Logos and Identity

To make the most of its creative marketing components, your business must have a recognizable brand identity with an intelligent, focused marketing plan. Spectrum's creative design team will help you create a unique brand that grows with well-executed promotion strategies.

The foundation to any solid brand begins with a custom logo — a visual representation of your business's unique identity. Your logo determines not only the colors and fonts that will later be used on your website and print material, but also the overall look and feel of those items. With your input, Spectrum will create a polished, professional logo that strengthens your brand identity in the marketplace. Coordinating business cards, letterhead, and envelopes may also be developed, all with an original, cohesive look that is critical to successfully branding your business.

Consistent design assures your potential clients and reinforces the brand recognition of your business.

When we use the word logo here, we are including all types of logos — logo marks: images or graphic representations (think Shell); logotypes: letters or words treated in a special way to make them unique (think Coca-Cola); or,

some combination of logomark and logotype (think McDonald's).

A logo identifies the company

It is a major part of the company's overall corporate identity. Some logos provide a hint about what the company does or sells.

A logo should help build the image the company wants in the minds of its customers and prospects. It must be able to deliver the message. It should be recognizable and easy to remember. It should work well across a variety of materials and media .

There's a balance between looking good and working hard that needs to be achieved. Neither is expendable.

Common Errors in Thinking

A logo can prove unworkable for a number of reasons. A common, and often costly, error is underestimating the importance of company identity right from the beginning.

We see this often when a company rushes the development of a logo without taking the time to evaluate whether or not it advances the image they wish to portray to clients and prospects. Later they may find that it does not enhance or build on their image as the company grows.

An important first step in logo design

The first step in designing a logo is review and evaluation of the company, always with a view to at least 5 or 10 years into the future. This means introspection. It means having a plan for the future of the company. It means an honest evaluation of what is wanted, what is possible and what is probable. What is the image the company needs to build in order for that plan to materialize? Can that image be represented graphically? Can a logo help to build that image? In what ways? Color, artwork, type style, size, boldness, flashiness, conservatism are all parts of reflecting the image desired. Which will accomplish the goal best? Which are trendy tricks that will fade leaving the company looking dated and stale?

Common Errors

Another part of the evaluation that should occur before the design of a company logo is determining, as well as possible, the ways in which the logo will be used. Stationery? More than likely. But what about signs? Use on vehicles, in advertising, on specialty items like pens? How about on a Web site or on a billboard? The list goes on. Many of these have very different technical requirements that need to be considered before creating a logo that might not be adaptable. It is possible to design a logo that is quite beautiful, enhances the company's image and yet, is completely unworkable in the real world. The reasons for this are almost as varied as the logos themselves. But they break down into a few major categories and with careful thought and preparation can usually be avoided. In the world today, a logo simply must be available as electronic artwork. There's no getting around this. There would be tremendous costs and delays in attempting to use non-digitized artwork when working with printers, advertising media, designers, etc. This may seem obvious but not all computer programs are the same. They have different purposes and learning which computer programs perform different tasks best is a very important part of learning about computers and learning how to best create a logo. We often see logos that have been created using an image editing program such as Adobe Photoshop. This is the wrong program to use. Adobe Photoshop is best used for continuous tone images like photographs that will be printed in full color or perhaps as shades of gray. It is not best for line art or drawings. For that, you need to use a program that will allow you to maintain the original artwork in a vector or outline format, so that it remains easily edited as individual elements.

Vector graphics can easily have different colors applied to them and can be created to print in one color or dozens of colors. Furthermore, vector graphics can be scaled without loss of resolution. Drawing programs such as Adobe Illustrator are appropriate choices and will help to avoid costly redraws later. So start out the right way and use a drawing program. This gives you the ability to update the logo when needed and to create the exact format that individual print projects require as well as preparing the logo for use on the Web or in other media, in small sizes and large, in one color when economy is required and in 4-color when appropriate. You will save money in the long run by creating the logo properly the first time.

A valuable asset.

A company's logo design, its corporate identity, is a valuable asset and should be approached that way. It should be protected from infringement and misuse. It should be updated and kept fresh through ongoing review and evaluation. It is an investment in the company and its value should be expected to last for years. Your logo must be applied consistently and protected in order to be a true asset to the company. Once a logo is designed and produced we find that they way the logo is used is what builds the brand. The configuration, colors, type style, relative sizes of elements all stay the same. Recognition is built by presenting the same image repeatedly. Don't change the colors for a holiday sales promotion. If you are printing and cannot afford the colors established for your corporate identity, print in black. Don't rearrange the elements in the logo for different publications. Keep the logo separated from other elements so it remains distinct and easily recognized. A very good option is to make it part of a signature with address and contact information and keep that together as a single element away from other content. Don't use a logo as a headline, or embed the logo in body copy or put it inside another graphic element on the page. Don't combine it with other images or other logos. Do not alter your logo. This is for brand-building and also to protect the integrity and legal standing of your rights to that logo.

Summary

Think twice, design once is the mantra. Look ahead at least 5 years and don't get too trendy. Prepare the image carefully in a flexible format. Consistency and continuity are your goals.