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Identity and Branding

An app’s identity is settled early and mostly permanent.

Where to find it

Architect Panel → Mobile Apps:

  • Mobile Canvas — the app, its screens and its settings
  • App Builds & Releases — building and submitting
  • Mobile Devices — the devices that have installed it

The permanent parts

  • Bundle identifier (iOS) and package name (Android). Once an app is published under these, they cannot change. A new identifier is a new app, with no upgrade path for existing users.
  • The URL scheme and universal domain, which is how links open your app rather than a browser.

Choose them as you would a domain name: reverse domain notation, your own domain, no version numbers, no project code names.

The changeable parts

  • Display name — what appears under the icon.
  • Description.
  • Primary, secondary, background and text colours, and a theme.
  • Icon, splash and notification icon images.

These need a rebuild to take effect, because they are compiled in, but they are not permanent decisions.

The display name is truncated

Home screen labels show around a dozen characters. Test the name by installing the app and looking at it rather than by counting letters.

The notification icon is separate

And frequently forgotten. Android renders notification icons as a flat silhouette, so a full-colour logo becomes a grey blob. Supply a simple single-colour shape.

Colours are used throughout

Not just on a splash screen. The primary colour appears on buttons and headers, background and text colours decide readability. Check the contrast between text and background properly — a palette that works on a website can be unreadable in sunlight.

Version and build number

The version is what users see; the build number is what the stores use to distinguish uploads. The platform owns the build number rather than letting the build service increment it, so numbering stays consistent across platforms.

A minimum app version can also be set, which is how you stop very old installs from continuing to work.

Universal links are worth setting up

They mean a link in an e-mail opens the app rather than a browser, on the right record. That single feature removes a large amount of friction, and it is configured once.

Get the icon right before the first store submission

Changing it later is possible but every existing user keeps looking at the old one until they update. First impressions of an app are largely its icon.

Worked example

An organisation set its bundle identifier from its own domain before the first build, tested the display name on a device, and supplied a separate single-colour notification icon after the first Android build showed a grey square. Universal links were configured so job e-mails open the app directly.

Recommendations

  • Identifiers from your own domain, no code names.
  • Test the display name installed, not on paper.
  • Supply a flat notification icon for Android.
  • Set up universal links — they remove real friction.