I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – your logo is not your brand!
However that does not mean that you don’t need a logo for your business.
Imagine building a house without foundations? We all know what happened to the little piggy who built his house of straw. With this in mind, I’d like you to think of your logo as your foundation for your brand.
Designing a logo is similar to designing a house.
1. Professional advice
Before you build a house, there are a number of steps where you consult professionals along the way. The first port of call would be a well qualified architect. This is someone who can assess the lay of the land, and then design your home accordingly. After all, you wouldn’t want your house to fall over after all of your hard work and money. We look at a logo design the same way. Why get something quick and nasty that doesn’t say anything about your brand? For all the time and effort you put into your business, an investment in a great logo, where you speak to a professional (not your cousin’s, friends’ daughter who’s good at art) is going to keep your business buoyant, front of mind and ahead of the game.
2. Well planned
Well planned foundations will ensure that you will get the house that you dream of. Without a plan of what the house is to finally look like, it’s very hard for the builders to lay out the foundations. So too, when creating a logo, you need a blue print of your business. What is your businesses ‘why’? What do you want to achieve? What is your brand, your voice, your tone, your message? Who is your target audience? Where are they and how do you ‘talk’ to them. All of these elements need to be considered.
3. Correct design
Just like your foundations for your home, you want your logo to be correctly designed. What do I mean by this? Well, you wouldn’t have the same kind of foundations for a single storey house as a double storey as the load is different. If your business is set to be the next Nike, you don’t want a logo that looks like it belongs to a local small business and visa versa.
Simply put, the foundation for your house is what everything rests on. The same goes for a logo in your business – everything flows from that single mark. So getting the foundation right, will go a long way toward having a strong and stable business – I mean, building – for many years.
Written by branding specialist Debbie O’Connor
Consultant, Strategist, Keynote Speaker
