Logo Design - Business Branding

Good business branding is vital for business success.

Constistancy in  logo use, and business branding ensures customers "see" your business and recognise it.

A simple guide to logo design is;

1. Study ALL the company information.
2. Research the company industry, the target market, business competitors.
3. Brainstorm and sketching ideas
4. Work sketches into design concepts. Ask for feedback from collegues/friends.
5. Shortlist the various concepts
6. Initial presentation and discussion with clients.
7. Refine or redesign concepts
8. Send final drafts to client for review.
9. Upon final approval, provide the required file formats.

This process can take up to a week or as long as a few months, depending on how much back and forth occurs between the designer and the client. (and of course the budget). It is good practise to include logo design options for horizontal and vertical usage, colour options such as two colour, greyscale and negative options.

Once the logo has been approved, you then move onto branding all areas of the business. It is customery to use elements of the logo and the logo colours, when branding the business. Branding can encompass all parts of the business including;  vehicle signage, uniforms, stationery, email signatures to name a few.

Example of logo design process
http://blog.spoongraphics.co.uk/tutorials/logo-design-process-and-walkthrough-for-vivid-ways

Style Guides

As part of the branding exercise some companies, esp. those with a large base of operations, develop a  brand style guide. This is a guide for designer/advertisers to use, to ensure the branding of the company is not compromised.

A style guide explains the correct ways to use the company logo, which fonts to use, colour options. It specifies the clearance space around the logo, how to use the logo and how NOT to use the logo, and which logo option should be used in specific circumstances. The style guide can also detail the type of photography to used.

An example of corporate style guide can be found here, fo rthe NSW State Government and Joomla - freeware

http://advertising.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/downloads/page/nswgovernmentbrandingstyleguide_0.pdf

http://www.joomla.org/images/logos/Joomla_Brand_Manual_10-02-2005.pdf