Logo for your website.

A logo in the more traditional sense would be iconic and representative of your business, perhaps in time people will remember it and identify that logo with your company. It’s good to have a meaningful logo if you can come up with one, but not all logos need to have an inner meaning. If you look at corporate logos today though they are more typically some stylised way of writing the company name, perhaps with an accompanying graphic but there is much less use of symbols or icons. Major Corporations like HP, Microsoft, Oracle, Xerox, Nike and others have very simplistic looking logos, yet their brand recognition is huge and they will ‘own’ the space when it comes to that colour and style of text and so you probably remember it.

It would be nice to think that your logo will persist in the memory of your website visitor so that when they return to your home page they will recognise it and identify it with a previous visit but with so many different websites, short attention spans and the deluge of advertising we face every day it isn’t surprising that people don’t remember all the logos they see.

In theory at least, if what a visitor sees on your homepage is recognisably similar to your stationery, invoice, business card, advertisement or packaging, there is a possibility that they will form a pictorial memory for your business and what you provided to them.

Logos don’t need to be works of art; something distinctive, different and memorable even though perhaps not unique will do. If you can pick an appropriate font (typeface) for your company name and put some sort of character, image, outline or symbol beside it then you will be doing better than a lot of business owners that don’t even get that far.

A few ideas to keep in mind when designing a business logo

Use readable fonts: Tricky looking fonts might impress you and if you have been scanning through lists of fonts your bored brain will probably do a mental leap of excitement, but keep in mind that your logo must be displayed and printed on a variety of items, in colour and monochrome. For example, a clever scripted font that looks like it was drawn by your 3yr niece might look great on a baby store but is it the best choice for a plumbing business when they print their invoices? Your company logo will probably end up on a letterhead, business cards and other printed material as well as on displays like computer screens and TV’s. So choose a font that is easy to read and does not confuse.

Use scalable vector graphics: It’s really helpful to have a hand drawn sketch when you are sitting with a designer so they can get an impression of what is in your head. From that sketch we can create a vector graphic replica. You can use tools like Adobe Illustrator or Corel Draw, we tend to use Illustrator or Photoshop. Using a vector graphic is highly advantageous if you ever decide to do some outdoor advertising where you need really big logo print. Your logo can be upscaled to any proportion without losing clarity. This becomes very important when you put up your logo on large banners or billboards. Signwriters get really frustrated when people hand them low resolution images and bitmap graphics.

Use a minimum of colors: A colorful logo might appear very attractive when viewed on a computer, but has limitations. A restricted colour pallete of 2 to 4 colours will probably work best. Think about what it will look like if you print t-shirts or coffee mugs with your logo embroidered, dye sublimated or printed. Select easily reproducible colors from a standard colour chart, eg. pantone and make all your future printers and designers lives easier whilst ensuring greater consistency. Think about designing a monochrome logo which looks good on a variety of backgrounds, then select colours to add. Also, design an inverted-version of your logo in case you want to have a dark background rather than a light background.

Below is a logo we developed for a car servicing company in Queensland and then the logo on a letterhead and business card sample.

for more more business logo just email us.