Creating a brand identity is not always as easy as it seems. A great logo should be memorable, right, you look at it and you just get it.
To the untrained eye a logo may seem to have little thought or meaning behind it, it’s just an image with some text thrown next to it. As a designer strives to make something unique, something that looks beautiful and something that might have a deeper meaning.
So there in lies the challenge, keep it simple but make it have a deeper meaning. As designers sometimes we overlook the simple ideas, like it’s not worthy because of its simplicity.
The amazon logo is a good example of having a deeper meaning while retaining a simple idea. At first glance it appears to have a orange smiling face, but when you look closer its an arrow that goes from a to z. This is almost subliminal and tells you that they have everything under one roof.
What is a brand identity?
Well in its simplest form a brand identity is the visual elements of a company, its name, sign, symbol, colour, typeface, its slogan and even its sound. Done right a good brand identity can convey your unique position in a market and leave a deep and long lasting impression to your customers.
A brand identity is not your brand. Your brand is the impression that your customers form for themselves. Once your brand identity is public in the form on a product or service you will not be able to control every aspect of it, it’s your customer’s interactions and reactions that build your brand.
Building your brand identity
The starting point for a creating a powerful engaging image begins with its name. With the growth of the Internet, choosing a name has become that little bit harder. Not only do you want a unique name, you will also require the domain name. The three rules for selecting your business name are
1. Keep it short, memorable and easy to spell
Your clients and customers must be able to remember your name. Not only that, they should be able to easily recall the name when looking in stores, online and when they are recommending your product to friends and family. Making a unique name that is hard to spell is simply creating a barrier for success and that is a bad idea.
2. A good brand name must have positive connotation
The brand name must invoke an idea or feeling in a person that generates a good, affirmative or constructive quality. Some believe that a great name should be abstract; the abstract nature of the name makes it more memorable. Other people think that a name should be informative so clients and customers immediately know what your company is. In reality any name can be effective whether its abstract, literal, an acronym or informative.
3. Your brand name needs a visual element.
Humans are generally hard wired to store images, we can instantly recognise thousands of images, and we do it every day. When I say apple computers, you immediately visualise the apple logo in your brain or an apple product. Including a visual element to your brand identity can thus help your customer recall your brand. Just like the apple type with an apple logo the visual element could be part of your brand identity story, lets explore that.
Your logo could be the first impression your company has on a potential client; just like the real world you only get once chance to make that first impression. So it must be professional and memorable. There are three basic design considerations when creating your company’s logo:
1. Design your business name
A custom font or a designer’s treatment of a typeface to make it unique to your business name can massively help recognition of your company. Many businesses use just the custom logotype as their brand identity, think Google, coke and Disney. Some larger companies go as far as creating a whole typeface, so that everything they do is unique to them – or at least the look of it is.
2. Your icon, the symbol or image or symbol that often accompanies the name
While not essential for a brand identity the icon can play a major role in customer recognition of your brand. It could also help to stand out from the crowded marketplace. Examples of this are again McDonald’s golden arch or ‘m’, apple, hp, bmw, bp, Pepsi and Mitsubishi to name a few. Established brands can use just the symbol on its own without the full brand name, and customers now who they are and what they stand for.
3. The brand strapline or tagline, the small group of words that state your companies mission.
A good strapline or slogan can help identify your company. There is no real science behind writing a successful one. Being truthful, witty or catchy are all good ways to generate your strapline, its not easy and will require many revisions. In general try to reflect something about your brand image that connects to your audience in some way. Examples are Nike – just do it. Apple computer – think different. British Airways – The world’s favourite airline. Tesco – Every little helps.
After your business name is chosen, your logo is designed and your strapline is created, your brand has the building blocks on which to build your identity. Everything you do from this point be it online or offline should now have a consistent brand identity and every communication should remain true to that identity.