By Trevor Hart
A cohesive visual identity is a crucial element for every brand, so it may seem counterintuitive to use multiple logos for one brand. However, when used effectively, multiple logos can help reach niche audiences, build customer loyalty, and ensure long term brand viability. Generally, the key to developing a strong set of logos boils down to four qualities: recognition, relevance, adaptability, and versatility.
Recognition – Crafting a Memorable Brand Identity
Especially in the digital marketing era, achieving any success in business requires brand visibility. Your logo is often the first thing consumers will see, so it needs to not only catch their eye but also make a memorable impression. Here are our top three tips for building strong brand visibility and recognition through your logo package:
- Maintain a cohesive set of logos. If each logo in your brand kit uses a different color palette or font; people will be left with a cloudy idea of your brand identity. Create logos that complement each other for optimal brand recognition.
- Develop a unique, memorable style. In the online world, consumers are inundated with content and advertisements on a daily basis. Using engaging, unique logos will set your brand apart from competitors.
- Utilize clear visual cues. Don’t make consumers guess what your brand’s product or service is. Integrating symbols and color schemes with the appropriate connotations will improve your brand recognition.
Relevance – Catering to the Appropriate Audience
They say don’t judge a book by its cover, but consumers always judge a brand by its logo(s). A brand’s personality is a driving force in building loyal audiences. This personality is communicated primarily through visual imagery and packaging. During brand development, audiences can be segmented in a variety of ways: demographics, geographic location, buying habits, lifestyles, etc. Conduct thorough market research before developing your brand to understand the psychology behind various visual elements. When developing your brand, consider these questions:
- What connotations do the visual elements in my logo evoke?
- What cultural significance might the colors in my brand kit hold for certain audiences?
- What company values or qualities do I want my logo package to reflect?
Then, tailor these elements–including logos–to the appropriate audience to ensure you are crafting a memorable brand identity. The key to forging strong brand-consumer relationships is designing a visual identity that resonates with the right audience. For example, the brand values reflected in a logo tailored to Gen-Z consumers is unlikely to resonate with consumers of another generation.
Adaptability – Optimizing Multi-Channel Marketing
Multi-channel marketing refers to the process of utilizing several different marketing methods for one brand. Tactics used in multi-channel marketing may include–but are not limited to–paid search ads, display ads, social media posts, and traditional marketing such as mailing lists or in-house promotions. In our blog on social media campaigns, we outline the importance of utilizing multiple channels. An adaptable set of logos is a critical part of multi-channel marketing strategy for three reasons:
- Audience Segmentation: Your audience research will reveal which marketing channels most effectively reach your desired audience. This information is critical for designing a set of logos that can easily adapt between print ads, social media graphics, and other marketing materials.
- Aesthetic Changes: The logo you decide to use for one marketing channel may not be as visually stimulating when used for a different channel. Having logos that can be easily modified–even minor changes to color, font, or other imagery–facilitates efficient multi-channel tactics.
- Technical Adaptability: If the only logo files you have are a single PNG for each logo variant, you might have a hard time making the aesthetic changes we mentioned. Be sure to have the right files on hand to make quick changes when needed. Likewise, research technical aspects such as the standard dimensions for each marketing channel. For example, Pinterest pins, Google display ads, and print ads will have vastly different parameters.
Versatility – Achieving Long-Term Success
In the rapidly changing marketing landscape, the need for a versatile brand identity has never been more urgent. Brands that have achieved long-term success have done so by developing an umbrella of products and services, each with a unique but complementary identity. For example, Google’s vast lineup of products includes a variety of logos:
While each logo reflects the nature of Google’s different products, each logo is unmistakably Google. This speaks to the versatility of Google’s foundational values and the relevance of their guiding principles: accessibility, scalability, and dynamic motion. The colors, visual cues, and imagery used in Google’s brand kit are so versatile that they can easily be used to showcase a variety of online tools and products including Gmail, Google Meet, Drive, and more. Here are our three tips for ensuring versatility in your logo design:
- Create space-conscious graphics: Placement, size, and scale are essential to a logo. When these factors are not quite right, your brand’s visual identity can look disjointed.
- Mind the details: An overly-detailed logo will not translate well across a variety of channels and will not withstand the test of time. However, sparse logos may come across lazy or forgettable. Be careful to balance between overly busy and too minimalist.
- Use simple visual elements: Gradients, colors, and other imagery should only be used to elevate the logo. If you are implementing these elements, consider how the logo will appear on social media and on your website as well as on t-shirts and stickers.
Perfecting your brand’s logo package doesn’t have to be difficult. Let 88 West help develop your brand identity! Check out our previous branding projects, or get in touch with us at hello@88westagency.com.
