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Logo Design

There’s a lot more to logo design than picking out a piece of clip art and putting the brand name under it. Printers do that all the time, and I’ll bet you haven’t had one of those cards make an impression on your mind. They tend to look alike and be bland. File and forget.

Logo defined: The logo, short for logotype in its most formal usage, is technically the type treatment applied to the company or product name. But over time its general definition evolved to incorporate other design elements, if present - a symbol and perhaps a tagline. So today, the term logo incorporates name and other consistently used elements to identity and “sign” materials of a company.

Logo purpose expanded: Not only should your logo identify your company, it should also convey the essence of the brand. It should compliment the corporate culture and vision. It should crystalize and communicate your desired position within the collective minds of your customers and prospects. It stands for the product, the company, or both.

Your logo can be a meme: We’ve discussed memes in the Positioning Statement segment, about how a meme can crystalize and present an idea inherent to your company’s identity. Your logo can contribute to that idea, or possibly be that idea. Think of the cupped hands in the AllState logo, the old umbrella logo for Travelers Insurance, the stage coach of Wells Fargo.  Symbols, particularly if they can be integrated with the name, can greatly help establish or reenforce the meme. See the examples of “Maverick” and “Carnivore” logo examples

Signature Strategies design process: At Signature Strategies, we consider these practical factors as well as the big picture: your corporate goals and vision, the identity and personality you want to develop and convey, the impression you want your customers and prospects to come away with, another way to differentiate from your competitors.

Signature Strategies designs logos to meet predetermined objectives having to do with establishing a consistent and attractive identity for the brand or company.

We begin the design process once objectives are agreed upon, a survey of potential logo uses is completed, and a collection of competitors’ logos studied. We usually develop ten or twelve logos, some with several variations, we believe meets all criteria. Upon getting client feedback, we’ll modify one or two, add one or two, combine another one or two for a second round of narrowing the field. By the third iteration we will usually have a distinctive, hardworking logo that all agree meets the predetermined criteria and that the client feels enthusiastic about.

Logos for services: The logo is an important element in branding and positioning services as well as products and companies. In many offerings, it may be the only tangible aspect of the brand. It needs to quickly and clearly identify and convey personality.

Historically, the logo was a trade mark, a mark placed on a product to identify the maker and demonstrate that craftsperson’s pride in his or her work. The logo should still be a symbol that connotes  pride and distinctiveness. The logo is not a place to take short cuts,  and sacrifice quality for expediency.

You’ll some valuable information on setting design criteria, and for selecting a final design in Logo Evaluation, many examples of logos designed by Signature Strategies in Logo Samples, and finally, a discussion of typography as it relates to logos. There are also several original type fonts and ding bat fonts we have created that you can download to use as you like from the typography section.