Would you like to learn a logo designing process that professionals use?

Your logo is the first thing that people often see about your company and often used to form a first impression.

Have you ever heard that you only get one chance to make a first impression? A logo is your chance to do that, but you only have about 10 seconds to create that first impression with your logo.

What to know how to create a logo that will make the right impression?

Read on to learn the logo design process that will impress customers and employees.

1. Brand Soul Searching

Do you know what your brand stands for? If you don’t, that’s the first step in the logo designing process.

Your logo should be aligned with your company’s values, mission, and marketing messages.

You need to have a clear understanding of these pieces before you start to design a logo because otherwise, the logo won’t be a true reflection of your company.

Another piece of critical information needed to design a logo is what you want your customers to think of when they think of your company.

For example, Volvo’s customers think of safety when they think of the company.

2. Competitive Research

Looking at your competition’s logos will give you great insight as you start to design your logo.

Think about it this way, the average person sees up to 8,000 brands in one day. How will your brand stand out from the thousands of others?

Look at other logos and write down what you like about them, what you don’t like, and what your first impression is.

This will help you design a logo that stands out.

3. Learn Basic Principles of Design

If you want to know how to design a logo, you’re going to have to learn the basic principles of design.

Color, typography, and symbols all work together to form an impression in the customer’s mind.

For example, red indicates a sense of urgency while blue gives people a sense of stability and security.

You need to brush up on these details before you start to design your logo so you know that your logo conveys the right message.

4. Brainstorm Ideas

This part of the logo designing process is the most fun because this is where you get to be creative and free.

You get to take everything you’ve learned about your business, design, and your competition and apply it into the design process.

Draw out sketches of logos. Include what typeface they should be and what colors to use.

If you don’t like to draw, then you can play with a logo design tool. Ideally, you’ll have 3-5 variations of your logo to work within the next steps.

5. Think About How the Logo Will Get Used

As you’re toying with different ideas for designing your logo, you’ll need to consider how the logo will be used.

Will it just appear in documents and your website? Will it appear on banners?

The application of your logo will also influence your design. As you’re sketching logos, print out a copy and put it on a business card and other places it’ll be used.

6. Tell a Story

Since your logo visually represents your company, it’s an opportunity to give your logo meaning that has something to do with your brand.

For example, Nike is a sporting goods company that is about high-performance sportswear for all types of athletes. The name Nike and the swoosh relate to the Greek goddess Nike, who wore wings of victory.

As human beings, we relate to stories, just as much as images. You can create a similar type of symbolism in your logo to deepen the connection between your company and customers.

7. Test & Refine the Logo

One of the biggest design fails of all time is by Gap in 2010, which spent a lot of money on a redesign. When the new logo was released, there was such a public outcry the company reverted to the old logo within days.

That’s why you have to test your logo before you release it out to the world. You can test a few variations of the logo against each other.

The thing to remember is that you have to go beyond your friends and family when you test your logo. Talk to your customers, potential customers, and employees.

You basically want to get a good sample size of the stakeholders in your business.

Ask them what their first impressions are of the logo. You can also ask them the first thing that comes to mind and whether or not the logo gives them a good or bad impression of the logo.

Also, ask them what they would do differently to improve the logo.

Take the best parts of the feedback, refine the logo, and go back for more feedback. This process should continue for a few rounds until you get a logo that looks great and conveys what your brand is about.

8. Finalize & Publish

After you go through several rounds of feedback, it’ll be time to finalize your logo and release it to the world. It would be in your best interest to create a marketing campaign a few weeks before you release the logo.

You can create anticipation around your brand and tells the story behind the logo. This would have a big impact on your brand because you’re creating positive emotions around your logo already.

When you release it and people see it and love it, that will reinforce the positive connection with your company.

An Easy Logo Designing Process

A lot rides on the look of your logo. Current and potential customers will look at your logo and make a snap judgment as to whether they want to do business with you.

Your employees will look at the logo and it can boost employee morale if you get it right. By following the steps outlined in this article, you’ll be able to create a logo that your employees and customers can be proud of.

For more great articles about logo design, check out these articles on the best file formats for logos and how to convey brand personality in your logo.

Are you setting up a new business?

Every new business begins with creating a brand.

This brand acts as the overall personality of your business and allows you to stand out in the market. The brand in which your company creates is the way that your audience will perceive you.

Are you a modern and cutting-edge business that relates to millennials? Or do you opt for a classic, straightforward design that identifies with a more senior audience?

Without establishing a solid, consistent brand for your business, your target audience is far less likely to identify and interact with your brand.

If you’re starting a new business, you’re going to want to ensure that you read this. We’re outlining a guide fit with five essential tips for starting a brand from scratch.

1. Identify Your Target Market

First things first, you’re going to want to target exactly who you are looking to market your product toward.

Ask yourself who you want to sell your product, idea or service to. In asking yourself this, be sure to consider age, gender, socioeconomic status and even the location of this audience.

Without a thorough understanding of who exactly your audience is, your brand will fail to connect with them. And, without a solid connection, your audience is less likely to interact with your business.

This audience is the basic platform for who you will build your brand upon.

2. Create a Logo

Next, you’re going to want to create a logo to represent your brand.

Whether you’re a small business or a large, multi-faceted business, creating an effective logo is one of the most important steps in establishing your brand.

Think of your logo as the face of your brand. After all, your logo is often the first taste of the brand that your clientele is able to see.

Taking this into consideration, you will want to ensure that your logo is attractive and appealing to your target audience.

If you have identified your target market as millennials, opt for a brand that is unique and cutting edge. This automatically sends a message to your audience that your brand is not only current, but also unique in comparison to the other established brands.

Fortunately, there are online services that allow you to create a logo in a way that is simple yet still professional.

3. Understand Your Competitors

In creating your brand, it’s essential to understand who your competitors are and what their brand is.

Evaluate your competitors brand and determine ways in which you’d like your brand to differ. Ask yourself how your competitor’s brand is falling short and how you can prevent that in your own brand.

It’s also important to note that you will likely share a target audience. That being said, study how they interact with their audience and establish the areas that need work. If you’re going to interact with the same audience, you need to ensure that your brand is offering them someone that no other brand is.

In order to best stand out from the competition, you first need to understand exactly how your competition operates.

4. Choose Your Brand Personality

When it comes to the personality of your brand, it’s helpful to humanize your brand. In doing so, think of your brand as a human and what you’d like their personality to be like.

You can begin by asking yourself what sort of human characteristics you would like your brand to possess. So, what is the overall character and nature of your brand?

For example, a comedic brand that is looking to sell online merchandise may look to have a brand personality that is pessimistic and sarcastic. On the other hand, a financial brand that provides online financial services may look to have a brand that is friendly and honest.

Remember, in order to resonate with your target audience, you must possess similar values and characteristics. In fact, 64 percent of consumers report that having a shared set of values with their brand is what allows them to have a trusted relationship with that brand.

It’s also important to determine how you expect your brand to identify with your audience. Ask yourself these questions:

• How do you want your brand to make your audience feel?
• Do you want your brand to make your audience laugh?
• Do you want your brand to resonate emotionally with your audience?

Determining the personality of your brand will determine which sort of people choose to interact with your business.

5. Hire Professionals

Sure, hiring professionals may appear to be a costly investment at first.

However, it’s important to think of this as a serious and worthwhile investment in your business.

In creating a successful brand, there are multiple hats that need to be worn. And, for entrepreneurs, it’s important to acknowledge the limitations of your expertise. While you may excel in establishing creative solutions, you may need help in the graphic design or marketing departments.

You may consider hiring multiple in-house departments or, instead, choose to outsource these projects. Today, there are countless freelancers that are searching for work in multiple departments.

The Essential Guide to Starting a Brand

If you’re considering starting a business, it’s important to begin by creating a brand.

Your brand is the face of your business and sets a precedent for what your audience can expect from your business.

But, starting a brand that is effective and resonates with your audience is not always easy. In fact, only six out of ten marketers believe that their brand aligns well with their overall business plan.

Fortunately, there are steps any business can take to create an effective brand from the start. From identifying your target market and creating a logo to fabricating a brand personality and enlisting the help of professionals, these tips are sure to keep your business on the right path.

For more tips on brands, logos, and design, be sure to visit our blog!

If you want to boost business for your company or shop, you’ll have to get creative. Thankfully, it’s not as difficult as it sounds.

All you need to do is brainstorm some stellar sign design ideas with your team. Signage is an easy way to attract customers and get your brand out there.

Are you curious to learn more? Keep reading for some awesome tips about signage design that will get customers in your front door and skyrocket your sales. Let’s get started!

Solidify Your Logo First

Small business signs will get your business noticed, even if you’re just starting out. But to create effective signage, you’ll need a stellar logo first. After all, your logo is the most recognizable part of your branding.

If your company already has a logo, make sure you’re happy with it before you create new signage. If you’re starting from scratch, check out our blog for info about creating the perfect logo for any business.

Choose an Attractive Color

Color is an important part of marketing psychology. So, when your team is coming up with business sign ideas, consider which colors best reflect what you’re trying to communicate.

Whether you’re creating the main sign for your business, or a sign to advertise a sale or promotion with both words and images, the colors you choose will affect how effective it is.

Use Signs to Increase Visibility 

Is your business hard to find? Use signs to increase your visibility and decrease customer frustration. Placing clear signs around your area that point people in the right direction will help.

Focus on Contrast in Your Signage Design

If your indoor or outdoor signage design is too busy and complicated, it won’t attract anyone’s eye as they walk or drive by. Make sure the colors you use contrast each other in a clear and simple way. Sticking to two or three colors is a great way to achieve this.

Contrasting with clarity will communicate the message you want, whether you’re directing customers toward your business’ parking machines or foot traffic into your shop.

Put a Fun Sign in Your Window

Are you afraid your business is looking a little stale? If that’s the case, then it’s time to have some fun.

Signs are a great way to communicate your sense of humor to potential customers. Use your whole team to brainstorm out-of-the-box storefront sign ideas. You might just surprise yourself! 

Take This as a Sign

Why wait to start boosting your business? Set yourself up for success today by using effective signage design to improve traffic flow.

For the best results, focus on using colors that match your company’s vibe and message. Be sure to contrast these colors appropriately and to keep your signage simple. Use these signs to show off your sense of humor and to boost your visibility. 

Need help coming up with a recognizable logo to put on your signage? We’re here to help. Check out our online logo maker for great results!

As of last year, there were 64,417 firearm dealers nationwide. That directly translates into a lot of competition. 

If you’re looking to stand out from the other guys, then you need one thing: the perfect logo. Creating one yourself can seem daunting at first, but we’re here to help you through the process and show you that you can do it yourself. 

In this article, we’ll dive into everything you need to know about creating a logo for your gun shop. We’ll cover why it’s important, the aspects of creating the perfect logo, and how to design your own. 

Are you ready? Let’s get started. 

The Importance of a Logo

The combination of imagery and text in a logo creates a visual symbol that represents your business. It’s how you build brand recognition and how your customers will recognize you. 

For a person who hasn’t seen your logo before, it often informs them of the name of your business and what kind of business it is. 

A logo is the chance to show off your business’s personality. Design the right logo for your gun shop and come off as relatable and trusting. 

What Makes the Perfect Logo?

The perfect logo is easy to recognize with or without additional text. However, it’s more than just an icon; there’s more than you think when it comes to creating a logo.

It needs to be attention-grabbing, distinct, and unique. Let’s break down what makes the perfect logo. 

Clear and Concise

The most important rule in creating a logo is simplification. All great logos are clear, concise, and low in details–with the exception of Starbucks. 

Imagine your gun shop’s logo on t-shirts, billboards, magazines, posters, and stickers. It should be clear to read and identify at any size if you decide to scale it large or small. 

Consider the Font

To reiterate the point above, you want the text to be bold, clear, and easy to read from any distance.

When choosing a font, the bolder, the better. Avoid script fonts as much as possible and stick to one or two font families. Less is always better when it comes to designing a logo.

Here are some of the best fonts for a logo: 

• Garamond
• Helvetica
• Bodoni
• Proxima Nova
• Futura
• Rockwell
• Univers
• Sassoon
• Modesto

Choose a font family like Sans serif for a look that’s clean and modern or go with Serif for something more tasteful. 

Color Matters 

Color has an impact on buyers and increases brand recognition by up to 80%. With that in mind, we need to carefully decide on the colors used.

A good rule of thumb is to use less than three colors. When in doubt, see what the pros are doing. Big brands like Amazon, Nike, Apple, Facebook, McDonald’s all use less than three colors–you should too. 

For your gun shop, you’ll want to opt for darker earthy colors like brown, black, white, and gray. Brown depicts masculinity, ruggedness, and strength whereas black is usually characterized as modern, sleek, and high-end. 

If you’re looking for a pop of color, we suggest you opt for blue, which signifies trust and maturity–perfect for an arms dealer. For an in-depth explanation of colors and how they affect your customer, check out this guide. 

Context Matters

A logo encapsulates your business and shows others what you stand for. How do you accomplish this? You do it with context.

Incorporating what your business does is one of the most important aspects of your logo. 

Customers who don’t already know your name will be instantly drawn to your business if you add context to your logo. If you’re a gun shop owner, you might want to incorporate bullets or something like AR-15 parts within the logo so it’s instantly recognizable to your audience.

One look at your logo and they know exactly what you’re selling. Avoid mystery at all costs, it’s one of the worst things you can do. Remember why businesses create logo’s in the first place–to be recognizable. 

Want some examples of how context works in a logo? Think about FedEx’s logo. The white space the letters make is an arrow showing the forward movement of deliveries. Check out some of the examples we broke down below.  

How To Design a Logo

When it comes to making a logo you have two choices: paying a professional to do it or trying yourself. Let’s look into both options and see what’s best for you. 

There are a ton of great freelancers and graphic designers on the internet willing to design a logo for you, however, it’s going to cost you. A quality logo may start at $200 and run upwards of $2,500. 

If calling on a professional doesn’t fit within your budget, consider designing it yourself. It’s quite easy to do these days thanks to logo making programs like the Online Logo Maker. Let’s find out how. 

Sketch It Out First

Start by sketching out primary ideas for your logo. You’ll want to map out the text and basic graphics you want the logo to encompass as well as potential color schemes. 

Take your Sketch Online

Once you have a rough draft of the direction you’re going in, it’s time to take it online. It’s much easier to start designing online once you have a sketch to go off of to avoid staring at a blank screen.

Use a quality logo making program to bring your logo to life. With the Online Logo Maker, it’s easy to play around with your colors, fonts, and graphics. This is where the designer in you will start to come out.

Make it a Vector

If you want the best format for your logo, you’ll want to save it as a vector. This is a high-quality format that is easily scalable (both larger and smaller) without skewing the quality. Vector formats can also be easily transferred to any format as needed. 

Examples of Great Logos

Need a little inspiration before you get started? We’ve gathered some of the most ingenious logos for you to take a peek at.

Each one combines brilliance context with streamlined text to easily inform customers of who they are and what they do.

Target

Can you think of a more iconic logo than Target’s target? With or without the text you know exactly what it means. Whatever you need, whatever you’re looking for, just head to Target. Bullseye!

Movers Moving Company

You might have never heard of Movers Moving Company as you have with Target but one glimpse of the logo and you get the idea that it’s a moving company, even without the text. 

Movers Moving Company logo is a great example of context in a logo. The whitespace the hand makes creates a house as if the hand was picking up and moving it easily. Combine that with the simple word “Movers” and you know exactly what the name of the business is and what it does.

Guitar Studio-School of Excellence

This logo may have more text than the others but the visual graphics are bar none. The “I” in guitar and the “S” in studio make up a contemporary guitar. Not only will this grab people’s attention but allow them to take a second look and read into the business.

American Red Cross

Another classic logo that says exactly what it is. American Red Cross’ logo is in fact, a red cross. Easily recognizable anywhere you associate this logo with medicine and the greater good.

For more logo inspiration, click here. 

How to Use Your Logo

Now that you know exactly how to design the perfect logo, you can put it to use. There are some basic rules when it comes to using your logo.

The first rule? Use it consistently and often.

Brand consistency is crucial. Ensure your logo is always used correctly meaning it’s not stretched out of proportion, pixelated, or in the wrong color scheme. 

You’ll want to use your logo everywhere. You might be familiar with the Marketer’s ‘rule of seven‘. It states that a customer needs to hear or see your message seven times before taking an action. 

A good logo sticks in someone’s head. Plaster your logo everywhere like your staff’s t-shirts, your receipts, your webpage, and your packaging to pack the biggest marketing punch. Never let your customers forget where they shopped and how good of an experience you provided them with.

Need Help? Start Here.

Now that you know exactly what the perfect logo looks like, it’s time to get to work. 

We know starting a new task like designing your own logo can be daunting, but it doesn’t have to be this way. Check out this online tutorial to using our online logo maker. It’ll walk you through making your design step by step regardless of your design or technical experience. 

Our online logo maker makes it possible for everyone to design their logo, without over-priced professionals and over-complicated software.  

Get started today.