While the old saying ‘don’t judge a book by its cover’ suggests we should do otherwise we are all guilty of judging a person or a company on the way it looks. And in the current culture, where looks are important and we’re all time poor, it’s not often someone will dig deeper if they don’t like the look of your brand.
Your brand can show potential customers, suppliers and business partners your professionalism, your approachability and the quality you pervade, without saying the words. And this will affect whether they choose do business with you.
But ensuring your limited company has a great logo is much more than those initial impressions. Your logo is a critical aspect of your business marketing and experts commonly urge business owners to ‘brand’ their company, complete with logo and consistent marketing material. Yet rarely are the reasons that support this advice explained.
What your logo will do for you
Your logo will, essentially, serve as the face of your company. Through good design it should showcase your unique identity, encompassing your business message and image all in one graphical snapshot. Logos can be as simple or as creative as you like as long as they offer visual clues about your company’s personality and character while also emanating the right impression and integrity.
Reasons to choose a professionally designed logo
Creating a logo that has had personal and professional input as well as careful consideration of your vision, values and ethics can be the difference between success and failure for your business. Here are some of the reasons why:
To appear established and as a bigger player – your choice and business name can alter how established your company appears to others and, in most industries around the world, it’s expected that businesses will have a logo. Without one you are a name without a face. Choosing to operate without one could suggest that you are not a permanent fixture to potential clients and customers alike.
To promote your reputation – A professionally designed logo accompanied with professional printed collateral portrays commitment to both your business and your clients. It shows that you are in it for the long run and that you are taking your venture seriously.
To be better remembered – People are far better at remembering something they’ve seen visually over something that they’ve heard or read. If you apply this logic to your business and keep your entire brand consistent you’ll be much more memorable when a potential client is seeking the products or services that you supply.
To represent your company’s values and position – If images really do speak a thousand words then your logo is your opportunity to create a lasting first impression about what your business has to offer, as well as promoting your company’s core values.
To achieve stand out and differentiation – With a carefully crafted logo and brand you will gain better positioning in relation to your competition. Flipping through a magazine or searching an online directory your company logo will be one of the first things a customer sees and, if you can gain their attention at this stage, you have a much higher chance than the competition.
To win trust and confidence – A professionally designed logo will persuade customers that you are great at what you do. An untidy, boring and uninspiring logo will portray a lack of professionalism and ability which, in turn, will break down confidence and leave potential customers turning elsewhere.
See how The Formations Company can help you with our bespoke logo design service.
Common company logo mistakes
Poor font choice and too many styles – When it comes to creating your logo one of the most important choices a designer has to make is the selection of font and the styles in which it will be seen. Many logo designs fail due to poorly chosen font and standard practice is to use no more than two fonts of different weights and to make sure that they match any graphic element with the right balance.
Overuse of colour – Another common mistake is to use too many colours in a logo. Your logo should work just as well and should be equally recognisable in black and white – every business will need to display their logo in one colour at some time.
Following trends – Another common mistake is to design a logo based around current design trends. Whilst your logo may fare well at the outset it may lose its appeal and become outdated very quickly. A simple, timeless logo will always prevail.
Overuse of special effects and complexity – Using special effects such as gradients and drop shadows can work well in some instances, but with logos appearing on the smallest of screens it’s important to think about how these will look when scaled down and viewed on mobiles, etc. Similarly, logos that are too complex or that contain too much detail will lose clarity and appeal if they are unrecognisable when scaled down.
Too abstract – It can be easy to forget that while you know your business inside out others need that made simple for them. So while you need your logo to stand out from the crowd and the competition it’s important to stay focused on what you want the logo to portray.
Your logo, your company, your way
Once you’ve set up your company with The Formations Company you can take advantage of our bespoke company logo design. We’ll assign one of our own designers to your company and they’ll ask you a series of briefing questions. They’ll work up five logo designs for you and, once you’ve made your choice, they’ll finalise it with any updates you’d like and provide it to you in a bitmap or vector file.
Find out more about the steps you need to take to set up your company in our handy guides.