Let’s clarify something: your logo and website are NOT your brand.
Your brand is a culmination of people’s experience, perception, and reputation for your services. Branding is the actions taken to build your brand (strategy). A brand identity is the tangible expression of your brand (logo, typography, colors, website, etc.).
That said, a good logo is important for your business because it communicates ownership, quality, and values. It’s imprinted on your products, business cards, websites, social media, and, most importantly, in the minds of your clients.
Your logo will likely be one of people’s first interactions with your company. It’s your opportunity to make a solid first impression, show that you deliver quality services, and visually express your purpose.
What are the various types of logos?
“Logo” generally refers to all the marks representing your brand. There are five different kinds of logos:
- A wordmark or typographic logo that compromises a standalone word or words like FedEx or Coca-Cola
- A lettermark that contains only one letter or an abbreviation like the two C’s for Chanel or the A for Adobe
- A logomark that contains a symbol only, like the Nike swoosh or Apple
- An emblem is a wordmark, lettermark, or logomark within a shape essential to the design, like the Harley-Davidson Motor Cycles badge or the NHL logo
- A combination mark that contains a symbol and wordmark or letter and wordmark
Since IDS Studios is a small business and doesn’t have instant brand recognition, we designed our business logo as a combination mark. Combination logo types allow the symbol and wordmark to be used as separate standalone graphics or together.
The icon can be used as a favicon, watermark, and for social media profile photos. The wordmark can be used separately for other usage, as needed. And, of course, the wordmark can be combined with the symbol—this helps foster business recognition and meaning for just the symbol.
What makes a good logo?
A good logo aligns with and feels appropriate to your industry or service.
Simpler is better so the logo can scale in size. If you’re a professional services small business (vs. a product-based business), you often only need a wordmark or typographical logo.
A good logo is designed to differentiate you from everyone and foster brand loyalty. How? It has meaning built within it. Why? Because your business’s belief system, core values, purpose, mission, and vision are what your brand is built around. That’s what people remember and tell others about.
No one is paying that much attention to your logo (except for graphic designers or those with an eye for design) as long as your logo isn’t inappropriate or unreadable.
People care about their experience with your service and what your brand advocates.
“Good design not only looks professional but also signifies something deeper. ”
Why does your business need a logo?
A well-designed logo validates your professionalism and builds trust in your services.
It tells potential clients who you are, what you do, and how that benefits them. It communicates to people without prior knowledge or experience with your business that you do great work.
If your logo looks unprofessional, people will question how well you can deliver your products and services. Have you ever hit the back button or chose one company over another simply because they look and feel more professional? People make snap judgments, and poor design makes them feel uncertain.
Create a strong logo to stand out to consumers, ensure they remember your brand and cultivate positive associations with you.
Logos have a deep symbolic association with people’s memories and emotions. Let’s take a quick look at Nike, for example. The swoosh is just a swoosh, but our connection to that symbol has everything to do with Nike’s vision of making the world a better place through running.
That powerful idea defined their brand, and their logo communicates that, empowering their business to thrive. Over time and with consistent brand marketing, your logo should do the same for your business.
A good logo communicates value and creates it. Invest in your logo design! It’s what matters most for increasing your credibility and pulling consumers in.
How do you create a good logo?
A business logo must be clear and easy to interpret to connect with your audience quickly. Keeping your logo simple is important so it works across multiple media platforms and is effective at any size.
Unlike large companies, most small brands don’t have years of brand recognition that people associate with their businesses or a huge marketing budget to help consumers understand what their businesses do. So, your logo needs to communicate who you are and what you do in an instant.
From concept to roll-out, there’s much to consider when streamlining your brand to a single mark. A great logo needs excellent typography, defined colors, and a strong visual element. Check out our logo designs—most prefer simplicity, good type, and bold colors, but not all.
Choose a typeface (font) that represents your values and industry
Selecting typefaces and their arrangement are hugely important in creating a logo and brand. Why? People associate how a word looks with what it says to determine their feelings.
Strong branding provokes emotional connection. Your typography should strike interest, promote trust, and encourage optimism. Typography can stir up such feelings without people being aware.
Typography is used to communicate the tone of voice and personality. Pick typography that reflects what your company stands for—elegant, traditional, whimsical, or modern.
Similar to furniture, typography should be aesthetically pleasing and functional. Your choice of typography matters because it impacts user experience. We often pick typographic families with many weights, increasing usability and versatility.
We might want to use the lightest weights for an elegant invitation or ad headline, while the heavier weights for signage or a vehicle wrap need to be seen from far away or speeding past you. Having options is key, and we like to be sure our clients have opportunities imbued in the type of family.
Make sure your company name is clear and legible. Consider how your logo will be used: It could appear on screens, business cards, letterheads, signage, and packaging, to name a few. It needs to be readable from a distance and up close. If your logo has a graphic element, ensure your typography is balanced with the icon.
Ask yourself, does my typography achieve an effective level of representation, communication, and visual appeal? It may be time for a rebrand if your answer wasn’t a definite YES.
Pick the right logo colors
The color of your logo will determine how it is perceived and has the power to drive purchasing decisions. Color triggers emotions and gives meaning. And when used consistently across your marketing, color improves brand recognition by up to 80%.
The right colors depend on your industry and target market.
You probably noticed that certain industries stick with certain colors. For example, financial institutions often use blues or deep greens because they communicate security and reliability. Fast food chains utilize bright, warm colors such as red, yellow, and orange to stimulate urgency, appetite and cheerfulness. Tech brands like Apple, Tesla and Uber use black to communicate power, prestige, and strength.
Pick your color(s) based on the feelings you want consumers to experience and the actions you want them to take. Take into consideration human psychology, culture, trends, and context.
Your brand color should tell a story, communicate your values, and be unique enough to avoid confusion with others in your space.
The most powerful brands use a simple color palette of less than three main colors. They also use solid colors rather than gradients. Keep in mind color looks different on screen and in print. Ensure you can reproduce your colors accurately (Pantone, CMYK, RGB, Hex) across media.
Use a simple iconic element
Although 72% of the best brand names are made up of words or acronyms, those names create an image in someone’s mind using typography. The same can be done with graphic elements, symbols, and icons.
A visual element adds interest and makes your logo memorable. It has to grab a consumer’s attention for 10 seconds so they can memorize it and form an opinion about it.
Some designers create this by modifying text (wordmark) or adding an illustrated icon that can be used independently in certain situations (combination mark). Make sure all the artwork is original and not from clip art. Over time and with consistent use, a visual association will develop.
Trademarking a Logo
Once you have an original logo representing your business, you may want to trademark it. A trademark (or an intellectual property mark) allows the owner exclusive rights to use it in connection with goods and services.
There are many important reasons for trademarking your logo, but the most important are as follows:
- A trademark prevents your brand from being sued and allows you to sue other businesses that use similar markings, slogans, or assets. Trademark allows you to take legal action against anyone stealing your design or using something similar.
- A registered trademark guarantees that your logo isn’t similar to any other. If you were to infringe on another business’s trademark (even accidentally), you open yourself up to a lawsuit. This could result in you paying legal fees and fines and giving up all profits you obtained under the unregistered trademark.
- It helps your brand establish trust and credibility and builds equity within your industry. Potential clients and customers trust recognizable and long-lived brands. A trademark shows that you are invested in your brand identity and want to protect the value you’ve created.
Recently, a potential client contacted us about designing a new logo for her business. She had previously created a logo using art that she found in Canva, a free-to-use online graphic design tool.
Canva also allows users to use stock art, icons, images, and graphics on its platform while designing. Once she created a logo she was satisfied with, she applied to trademark her business name and logo.
However, her trademark for her logo was rejected because you cannot trademark something if it uses stock art. Why is that?
“So even if you don’t mean to, when you generate art using stock or AI, you’re taking imagery that you don’t have a legal claim to use.”
Can you trademark free stock art or an AI-generated logo?
You can’t trademark stock because you do not own the source material; you will undoubtedly have issues filing for trademarks with imagery that incorporates stock content.
iStock is one of the internet’s most popular stock image sites, and their legal license agreement policies are quite enlightening in the context of what we’re discussing here.
They specifically forbid the use of their content in logos unless you pay for a license to use that specific piece of visual media, as outlined in the below excerpt (from Section 3, Restricted Uses, paragraph D):
“No Use in Trademark or Logo. Unless you purchase a custom license (not available for Music), you may not use content (in whole or in part) as the distinctive or distinguishing feature of a trademark, design mark, tradename, business name, service mark or logo. Additionally, you shall not be entitled to register (in any jurisdiction) such content (in whole or in part) as a trademark or rely on any such registrations, prior use, and/or accrued goodwill to prevent any third-party use of the content or any similar content (including by us, our customers, or the copyright owner of such content).”
A common question we’ve fielded from clients and other professionals in recent years is whether AI (artificial intelligence) can be a valuable tool in logo design—even if AI is just a source of inspiration and not a means of creating a usable concept for your visual branding.
It is completely ok to mess around with AI software and stock media to see what you like, what you don’t, and what ideas you might be able to come up with by looking at content that isn’t yours. A bit of window shopping can be a thoughtful spender’s best friend!
AI technology, and especially AI image generation, has exploded in popularity. While it may seem that such powerful software could be an asset, we recommend caution when relying on it to create art.
It’s a good idea to seek inspiration wherever you can, but the main downside is that it’s impossible to trademark images created by AI technology. AI image generators source their data and stylistic elements by scanning what’s publicly available on the Internet, including images of original art or designs uploaded by creators that may or may not be trademarked already.
So even if you don’t mean to, it’s very likely that you’ll be taking imagery that you don’t have a legal claim to use, which could open you up to difficulties that are easily avoided by relying on the creativity and collaboration of professional designers (like us!) to put ideas in motion on your behalf.