A serious pitfall for many designers is skipping to the end of a logo project and starting to draw right away. Any qualified person can design a pretty logo in this way, but from our experience how effective that logo is depends on 5 other distinct processes being successful too.
So, removing the actual design process of the logo itself, this article reviews the other steps that we take to ensure that a logo is as effective as it can be for our clients and their companies.
Research
Research within the client’s industry for competition and comparables is critically important. Our first step with any corporate identity project is to survey the existing logos out there, making sure that we don’t duplicate someone else’s concept. This also assists us to avoid cliche or highly used elements used in an industry, and inspires our creativity knowing what else is out there already. This greatly assists our logos to stand-out for greater effectiveness in commerce.
Target Audiences
Establishing the target audiences is the only real way to focus the imagery and brand “feel” of a logo to be most effective. The emotional connection behind any logo is important, and the only way that can be accomplished is through clearly establishing the target audiences. The next time you’re out and about, look around at logos that attract you. You’ll find that you see many logos that have some attraction and are relevant to your needs, but your brain will automatically omit many logos from your attention. The little search engine in your head automatically edits logos and images of things that you’re not interested in from your perception, and that’s weird.
The Story
Most every successful logo and brand we have designed has a story that defines it. By crafting a story around a brand and logo, we make it easier for our client’s customers to identify with the logo, to personify it, or to make it their own to the point where they even want to wear it on their body. A good use of metaphor plays into this process, an the result is a more committed customer, and usually, if it’s done right, they don’t even know why.
Outstanding Client Experience
A superior client experience with a logo design process is surprisingly important in a logo’s overall effectiveness. We strive to design the client’s personal human element into all our logos in order to help our clients build teams with their final corporate identity. Success with any logo comes from within any organization as well as from without, so starting at home and making the logo concepts relevant to the client personally will only make the design process go smoothly, and can make a happy client into a client for life.
Metrics
Establishing quantifiable evaluation up front and checking on it at regular intervals is the only successful method to know if your logo is truly being effective for the target audiences. At the release of a logo into commerce, our clients have benchmarks that they’re looking to reach in business, and the logo itself contributes to these evaluation moments in a very real way. With data about a logo’s effectiveness, we’re able to know when it might be time to promote a logo with a particular media, or if it’s time for a logo revamp, update, or even the design of a whole new logo in order for the corporate identity to continue to reach our client’s target audiences over time.
At ID International we design corporate identity and logos on a daily basis for our clients, and if we’re not currently drawing pretty shapes and type on paper, each project is always in one of these above steps guaranteeing the project’s effectiveness.
Contact us at ID International anytime to learn more, and to launch your own corporate identity project with us at: www.identity-international.com
