All logos are not created equal

At the heart of a strong business brand is an identifiable logo. Developing a logo requires creativity, research, thought and considerable work. It’s not something that should be thrown together ad-hoc. You can get a cheap logo through websites such as Fiverr, and I recently saw an offer in a Facebook business group for a logo, business card design and 250 printed business cards for $299. But as with most things, you get what you pay for.

And what you should get is a customised logo that effectively represents and differentiates your unique business, and appeals to your customers – not leftover concepts from someone else’s brief, or a rip-off of another logo.

A design professional will take the time to understand what your business does, your vision, values and personality, and who your customers are. They will spend time discussing your design ideas and preferences (and they may not agree with them and they will tell you why!). They will research your business category, competitors and symbols. They will explore and test ideas and concepts, and present you with multiple logo concepts to work from.

I thought it would be helpful to take you through the logo design process so you can understand the value of engaging a professional graphic designer:

• Brief: The designer will take a detailed brief about your business – vision, values, personality, products and services, and customers. They will want to know about any design ideas and preferences you may have, dislikes and so forth. They will draw out all the information they can to determine what attributes they will turn into a visual representation of your business. They will take lots of notes!

• Research: The next step involves researching the marketplace, competitors, businesses with similar personalities in other categories, as well as relevant symbols and icons. This research will help ensure your brand is differentiated and unique.

• Concept development: Alongside the research, ideas will be noted and sketched. There will be brainstorming, experimenting and then filtering and refinement of concepts until the strongest designs emerge.

• Presentation: Once the initial concepts are developed the designer should present at least two, but ideally three distinctly different logo concepts (not just different colours or slightly varied logos – that’s later in the process).

• Feedback: The designer will be interested in your initial feedback, along with your thoughts as you contemplate the designs over a few days.

• Revision: Your feedback will be incorporated into revised designs and updated concepts will be presented. Then there’s more feedback and further revision of the concepts – this may loop through two or three times.

• Development: Once you’ve decided on a concept, the final logos will be developed – perhaps in vertical and horizontal versions, to work as a single colour and in reverse; as well as versions for social media icons. Logos should be created in various colour formats (PMS, CMYK, RGB) and in various file formats (eps, png, jpeg).
  Many clients also engage their designer to develop the visual identity that will accompany the logo, including colour palette, typography, graphic style and imagery. This would be refined at this stage and designs developed for stationery and marketing collateral.

• Delivery and support: You will receive your logos, and ideally a design style guide that outlines correct logo use and specifies colours, typefaces and more. A good designer will be able to help you roll out your new logo design, and be able to provide future services to build your visual brand identity.

As you can see, it’s quite a process! Although there are cheaper logo design options out there, they really don’t compare to the value you get from investing in an experienced graphic design professional. Remember, all logos are not created equal.

If you're looking to develop a new logo, or evolve an existing one and want to chat, please get in touch with me.

Visual identity for the IEA Solar Heating and Cooling Programme

The Executive Committee of the International Energy Agency Solar Heating and Cooling Programme is aware that brand identity is a valuable asset, and visual consistency is an essential part of good communication strategy. With the Programme’s work achieved through the collaborative efforts of multiple members across multiple countries, this is a challenge.

The IEA SHC Programme recently engaged me to improve their visual identity and its uniform application. I created a visual identity for them based around their existing logo, and encompassing colour palette, design elements and fonts. To help improve consistency, I documented the visual identity in an official style guide, and developed Word and PowerPoint templates for reports, presentations, stationery and promotional materials.

The Programme will roll out their strengthened brand identity as they continue their global promotion of the use of solar thermal energy.

To find out how I can help to energise your brand visit http://mayburyink.com.au

To find out more about the great work of the IEA SHC Programme visit https://www.iea-shc.org/

A writing style guide is an important branding tool

A writing style guide is an important tool in your organisation’s branding kit. Written consistency is just as important as visual consistency when building a strong brand.

A writing style guide outlines the ‘written voice’ of your organisation, as well as detailing preferred editorial choices.

Written voice is how your organisation’s brand personality is expressed in words. It relates to language style, sentence construction, and the types of words and phrases used. It defines how formal or informal, serious or humorous, detached or warm the writing style is. Your organisation’s written voice can help it stand out, and ensure efficient and effective communication with your target audience.

Editorial choices in a writing style guide relate to specifics such as capitalisation, abbreviations and acronyms, how dates and numbers are written, and spelling preferences, to name a few. Editorial consistency adds to the professionalism of your organisation.

A writing style guide is a tool that can be used by all staff, and for writers, editors or other consultants.

Contact me if you want to discuss developing a writing style guide for your organisation.

Don't be slap-dash with dashes

Using dashes correctly and consistently can add to the professionalism of your business writing. Here is a quick lesson on how to use dashes correctly, and how to create dashes using your keyboard and in Word.

I need to say upfront that hyphens (-) are not dashes!

There are two types of dashes: en dashes (–) and em dashes (—).

En dashes are used as a linking device for things like time and distance, for example: pages 125–200. They can also be used as an association between separate words, for example: Asia–Pacific region.

Em dashes are used to indicate an abrupt change, to provide additional or explanatory information, or to isolate statements within a sentence. Em dashes have more emphasis than a comma, are less formal than a colon, and can be used similarly to parenthesis. For example:

Your business headshot should reflect your professionalism—no snapshots or family photos.

Choosing the right colour profile—CMYK, RGB or PMS—is the essential first step in creating a beautiful image.

It is now commonly accepted to use an en dash with spaces either side, instead of an em dash, like so – just make sure you use en or em dashes consistently, according to your business writing style.

How to create dashes using your keyboard

On a PC

To create dashes on a PC the numbers below must be typed on the numeric keypad (not the numbers above the letters).

En dash: press ‘ALT’ + ‘0150’

Em dash: press ‘ALT’ + ‘0151’

On a Mac

En dash: press ‘OPTION’ + ‘-’ (hyphen/minus key)
Em dash: press ‘OPTION’ + ‘SHIFT’ + ‘-’ (hyphen/minus key)

How to create dashes in Word

Word will automatically change two consecutive hyphens between text into an em dash, and a hyphen with a space before and a space after, into an en dash.

You can also find en and em dashes in Special characters. Go to the Insert menu and click Symbol, then More symbols and you will get to the Special characters tab.

Now there is no excuse for being slap-dash with dashes—and please, no hyphens!

Does your brand have a visual style guide?

Your business’s brand is a valuable asset, and it must be carefully maintained. Which means consistency in all visual representations of your business. A visual style guide is a valuable document that helps ensure the consistency of your brand. And it will save you time briefing designers.

A visual style guide can give instructions on how to use your logo correctly and how sub-brands/co-brands fit within the brand architecture. It specifies the corporate colours for print and online, details fonts, and shows the preferred style of imagery and graphics. It links to your writing style guide (but that’s another story).

Contact me if you want to discuss developing a visual style guide for your business brand. http://www.mayburyink.com.au/designcomm_intro.html