BONUS: Effective Logo Design

Your Logo: Key to a Vital Corporate Identity

Your company logo is a visual representation of your business brand. It is an expression of your vision, purpose, appeal and degree of professionalism. It takes stock of all of these essential qualities of your company and synthesizes them into one recognizable graphic image.

Once developed, designed and reproduced, your logo becomes the face of your company in your particular industry and in the marketplace at large. Closely associated with your business name, your logo appears on all of your advertising material, electronic correspondence, packaging and letterhead. It shows up on the pages of your website, on brochures and online ads posted all across the internet and visible to potential customers all around the world. Depending upon your type of business, you may even place it on promotional products– from mugs, caps and tee shirts, to billboards and bumper stickers.

Your logo is perhaps the most visible, vital and enduring part of your business, and should be planned and designed with care. Once you make your choice, and have been using it for any length of time, changes become very difficult, as you risk confusing the client base that has become accustomed to seeing it.

At first sight, your logo triggers a perception of your business in the minds and emotions of your audience. It doesn!t explain every detail of your company (what you sell, the quality of your service, who you are and where you are located) to the potential customer with one glance, nor should you expect it to. The central purpose of your business logo is to draw attention and build a certain level of recognition among the people that make up your target audience as well as those who operate in the world of commerce, generally. Your logo should work to draw attention away from your competition and create the interest needed to propel your company to a premier place in your industry.
People view your logo in the small increments of time, so the combination of symbol, text and color you select needs to express the essential characteristics of your business in a memorable way. The greater and more positive an impression it leaves in the minds of the public, the faster you!ll be on your way to establishing a positive, authentic and recognizable brand for your company.

Your logo is made up of a variety of elements, mainly:
Text – Your company name displayed in a stylish, clear and professional looking format
Graphic – A carefully chosen and specifically designed symbol or icon that sums up the essential qualities of your business and conveys its unique strengths.
Color – the unifying design mechanism that ties your logo to the rest of your company image and evokes an emotional response from viewers.

When combined, these elements (and various others, again depending on your type of business) help to establish your brand identity stylishly, professionally and hopefully, powerfully. The perfect combination will make a positive first impression, elicit a feeling of trust and satisfaction as customers search for your brand as they shop, and inspire an attitude of respect and trust among other professionals in your industry.

Remember that your logo is just one facet of your brand building strategy – don !t expect it to be the entire campaign – but when it!s well designed and circulated, you!ll see that it!s a crucial part of your overall business success.

Avoid these Design Mistakes for a Picture Perfect Logo

Designing your business logo involves a careful process of research, planning, experimentation and choice. However you decide to approach it, you!ll need to invest time, money and other resources to come up with the winning combination of text, font style, color and graphic images.

You can design your logo on your own, hire a professional design agency or use an auction site, where designers will submit their suggestions and then you select the best sample. Once you!ve chosen the design professional that you wish to work with, you should continue to work on your logo until the design is perfected. Remember that your business is going to have to live with your choice of logo for a long time, so you should plan and design it with this thought in mind. Some business mistakes are less permanent – choosing a bad store location or making a hiring mistake can be rectified by moving or termination – changing a logo due to a design flaw after customers have come to recognize it is a bit more complicated and confusing.

Here are some common mistakes that business owners make in the process of producing a logo for their companies. Do your best to avoid them and you!ll be on your way to creating a strong and attractive logo:

! •! Don"t rush. Take some time to flesh out a full description of your business and to develop a truly unique design that is both attractive and expressive of the fundamental qualities of your business. Enjoy every step of the creative process and your end result will be much more appealing.

! •! Stay away from a complicated or exotic design – for a number of very good reasons.

Simple beats ornamental in terms of attractiveness, ease of recognition and recall for your audience. A simple design also transfers more smoothly and easily between various kinds of media – from printed pieces of to web graphics with minimal cost and hassle. You!ll also avoid problems related to size issues, particularly useful if you intend to resize your logo, for example, from the size on your letterhead to a large and visible logo to display on promotional T-shirts.

! •! Don"t ignore design parameters such as your logo"s footprint and aspect ratio. Design elements that fall outside the sphere of your central design can distort your logo!s footprint and cause various problems throughout the reproduction process. Try to keep the design balanced and self contained, and keep your length, width and height dimensions as uniform as you can.

! •! Avoid using an obscure font for the text portion of your logo. It is critically important that your company name be instantly recognizable – be sure you don!t lose sight of this principal in an effort to be stylish. Keep fonts simple, avoid italics and stay with sans serif styles for the most part.

! •! Be original! Don!t copy your competition and risk obscurity by designing a logo that looks too much like that of another business, especially one that operates in a similar sector or nearby location. One of the purposes of your logo is to differentiate your business, to get it noticed, and you won!t achieve this objective if your design blends in or becomes confused with another.

Be aware, learn as much as you can and avoid these common mistakes and you !ll develop a unique, easily recognizable and memorable logo that places an attractive stamp on your brand building and business identification efforts.

Color Your Logo for Maximum Attractiveness

The perfect logo design for your business should achieve your goals for brand recognition, whether it appears in black and white or in color. Flexibility of design, especially when it comes to color, guarantees attractiveness regardless of the presentation.

For specific advertising purposes, the colors that you choose for your logo are important because their shade, intensity, and fit with your specific type of business will determine the effectiveness of your graphic representation. Your choices should enhance your brand recognition power by matching your business and blending with selected icon and font to create a single, cohesive image.

Keep these points in mind when selecting colors to incorporate in the design of your company logo:
-- Match the colors with your unique business characteristics. For example:
-consider neutral shades for a relaxed, yet professional business purpose, for example, a medical office, legal services provider or accountancy business.

-warm colors, such as reds, yellows and oranges are great for attracting attention and provide a welcoming ambiance and for the hospitality and restaurant fields. They also project energy helpful to sellers of children!s toys, furnishings and clothing, especially when used with simple primary shades.

-feminine shades of pink, purple, pale green and blue enhance recognition for products being marketed to women, such as fashions, accessories, cosmetics and jewelry.
-smart, slick contrasting colors such as black, silver and white work together to create a brisk business image that indicates efficiency and competence, particularly helpful for a business involved in sales, real estate or public service.

-the use of patriotic colors in company logos indicates dedication and trustworthiness. They are usually used to create logo art for government agencies or businesses that market products associated with a patriotic purpose or celebration, such as flags, uniforms, souvenirs and promotional materials.

-- Be aware of the level of saturation used in your logo design, the colors should complement the text and icons without overwhelming them or obstructing them from instant recognition.

--Don !t expect the colors used in the computerized version of your design to look exactly the same when reproduced in printed form. Some colors do not transfer to equivalent ink tones. If you are working on your own and have limited design experience, you should probably consult a professional with regard to this field.

--Consider your logo colors in light of your entire business color scheme. Letterhead, collateral promotional materials, your website design, physical store (if you operate one) and your packaging should coordinate to project an image of efficient cohesiveness, adding to the professionalism of your corporate image. It might not be necessary to make everything match, but avoid clashes at all costs.

Choose and apply your logo colors carefully and the result will be a logo that attracts the right customers to your business for all the best reasons.

Your Best Business Logo: Recipe for Success

You want your new business logo to have as professional an appearance as possible and to function as an effective representation of your company. Making these design principles a part of your logo creation process will help you to emerge with a final product that will make your business proud and profitable for decades to come.

Principle #1 – Choose simple over complicated when it comes to both color and design. Even if your business is centered on an artistic or decorative product or pursuit, you need not overdo this in your logo. Overly elaborate designs might make pretty page art, but can actually hurt your business by failing to leave a quick, accurate and lasting impression on your viewing audience.

Consider the popular logos that you see every day, in fact, spend a few days noticing them as you go about your life as usual—driving, reading newspapers and magazines, viewing television and websites for recreational purposes. When you see a logo that really reaches out and grabs your attention, write it down. Keep going until you!ve got a list. When you review them, you!ll probably notice that they share a simple but attractive design with a splash of color and ability to stay in your memory.

Principle #2 – Continue the simplicity trend when choosing the text for your logo. Pick a font that is familiar to the eye and very easily readable. Again, examine your list of everyday logos from Principle #1 and you!ll see that the best fonts are clear and simple, with open spaced characters, usually of san serif variety. Avoid italics; they are notoriously difficult to read, especially in small font sizes. Popular choices include Arial and Verdana.

Principle #3 – Express Yourself! Think of your logo as your company!s graphic signature, in a world where clashing and competing graphics make up a huge part of the everyday visual life of consumers (you!ve likely experienced this phenomenon while compiling your list of favorites); the last thing that you want is a disconnected logo that confuses your audience. You need to build into your logo a close relationship between the essential nature of your business and the design that introduces your company to the world. Again, examine the logos you see every day and you!ll see how they relate to the purpose, mission and "personality! of your company. If they do not, you!ll see a real life example of why it!s so important to follow Principle #3 as closely as possible.

Principle #4 Leave an Impression

How big is your company !s advertising budget? Chances are, if it is new, you have little to spare. Make your resources go further by devising a logo that begs a second look from your target audience and increases the level of recognition with every view. To accomplish this goal, you!ll need an original design that clearly stands out from the rest of the pack. This is not as difficult as it might seem – it requires thought, time and planning along with reliance on established design rules and a clear understanding of your country!s purpose and its vision for the future.

Your company logo is a visual representation of your business brand. It is an expression of your vision, purpose, appeal and degree of professionalism
Logo Design: Use it to Your Business Advantage

Even if you !ve included a well designed logo in your overall branding and promotion strategy, you!ve probably already listened to plenty of conflicting opinions concerning the importance of a logo to the overall success of your company. These opinions, some from experienced business people, have probably left you wondering – how much of my precious resources do you really need to commit to logo design?

When considered as just one pillar of your overall branding and marketing strategy, your logo !s value is negligible, but when combined with other elements, it can lift your company to a level of success head and shoulders above your competition.

How can you harness the power of a great logo and use it to build your brand and enhance your business recognition? Here are some visible ways that your logo supports and advance your business, all with the aim of establishing a profitable and enduring enterprise:

! •! A good logo will increase the power of your advertising dollar. Well designed and memorable – it will stretch your resources by taking fewer views to make a lasting impression on your target audience. This aspect is particularly important if your ad budget is small.

! •! Your logo presents your business name with the power of a graphic form. For this reason, you need to be sure that you!re comfortable with the design and that it is a valid and authentic representation of your business image and vision. Graphics naturally draw attention to text, and style attracts interest so that viewers want to examine the substance of the business itself. Your logo supplies enormous power in establishing your business as truly professional and trustworthy, and gives you the advantage over a business without one, or with one of inferior quality.

! •! Your logo projects your business image industry wide. Suppliers, customers, competitors in your field will get their first impression of your business from your logo – make it as positive as possible. A clean, professional, memorable graphic presentation gives them confidence that they are dealing with a high caliber business that cares about its reputation and plans to remain an industry player for years to come.

! •! Your logo attracts customers. It plays a vital role in establishing brand identity and brings new customers into the fold while it welcomes returning customers who associate it with a positive previous customer experience. Think of it as your sign post on a highway crowded with competing businesses. In addition to bringing in new customers, it will bring in repeat business based on the level of satisfaction that people remember and associate with the visual image of your logo.

! •! Your logo is especially important if you do business online. The online marketplace is a virtual cornucopia of design and color, sounds and images, all competing for attention and ultimately, for profit. Creating and utilizing a logo that stands out from the competition and helps to convey an image of excellence and trustworthiness contributes greatly to both your business image and your bottom line.

Choosing a logo may not be the most important decision you !ll make in the initial stages of your business, but it is one that will follow you through the years to come. Wise decisions will go a long way toward creating a powerful logo as well as a powerful and profitable business.

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