Imagine this scenario – you’ve spent years dreaming about running your own business, countless hours perfecting every aspect of your product, even picked out a killer company name, and then it is represented by a logo that looks like it was made using WordArt. Your logo is more than just an image, it IS your business. Take Apple’s logo for example… basic, nothing special, it’s just a piece of fruit with a bite taken out of it, but it has been one of the most iconic and easily identifiable logos since their sales skyrocketed in 1980. Think of your logo as the frontman of a good band – the music (your products) could be outstanding, but the frontman is an uncharismatic, unlikeable character with no respect for the talent of his musicians. Let your logo be the Freddie Mercury to Queen.
Time is precious and designing a logo is time consuming. A well-designed logo requires research which can be a lengthy process, even more so if you don’t know what you’re looking for. Professional designers follow a workflow with proven success, utilising the most efficient methods. Calculate your hourly rate and times that by the hours you’d spend scouring Google images for the perfect logo. A logo from a freelancer or agency typically costs around £200-£300. Remember, work smarter, not harder.
You’ve got your company name, and now you’re Googling ‘roofing company logos’, the first results populate an image of a 2D roof, a couple of windows, and a company name usually in bold capital letters. How many other roofing companies do you think have done the same? Before you know it, you’ve slapped said logo on the side of your van and now you look like every other roofing company out there. Whilst this might fix a problem, it doesn’t make your company stand out. Expert designers steer clear of overused designs for this very reason, they want your logo to be unique to you.
Ever seen someone wearing a branded t-shirt with a logo you don’t recognise and you’ve had to squint to read what it says? Probably not, but the point is, logo versatility is a thing. Say you’ve got an ultra-detailed logo that looks mint on the sign above your shop, good stuff… now scale that logo down to your employees’ uniform and you’ve got a thumbprint that looks like a stain. You want your logo to be easily visible on everything – the side of a pen – ten out of ten, plastered across a van – huge fan!
We’ve all been guilty at some point of going into a hardware store and looking at the paint colour charts and trying to match up colours like some interior design god, only to find that when you’ve finished decorating, you find the colours don’t quite match. Colour theory is a science and art, established by Isaac Newton in 1666. It’s relatively easy to understand but very hard to master. Every colour has warm and cool variations, each that are complementary to another. Finding the correct colour combination can make your brand POP! Get this wrong and it can make things feel off, very off. Designers are trained to find the perfect colours to make your brand speak loudly for itself.
How about fonts? Just like colours, there’s thousands of fonts out there. To the untrained eye, fonts are just either blocky cowboy film title credits, fancy 5-star restaurant menu headings, or a copy of the latest school newsletter (looking at you, Comic Sans). Believe it or not, two fonts can look the exact same, but a designer can tell the difference, and it could be something as simple as a flick on the letter L. Fonts play a HUGE part in your brand, it gives it personality and recognition. More often than not, a good designer will take a standard font and customise it to be unique to your company. Famous brands such as Samsung, Google, and Netflix all have their own specialised fonts.
This is probably one of the biggest hurdles to overcome as a business owner. Remember the episodes of Kitchen Nightmares where Gordon Ramsay would rock up to a restaurant that would have garish décor, specifically the one set in a tropical theme with a tiki hellscape? When you’re designing something for yourself, it’s difficult to detach yourself from your emotions. What might work for you, might not work for your customers. It’s always best to hire an outsider to create a design for you – whilst they’re passionate about what’s best for your business, they aren’t emotionally involved in the same way that you are.
As mentioned earlier, a logo is not just an image, it is your entire brand. OK so, on the surface, a logo is just an image, but underneath all of that is psychology. People are naturally attracted to symmetry – think the Taj Mahal, celebrities with almost perfect symmetrical faces. The same applies for the correct use of ratios. Without going into too much detail, the golden ratio is used to create balance and order in design that is aesthetically pleasing to the eye, much like the rule of thirds. Cluttered in-your-face designs can be off-putting which is why a designer takes into consideration the geometry, symmetry, and the rule of thirds to avoid overdoing it.
So, you’ve got a couple of hours spare, you’ve gone onto Google and typed ‘logo design’ and a number of results pop up ‘free logo maker’. You think ‘Great, let’s create a logo’. Within minutes of visiting a single website, a popup appears offering premium plans with a 30-day free trial. You click away from the offer and proceed to create yourself a logo, but you find that most of the pre-made (and overused) templates are locked behind a paid account, so what do you do? Sign up to that 30-day free trial. Right, you’ve designed a logo in the free 30 days you have and placed it on your website and cancelled the free trial. Winner… you’ve still got access to that logo, however, you notice in a months’ time that you’ve decided you want to change up the logo a little. Back to the free logo maker website you go and oh… you’ve lost access to 90% of the premium features you once had and now you’ve used your only free trial. A lot of logo maker sites claim to be free, however, what they fail to mention is that once you’ve established your identity, you now have to sign up to access their (often expensive) premium services to make any changes. One popular design maker website in particular charges £99.99 for an annual subscription, that’s 50% of what a professional designer would charge you for a highly customised, well-researched, professional logo that is yours to own forever.
We’ve all heard of the term ‘consistency is key’. Well, that’s because it is. It applies to most scenarios, often with a positive outcome. Becoming fit and healthy because you attended the gym 3 times a week for a year? That’s consistency. Turned up on time to work every morning with little to no sick days? That’s also consistency. It builds trust, which is the foundation for loyalty and promotion. You want to build an identity that your customers can trust. Think Volvo – safe, reliable, and durable. Aldi – budget friendly, value for money. Your logo is your biggest identifier of your company, and the first thing that people see. It’s imperative that you nail down the design and everything it represents.
Alright, the point about being unique has been laboured enough in this article. So, let’s take a different angle this time. How many times have you been driving, and a billboard has caught your eye, or a new shop that has opened in town, you’re immediately inquisitive and take a mental note to explore it later. You’ve just succumbed to marketing. Tik Tok is an excellent platform to hype up products, especially since it’s user base is mostly influential teenagers and young adults. Why do they go viral? Good marketing and professional designers that have created a strong brand. People nowadays are extremely fickle and are always looking for the next fad, setting yourself apart from your competitors is what stands between you and becoming the next big thing.
