Stephanie asks

Hi Stephanie - Thanks for the tough question. I can give you advice and a practical iterative process to follow. Here are the steps in the iterative process. I realize they sound like the same ol' same ol' but I think going through them in this order will help to zero in on what will work for you.

• Know your target market's preferences
• Focus on a tagline or services offering statement
• Select a brand style or image
• Create a logo

And it's okay to cycle  through these steps a couple of times before you make final decisions.

First, I'm going to assume you know who your target market is and what they respond to. What do they read? Where do they see advertising?  Knowing their media consumption habits and psychographics (are they conservative, entrepreneurial, edgy, corporate, young, mature, etc.) should be a part of your discovery process. Ground yourself in what will resonate with them.

Given that knowledge, let's start with generating a tagline because that will help you zero in on the image you want to project. Here's a simple approach. Pretend somebody asked you, "What do you do?" Try to come up with a very short answer... no more than 10-words. Brainstorm. Write a bunch of replies that start with, "I help....," "I provide..." or ""I work with...." Be colloquial. Just try to generate a lot of answers to that question at first. Focus on the customer. Don't critique yourself or censor yourself while you're doing it. That can come later. After that exercise, you might have a tagline or, at least, the beginnings of one.

If you're already in business, take a look at any testimonials you've received or ask clients to describe the value you provided them. The clients' view of you and the value proposition you offer can be another great source of tagline ideas.

The rules for taglines are that they be concise, distinctive, communicate your message, sound pleasant to the ear, be something you can stand behind, and be designed to last for a few years.

This may sound heretical but not everybody needs a tagline. I never had one. I just list my three main services on my business card, stationery, invoices, etc.  To wit, "Blum & Company, Advertising * Direct Marketing * Marketing Communications." If thinking up a fabulous, creative, catchy tagline you can live with for a few years is stopping you from producing your marketing materials, you may want to jump over that hurdle and go with the service description approach.

Next, think about the style you want for your brand. What are the values, characteristics, or attributes you want to project to your target audience? Create a list of adjectives that project what you and your business model are all about. That adjective list can give you ideas for brand positioning and for the look and feel you want your materials to project.

What are the visual cues you want to project? Logo design, main brand identity color(s) and complementary brand palette, and font selection are where to go next. Let's start with color and fonts and then go back to logo design. Experts recommend selecting a two-tiered brand color palette with predominant colors for your logo and stationery products and complementary colors and lighter shades for your website and more comprehensive print materials. You'd probably need a graphic designer's help to generate a sophisticated palette.

If you're doing it yourself, keep it simple (good advice even if you aren't doing it yourself):

• Choose a dominant color (your brand color), complementary secondary color, and perhaps a couple more complementary colors.
• Choose a brand identify font and one complementary or secondary font. It might help to think of the choice as a primary font for text and a font for headlines. These can be different than your logotype but  the logotype and all other type should work together. (You might take a look at the Adobe Type Library: Type Classifications and pick out fonts that feel right for what you want to convey.)
• Keep a consistent look and feel across the materials. I doubt I have to say this, but don't change style with every piece.

For color combination ideas, you could look at  The Designer's Guide to Color Combinations by  Leslie Cabarga (North Light Books) or The Designer's Guide to Color (Chronicle Books), a handy set of color combining guides. The Designer's Guide to Color Combinations is very practical and has sections entitled Victorian Color, Art Deco Color, Atomic Age Color, Far Out Sixties. Current Color, Limited Color, Bad Color, Earth Color... nice ways to see how color combinations communicate a feeling, mood, or style. The Color Marketing Group publishes seasonal Color Trend reports you might find helpful.

All these exercises in brand messaging and focusing on your preferences will help you as you decide on a logo.

Logo design is an area where I think it pays to use a professional designer. If you do use a graphic designer, ask about the cost for using their services to create your entire identity system of business cards, stationery, etc.

But there are do-it-yourself logo software and websites out there. As part of your discovery process, you might want to just play with logo design at one of them and see what you get.  How your logo works out will be dependent on the image or icon you start with.

By the way, another possibility is to simply use a type treatment of the firm's name as your logo. No graphic element. That can be effective too.

Logos have to look good in small and large sizes, look good in black and white as well as color, and look good used with your tagline. Using do-it-yourself tools, you might find it a challenge to get the logo to work alone as a singular graphic element plus together with the tagline.

As you go through the stages of the selection process, you may want to circle back and rethink previous ideas and selections, but the idea is that this process helps you to get closer and closer to choices you have confidence in.

Once your logo has been created, you will need several different file formats for different media. When it's finalized, get EPS, JPEG, and GIF versions. Also, when you choose colors, be sure to see how they translate in different media. You don't want a discernible difference from print to the web.

Good luck and let us know how it goes.

Best regards,

Sandy

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