Your Corporate Identity, logo design

By: ron bercume at SeeMore Media

Submitted on Sun, Apr 15th, 2007 12:00 am

When you see the face of a friend, you don't have to wonder who it is. You recognize him, you experience affection on meeting him, and you remember him in the future. A good logo can help make a company into a friend, into "someone" who is known, liked and remembered. There are infinite faces, and there are infinite logo designs. You want to make yours stand out in a crowd. The nice thing about a logo is that you get to choose what image you show to the world.

The process of designing a logo employs a complex web of factors in order to arrive at a simple result. The simpler your logo, the more memorable it is. A memorable logo strengthens your brand recognition, distinguishes your product from competitors' and serves as your identification for doing business. It sends a subliminal message to the viewer that elicits an emotional response.

Consider some of the best-known logos: Apple Computer's apple, Nike's swoosh and McDonald's arches. Each is an uncomplicated mark that immediately conjures in your mind an entity different from all others. It also suggests to you how you feel about the company. The power of a good design is remarkable. McDonald's is probably the best example of using a simple logo as a marketing force. The graceful gold lines figure prominently in all of its presentations and enjoy almost universal consumer recognition. Similarly, your logo is going to be your face to the public, now and into the future. You need it to be as resonant and memorable as possible.

When you hire professionals like those at SeeMore Media, they bring designers' tools to the task. Artists create logos with shape, color, typography, style and form. The way that these are combined defines your image. Designers know that rectangles indicate stability, while circles suggest movement. Blue has the attributes of trust and power, while green speaks of life and nature. A serif typeface is conservative, while sans serif is informal. The designer uses these tools to reveal your company's essence.

In order to interpret your business to consumers, the artist needs to know as much as possible about its key aspects. SeeMore Media gathers detailed information through an online questionnaire. The information to provide includes: What's the consumer's prime benefit from using your product or service? What's unique about your company? Who are your competitors? Who is your target market? What's their average age and background? The clearer your answers are, the better your logo will represent you.

Other questions concern your preferences. Does your company already have an identifying color? Are there specific colors or features that you want included or excluded? Have you seen logos for other companies similar to what you want? Does your company already have a tag line, or slogan?

How and where your logo will be used has an effect on its character. Will it be shown on the web? In print? On signage? On clothing? On letterhead and business cards? Each of these applications has its own requirements. You want something that works well in every planned media. This also gives the designer some idea of the sizes involved.

You'll be asked to choose how many colors you want, to a maximum of four. More color increases the cost and difficulty of printing the logo and won't necessarily improve its effectiveness. You can make this decision after the creative work starts. Most logo design processes begin with black-and-white samples. The clarity of black-and-white reveals a design's effectiveness, and most companies need a black-and-white version for faxing, photocopying and newspaper ads. While color is easily added to a logo, it's not so easily removed. Colorful designs can look awful when robbed of their hues.

Logos come in several types: text, iconic and illustrative. A text logo has no graphic. The stylized name of Coca-Cola is a successful text logo. This type is tremendously difficult to design, because the artist's tools are limited to the name of the company and the typography. A good one has several advantages: it's useful for making the business name into a brand, it's easily understood by consumers, it can be reproduced effectively in any size and color, including black-and-white, and it can be printed on just about any item. On the other hand, a text-only logo is difficult to make distinctive and isn't as flashy as other types.

An iconic logo employs a simple graphic, or icon. These are the ones that become unforgettable given sufficient exposure. The three companies mentioned above, Apple, Nike and McDonald's, have iconic types. The most common form of logo, it can be the most difficult to do well. It's in the nature of an icon that it must appeal to huge numbers of people, be clearly identifiable and truly express the nature of the company, all while being simple in form. A good iconic logo is more memorable than a text-only logo, yet it's still easily reproduced in various colors and sizes. If it's unique, it's easily trademarked. The process of developing an icon is time-consuming and requires a truly excellent designer or design team.

An illustrative logo has a more detailed graphic, perhaps of a mascot or of an aspect of the company's product or service. KFC's drawing of Colonel Sanders is a good illustrative design. This type of logo is more easily made distinctive and can be highly memorable, but it's also less flexible in application. Since it has more detail, reproducing it in small sizes or in black-and-white is usually not effective. Illustrative logos are the most expensive variety to obtain. Several different artistic talents must be combined, requiring a creative team; if design parameters are changed during the process, it usually means starting over again from scratch.

Along with these three main categories are many combinations, modifications and hybrids. An icon may be combined with typography that is either removable or integrated. An illustrative logo often includes typography for the company name. A particular graphic may be neither as lean as an icon nor as fully detailed as a rich illustration. Be sure that the logo design team you work with allows you the flexibility to find exactly the right image for your company.

SeeMore Media's artists help you to answer all of the design questions that arise. You need only to provide information about your company. As long as you know who you are, you'll get what you need. Thinking carefully about your company's brand as you go through the design process may be instructive as well as enjoyable.

About the Author

ron bercume
SeeMore Media

SeeMoreMedia Graphic Design, Adirondack Mountains, NY Real world design product for large to small business, with a common sense approach and focus. We specialize in business identity development, producing everything from general print medias, to full blown websites. Staying abreast of the latest in contemporary design and technology, we provide our family of clients with a accessible products and services to successfully promote their business