A Brief Summary
16 Tips To Know About
Logos & Branding
I have shared 15 tips and a small rant with you about the why, what, and the how of logos and branding for your small business or corporation. I sincerely hope that it has helped you in your understanding of the subject a bit more and gives you a better feeling about creating one for your business.
Now, I feel I must say something about budgets and a large caution about a grand mistake that many small businesses and corporations are likely to make and that will cost them greatly.
First: Your marketing budget. There should be one! They are easy to make but a bit more difficult to keep. Discipline is the key factor. Many major corporations have concluded that a fixed percentage of the CGI (corrected gross income, after expenses) is the best way to calculate your marketing budget. The average is about 14%. Also, I suggest you deduct… Continue reading
How should I introduce my new logo to my target public? Tip #15/15
Logos & Branding Tip#15
How should I introduce my new logo to my target public?
If your company is new, it’s not a problem at all. Design your new logo into all promotions as quickly as possible and get it out there FAST!
If your company is relatively small, it is quite a bit easier than if it is large and has been around for quite a while. As above, get it out there FAST!
Let’s take the small company or corporation that has just had a new logo and branding “facelift.” If you have followed my advice thus far, you will have surveyed your key publics on your new logo and they will have responded in a positive manner. People love to help.
The next action you should take after you have finalized the logo is to send out an email thanking them for their help in its creation and announcing the why, how, and what… Continue reading
Logos & Branding – Blog Tip #14/15
Logos & Branding Tip#14
How exactly should I use my new logo?
Should it be designed onto everything?
Should I set some standards of usage?
Blog Tip #14: The new logo, once chosen, one should insist that the logo be used in all the company’s communications. It must be identifiable whether in a magazine or on the side of a truck, and whether it’s nearly the size of a pinhead or a football field.
The designer should take into account every possible circumstance that the logo is likely to be used. That is one color on a white field, one color on a black field, 2 colors, and 4 color process (full color) in either situation. What are the exact, specified colors using Pantone Matching System (PMS)?
Obviously, one cannot foresee every situation but your designer can specify most circumstances and the logo’s usage in those particular situations. If not, get a better designer.
Will the logo… Continue reading
How should I protect my new logo? Tip # 13/15
Logos & Branding Tip#13
How should I protect my new logo?
Should I get a Trade Mark (TM), a Service Mark (SM)
or should I have it Registered ®?
Protect it or lose it: Once the logo has been surveyed and finalized, the symbol, if it has one, must be Trade Marked. The name should be Service Marked so that the complete mark is protected and always Copyright its use with any text on any promotional piece.
Then, and this may take some time, apply to have it registered with the Patent and Trademark office. The fee is small, and the trademark form doesn’t require an attorney’s help to complete. However, it may take the better part of a year to receive the final registered trademark from Washington, D.C.
By now you may have put blood, sweat, money, and time into this endeavor and you don’t want that effort to be lost. “Protect… Continue reading
Who should I hire to create our new corporate logo? Tip #12/15
Logos & Branding Tip#12
Who should I hire to create our new corporate logo?
What criteria should I use to pick the best designer?
Get Some Help: Hiring a professional to develop a logo is an absolute must. You don’t want your future resting upon some amateur effort. But before hiring a logo designer, look at many samples of recent work. Check their longevity and track record in their field. Check out their referrals and success stories.
A great logo should be a perfect blend of insight, creativity, and communication, but you cannot have insight without information. If your logo designer does not request the details of your business, any professional research done, your product or service, and a profile of your target market, find another designer, quick!
The lowest price is no guarantee of great work and neither is a high one…you often get what you pay for. Cheap equals amateur, usually. Cheap, in the long run, is… Continue reading
Why should we Instant Impression Test before we create our new corporate logo? Tip #11/15
Logos & Branding Tip #11
Why should we Instant Impression Test before we create our new corporate logo?
Impression Testing your logo: You never get a second chance at a first impression. One of the most important steps in the development of graphic images and logos for marketing, advertising, and public relations is INSTANT IMPRESSION TESTING. Without it, you can easily waste hundreds or thousands of dollars on a logo or a direct mail campaign no one likes or remembers. The same goes for ads or any other promo.
Look at the cost of a half-page ad in any major publication. It’s not pennies. Why risk having that investment go down the drain with an ad that doesn’t attract attention, interest, nor deliver your message. If your ad doesn’t bite or has a logo that no one even glances at? Cancel it fast!
Your buying public must be consulted prior to completing any logo, designs for promo or packaging… Continue reading
Why should we survey before we create our new corporate logo? Tip #10/15
Logos & Branding Tip #10
Why should we survey prospects and clients before
we create our new corporate logo?
Marketing Research is the major key to great branding: Great logos should be a perfect blend of insight and creativity but you cannot have insight without exactly correct information.
But where does one get this type of information? Most business owners try their family, business associates, employees, and occasionally their competitors. Although it might be tempting, that is not the most reliable info on which to hang one’s hat and one’s budget.
A much better and more reliable source of information is surveying your prospects, clients, or customers. After all, they are the ones to whom you want to attract, interest, and deliver your message so they will buy from you and not from your competitors. Right? Go to the head of the class!
A corporate logo or a picture is worth a thousand words, of course,… Continue reading
What should our new logo show or say about our business? Tip # 9/15
Logos & Branding Tip #9
What should our new logo show or say
about our business?
Nature’s Embrace Organics Home Web Page
Small Business Messaging: Your logo should convey the correct image to your customer/client in a single glance. Customers decide a lot about your company at a glance. Try it now. Take a glance at your sign. Peek at your business card or stationery. Glimpse your brochure. Check out your company’s vehicles. View your business website. What did you see?
What image comes to your mind? Chances are your logo, or lack of one, formed an image of your business even more so than your name.
It screamed at the viewer: We’re Creative! Dull! Clever! Economical! State-of-the-Art! Behind-The-Times! Classy! Disorganized! Trustworthy! Cheesy! Or Friendly!
Getting the logo to scream the right message in the correct volume is absolutely vital. But how does a small business owner achieve that goal?
Potter Marketing & Branding has been In… Continue reading
When should we start our logo creation phase? Tip #8/15
Logos & Branding Tip #8
When should we start our logo creation phase?
Starting The Design: The best time to start the logo creation phase is just after the completion of your basic marketing and positioning research and surveys. Before that, you are flying blind with no target, shooting in the dark at any noise.
When the research is done, your design firm will have enough data to launch the design search. Aesthetics is not the only criterion for a great logo and branding. Pretty colors and beautiful shapes may not matter. And yours or my personal tastes may have no bearing on its appeal. The things that really matter are:
- Have you done any marketing research on the acceptable message your prospects and clients want to hear?
- Does your new logo say and do what the research discovered will effectively push the emotional “hot buttons” of your public.
- Will your new logo help to trigger… Continue reading
Logos & Branding Tip #A
Logos & Branding Tip #A
Here is a different kind of post for my Blog.
I am really BUGGED! How about you?
We’ve all heard the advice, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going!” But what does that mean in marketing? Sixty years of business research has proven conclusively that when times are tough, promoting your business harder and wiser will do you far more good than the defeatist adage of, “Tighten your belt, hunker down, and wait till the storm blows over.” You can’t climb the mountain if you hunker in a bunker. Accountants, number crunchers and the like would have us believe that we can “save our way out” of this downturn. That really BUGs me!!!
But really isn’t the answer always: “Get more income in the door?” The truth is that one must row with both oars: Promote and close new business first, while you also tighten expenditures. You’ll only… Continue reading