Logo Design: Visually Aligning Your Story
--
Within the anatomy that makes up a brand, one could argue that a logo is the face of the company. A solid, visually pleasing logo design can draw in consumers in and spike their curiosity. These “company faces” however, carry the weight of so many significant underlining components to a brand, for they are the embodiment of what a company stands for, and the promises they aim to deliver.
Whether a start-up company is aiming to make a first impression, or an establish company is re-introducing itself to the world with a brand refresh, logos, when carefully created, can truly propel brand recognizability and even consumer loyalty. It may appear as though a hefty task, but knowing the best practices makes a world of difference.
Positioning Your Brand Story
One of the greatest aspects of logo design is the way it embodies the entire entity of a company and all its moving, dynamic parts. Aligning your brand story and the identity that you wish for it to tell needs to be cohesive with its visual representations. Dissecting your company’s overall “why” or purpose is a great steppingstone in solidifying a design you can claim proud ownership over.
This is also a vital way to capture the way you wish your company’s name to be associated with a visual representation since a name and design are tethered together and should thus feel cohesive.
The expectation to fully capture originality can loom over any idea or concept, and although it is a challenging feat to ensure pure, authentic, and complete originality, solidifying your brand story is what further streamlines the logo design process to feel personalized and unique to your brand. Moreover, this can even open up the opportunity for team collaboration and input within the design and iteration process.
Finding the Balance
Targeting an approach that can lead to brand recognizability within a logo design can often be found within simplicity and minimalism. Logos are best effective when they cater towards a balanced, timeless look that allows them to become instantly recognizable by consumers. Yet, there is an underlining psychology at play that adds another floating piece to the orbital process of a logo design before it finds its gravity and can solidify in the market.
Although many consumers would prefer a less cluttered logo design, a design that is too bare can often decrease client trust because of the lack of descriptiveness. According to a study, logo descriptiveness creates authenticity for consumers because it reflects clearly on what a company does. Overly minimalist design thus creates a cold, distant large corporation feel which can drive away possible consumers.
Therefore, it is about finding the right balance that will reflect your company perfectly, while catering to your target audience. Think about the emotions you want your consumer/user to feel and the message you wish for them to understand about your company.
Color Can Be A Catalyst
In UI design and brand building, it is no secret that color plays a fundamental role in user and consumer reception. Realistically, it may be the feature that users notice first about a logo design. Much like the psychology of graphic design, color has a stronghold on user influence as well. The right color palette can strengthen brand association which in turn allows the opportunity for conversion.
According to a study, color plays a fundamental role in customer conversion and influences 60 to 80% of their decisions. Finding the right color story for your brand and logo development can be broken down by its psychology. In that same study, it was also discovered that reds and blues were the most prominent choices, with red known to create a visceral, attention-grabbing response, and blue emitting feelings of confidence and reliability. Color is another layer to the confluence of design and can truly impact your company’s logo and the way consumers respond to it.
Solidify Your SEO
As stated, pure originality can sometimes be hard to come by within the relentless pace of the digital world. However, taking preventative measures to ensure there is no overlap in SEO is paramount.
For start-up companies, the best practice of ensuring that your company does not overlap too heavily on another brand can be full-filled by avoiding common phrases in your company name that will muddle your SEO when consumer search for you, and by avoiding similar color combinations to other brands. It is important to stand out as your own entity in such as saturated market, and thus, if a consumer searches for your logo or company, the last thing a brand would want is to be confused for another.
For established companies, a brand refresh can be conducted at the micro to macro level, however, when it comes to logo design, it is key to ensure that your current logo has enough versatility to be reconceptualized, while remaining recognizable to your pre-established audience. Finding new ways to align with your new brand positioning and livening your color story or sharpening your visuals and typography can truly elevate a logo without sacrificing user recognizability.
Logo design attains the power to truly propel a company and embody its overall story. The essence of a great design needs to be all encompassing to a brand’s authenticity, and a firm footing at the startling line can create a logo that can lead your company off to the races.
