A good logo is more than aesthetically pleasing. It is easy to understand, easy to remember, it relates to the brand image, and it conveys the brand message successfully. Logo designing is an extensive process that requires a lot of expertise, experience, and understanding of the brand. There is one ultimate truth about logo design you must never forget – no good logos come for free. You might be a great creative thinker or an ideator, and you can come up with your brand’s logo idea all by yourself, but you will need the assistance of a graphic designer or a dedicated logo designer to help you with the final design process.
Designing a logo is not just slapping a few fonts and stock vectors together to create something abstract and new. This is not a small design job although it is probably small by dimension. A logo will represent your company personality, brand message, and appeal to a wide base of potential customers. Therefore, it has to be appealing to a mass, it has to represent either a part of the service or the company itself (think about the Hindustan Unilever logo), and it has to be powerful enough to lay the groundwork for the entire branding process.
What is a good logo?
A good logo is a powerful logo. It has a high recall value, and it includes good imagery. A good logo simply stands out in the crowd. It is imperative to keep it distinct from logos of other companies. No two companies can have the same or very similar logos. A logo is the identity of a company, and there is no way your company can adopt a logo design inspired by your competition. When you think of a great logo, you can think about Mozilla Firefox, Nokia, Coca-Cola, McDonald’s and KFC. These are all popular brands with logos that have been the same (or at least similar) for the last couple of decades.
How many types of logos are there?
Many brand owners, business managers, and even novice designers are unaware of this, but there are several types of logos. Primarily, there are three broad types that your logo design firmshould help you check out.
- Logotypes:these are the most common of the lot. There was a time when all brands used to have one including Wendy’s, Facebook and Nokia. They usually include a distinct twist to a popular font in the design. Today, the concept of using a typeface to inspire the logo design has taken new dimensions thanks to the powers of Adobe Photoshop and InDesign. It is the trademark of versatile companies with multiple services like DuPont, Athletica, and Cube. Each of these companies stylizes their fonts to create signature logo designs that are instantly recognizable.
- Literal imagery:these are very common in all niches as they render meaning to the company’s name almost instantly. It is a visual representation of the company’s services, products or domain. They are easy to recognize and remember, making them one of the most popular types of choice for marketers and brand owners alike. Creating a literal logotakes creativity and intelligence. Some of the more popular literal logos are simply witty! Hidden imagery and insinuated meanings are very common among literal imageries. Meat lovers Gourmet Burger &Cie, NBA and The Guild of Food Writers have interesting, fresh, yet understandable logo designs. The smart use of white space creates room for new additions to the brand stories in the last two cases.
- Abstract imagery:abstract logos are the best for companies with several subsidiary businesses, branches, and services. One of the ideal examples of a multifarious abstract logo is the Apple’s Apply with a bite taken out of it. When a person looks at it, he or she immediately knows which brand it is and yet the logo does not represent a particular Apple product or service. It is true for the Nike swoosh, the Adidas stripes, Twitter bird and Volkswagen medallion. Although they do not contribute a direct meaning, they are instantly relatable to these brands. Abstract imagery helps these brands expand more without new design processes and incurring new expenses.
How to choose the perfect logo?
Which logo design type is ideal for you? Is it possible for your company to come up with a design that is rather intermediary? What is the one design that will determine the present and the future of your company? To design a great logo you need to complete the following tasks first –
- Know your brand inside and out
- Find a designer, who understands your branding and logo needs
- Construct a good brief that can deliver all your necessities across to your designer team
- Research on the different logotypes, the evolution of logos over the years and the companies that have diversified the concept of logo design in the recent years.
- Find out the latest logo design trends and understand why it might be beneficial to include these trends in your design process.
- Understand your target audience. Who will see the logo and which media platforms will see the logo? This will make a lot of difference in the designing process.
Why is logo designing challenging even today?
The problem with a lot of novice designers is not the lack of Design Tools or resources. Almost all the modern young designers know quite a bit about the available software and resources, but they rarely know how much to include and what to exclude. An excellent logo design is not always about what is in it; it is also about what is excluded from it. The Starbucks Mermaid can seem a bit OTT for a lot of designers today, but it works due to the Starbucks heritage. The same way, Apple believes in a simplistic logo design that is no less recognizable that the Starbucks Mermaid.
The design you choose will depend on your brand image, business niche, target customers and, of course, your taste. No matter what design or logotype you go with, you need to invest in a lot of research to perfect the process.
