Logo Design Tips 2021: What It Takes to Create an Amazing Brand Identity
Contrary to common opinion, to create a great logo design, you don’t need to be a professional graphic designer. In fact, thanks to the power of the internet and software as a solution, there are now more opportunities for building a logo and identity for your brand or business than ever before.
With this in mind, it is becoming increasingly possible to build a logo that will become your brand identity and communicate its message using an online tool such as the Wix logo creator, all while not having to put out a ton of money in the process. And even better, there are little-to-no design and technical skills required.
But what exactly does a great logo look like, to stand out and fulfill its purpose?
For anyone who has decided to create a brand identity with their logo, we’ve gathered six actionable logo design tips to help you create an amazing brand identity in 2021.
The following logo design tips will guide you from the moment you pick a logo theme to the moment your logo will shine on the billboards and across all your social media handles.
Know Your Brand
Do you know your brand well? Until you look further into its core beliefs and differentiating qualities, you cannot create a company logo that best reflects the brand.
Let’s presume you’re a business that deals with organic goods. You’d like your clients to equate a healthier lifestyle, sustainability, and trustworthiness with your company.
As referenced by many of the top branding blogs online, these values must find a way to be expressed through your organic brand logo. Therefore, having them in mind will make all the difference throughout the design process.
In short, the concept of your business logo should comply with the overall branding strategy. Therefore, take the time to determine what makes your brand unique and stand out from the competition before working on your logo.
Evoke an Emotion
There are some associations that clients make with their favorite brands. Think of your favorite pastry shop- you can almost feel the warm and cozy feeling you get from the atmosphere.
A powerful company logo incorporates all of these emotions or feelings into a succinct graphic design. Thus, these thoughts are remembered every time a client sees the logo of a certain brand.
For instance, the iconic Nike “swoosh” gives customers a boost of motivation and trust to achieve both their athletic and life ambitions.
The famous Coca-Cola logo evokes emotions of satisfaction and lightheartedness, which is what the consumers are paying for as they reach for a bottle in a supermarket.
Of course, if it were not backed up by an actual positive experience with the brand, the logo alone would not produce those emotions. However, if the emotion is created through an exceptional product or service, a logo does an excellent job of reminding clients about the brand that made them feel good.
Choose the Right Color Combination
In deciding the emotional connections clients create with your brand, colors will play a key role. In their logo designs, businesses that focus on customer confidence use the color blue in their logos. You can find the brightest examples of this in the banking and tech sectors.
Specific sectors are most frequently dominated by a certain color that best reflects the ideals of that sector. Companies working in the area of health care and agricultural goods, for example, often use green logos for their branding. Meanwhile, in the film and beauty sectors, pink labels are often used.
Familiarize yourself with the psychology of colors and consider which colors to use with your logo based on your industry. Also, choose a color mix that best fits your brand identity.
Also, if you regularly use a certain brand color on your website, social media accounts, or products, make it the primary color in the design of your company logo as well.
Keep it Simple but Avoid the Cliché
When you need your logo used on multiple materials and platforms or used in several ways, a complicated template would be tough to deal with later on. It isn’t easy to memorize such a design and it would take a lot more time and effort for it to become easily recognizable. Try as much as you can to make it as visually simple as possible.
However, please don’t choose a clip art or similar generic symbols, as enticing as it may be. A cliché logo will struggle to become memorable in your audience’s mind, as viewers would have already seen several identical symbols. This would be counterintuitive to what you need for your brand identity.
A logo design needs to stand out in order to become imprinted in people’s minds. That means that it will require you to step outside of the box to build an iconic logo. Truthfully, the process may not be easy, but it pays off eventually.
And if you’d like a summary and real life example of everything highlighted in this section, be sure to check out this recent article from Forbes, on the importance of keeping it simple and delivering a great design and user experience.
Design with Your Audience in Mind
Have you developed any buyer personas for your brand? If so, it is time to call them to action. Asking why? Because, among other things, your logo needs to be customized to your target audience. In other words, the first people to find it relevant and appealing should be the clients.
Running a preference test is one way to get this right. The preference test is similar to the A/B testing in online marketing, except the preference test is much easier. All you need to do is build several logo designs and ask people in your target demographic which concept they find appealing.
Additional questions may be included, such as which symbol they find more trustworthy or modern, or any other important attribute to your specific brand. When you have their responses, it will not be as difficult to make the correct decision.
Several online resources that make remote testing possible include UsabilityHub, UserTesting, Optimal Workshop, etc.
Build for the Web
A responsive logo should easily adjust for several purposes and platforms, including your website, mobile app, and social media. Your logo should fit into a square (1×1) without losing its distinctive identity and quality, to be appropriate for the web.
For example, to build a mobile app icon, reducing the logo to 1×1 dimensions is important. Even though your brand has no plans to create a mobile application, square icons on the site are still invaluable. Take a peek at the browser’s tabs to get the idea.
Final Thoughts on What it Takes to Create a Great Brand Identity
Your logo design is the most concise statement about your brand, its values, and the advantage it gives to consumers. The logo you create will steadily inject your company with a distinctive character as the brand expands. Its sheer look will remind clients of the experience they have with your brand.
Therefore, build wisely and go for the one that can survive the test of time. Also, remember to give customers the best service. The logo design tips we have covered in this article should help you create an amazing brand identity in 2021.
