Business owners acknowledge that the use of the logo is one of the most important parts of choosing their branding. It is all part of psychologically drawing in the customers, helping the customers feel that they really need this particular product. In order to do that, however, it takes time and skill to ensure that the logo has been correctly thought through and will actually perform the job it is meant to do.
There are many common mistakes that can happen during the process of the designing of the logo. The mistake that seems to crop up frequently is that the logo delivers a confused message. It does not match the products that it has been designed for. This leads to confusion by the public which in turn will make them turn away because they might think the product was new and untested. They might tend to envisage that the product was of inferior quality because they do not make associations between the product and the logo.
One of the common mistakes that new businesses might make because they cannot afford the work of a graphic designer might be to go to a general publishing for business shop and select a logo from a stock of images. These are unoriginal and will inevitably belong to other businesses out there with a similar product to yours. If at some later point the other business’s product is seen as inferior it could well turn out that your products become associated with the other business through the use of the same or similar logo. You would also not own copyright it would be retained by the original business shop and any changes you wished to make would not be allowed, therefore setting your company up with ‘problems’ in the future.
The design of the logo must also be attractive through the use of distinctive lines, colors, angles and associations with the product. If the design is considered to poor or not thought out effectively then it will be assumed that the business has not given due consideration to the overall image of their brand.
Another common mistake is to not make the logo versatile. During the course of its life the logo will have to be added to websites, stationery, metal products, rubber stamps and without the ability to still adapt to the different methods of transferring it, it will not be a suitable logo. For example, it will need to be able to be used on different forms of software and on some makes this requires more work to adapt the logo. For this reason the logo must be relatively simple and straightforward.
Leading on from this, it is important that the style of logo is carefully considered, as certain styles of logo can be overused – for example, concentric circles. The basic symbol of the circle is that of eternity but it would be necessary to see how that fits in with the overall intent of the brand. Basic clip art will also create an illusion of unprofessional-ism which certainly would not be a good idea with a business image. Text only can be used but once again, the full use of the psychology of the symbol has not been integrated into the logo with the result it will not have the strong draw that the symbol with or without the text would have.
Another common mistake in the logo designing process is choosing a logo during a period of time when there is a trend happening. For example, we can instantly recognize which era clothing had been produced, or cars had been manufactured by their design. The reason this has happened is that the logo was allowed to follow a trend that was kitsch during that period. By being novel and almost bucking the trend the logo will live longer to serve the purpose for which it is intended.
