in its meaning from an impression, to a logo, to a whole lifestyle synonymous with style and sophistication. The brand was once an object used by craftsmen to identify their work, by either a signature or a distinctive symbol particular to them. What was used to form an impression and to signify ownership is now a term used to encompass the actual process of forming an impression.

From celebrities to cheese, cars to cat food - the brand has become truly ensconced in our world. Now, more than ever before, it's not just the savvy marketeer who knows about brand awareness. Branding used to be mainly confined to consumer goods and services. Today, even a charity needs to have a distinct brand. And it's not just about a fantastic logo, or great slogan, branding is about the attitude that makes or breaks the success of a product or service.

Some brands have real personalities attached to them; think about the celebrity behind a global airline and you immediately think about the personality of a brand. Even hearing the name of one of the most successful brands - Brand-B - immediately brings to mind an image of the celebrity couple behind its success.

As well as its values, a brand also boasts other attributes including taste and appearance - terms that relate to how a brand influences or motivates us using visual, auditory and kinaesthetic cues. All of these messages are communicating away in the background without us having to worry about our thought processes that influence our decisions to buy or to keep loyal to a certain product range.

But a brand is not simply a logo or tag line - a brand should encapsulate what people think about your business, product or service when they encounter it. And just as significant as recognising the importance of the brand and its crucial role in today's marketplace, is being aware of brand consistency.

Brand consistency is the process that ensures that we don't detract or wander away from the core brand proposition. For example, your company logo should always be used in a similar way on all marketing materials; a uniform typeface should be used with particular guidelines on typography; consistent colour ranges are always applied along with similar design styles. Adhering to these guidelines ensures that your brand is inter-linked and also has a link back to that core brand proposition. If you think of every piece of marketing material being like a member of the same family, then it should support and even look similar to all the other members in the family. The brand has its own unique look that enables a consumer to recognise it as belonging to that brand proposition and distinguish it from competing brands.

But, as we have established, branding is not just about applying a logo in a consistent manner, or applying the correct Pantone colours. It is about ensuring all the messaging on all communications materials are pulling in the same direction and that it all looks consistent.

You know that if your documents and presentations have a unified and polished appearance, they make a positive impression. You can brand your Microsoft Office Word 2007 documents quickly and easily by applying a document theme - a set of colours, fonts and other formatting details that work together to give your documents a stylish, professional and consistent design.

Located in the Page Layout tab, the Themes group contains pre-organised collections of colours, fonts and effects against matching colour backgrounds - helping you to create a presentation with the look and feel to equal any designed by a professional.

Word 2007 offers a wide range of predefined document themes, and you can also create your own by customising existing themes. Document themes can be shared across programs so that all your Office documents can have the same style.

Theme colours contain four text and background colours, six accent colours and two hyperlink colours. The colours in the Theme Colors button represent the current text and background colours, and the set of colours next to the Theme Colors name after you click the Theme Colors button represent the accent and hyperlink colours for that theme. When you change any of these colours to create your own set of theme colours, the colours in the Theme Colors button and next to the Theme Colors name change accordingly.

Theme effects are sets of lines and fill effects. When you click the Theme Effects button, you see the lines and fill effects used for each set of theme effects in the graphic displayed with the Theme Effects name. Although you cannot create your own set of theme effects, you can choose the theme effect that you want to use in your own document theme.

With Word 2007, you can ensure that your brand is not just talking to your audience, but that it's encouraging a positive affinity with them, too.