How to avoid getting ripped off by a logo designer

PUBLISHED BY NELA DUNATO ON MARCH 1, 2017 AT 06:33 IN BRANDING, GRAPHIC DESIGN, BUSINESS, TIPS FOR CREATIVES

http://neladunato.com/blog/avoid-getting-ripped-off-logo-designer/

Unethical freelancers are the worst, and it stings even more when those rotten apples are my own colleagues. I’m as passionate about preventing these people from cheating you as you are.

Crooked design professionals hurt the entire industry by ruining the reputation of freelancers. Because of these hacks, business owners are afraid to hire people from a different country and consider freelancers to be “second class” to creative agencies.

It’s not fair that all freelancers should suffer because of a few outliers who prey on naive business owners. For this reason, I want to make their job of cheating you harder, and your job of finding great freelancers online easier.

Here’s what you can do to protect yourself from being taken advantage of.

Don’t use Fiverr

Hiring logo designers on Fiverr is the equivalent of walking into a sketchy back-alley office of an unlicensed surgeon. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

$5 is an unreasonable price for a custom logo design, so the majority of the designs you’ll get there are either:

• bloody awful amateurish work
• plagiarized
• derived from stock graphics

Neither of these paints a great picture of your business. In fact, it can tarnish your reputation, and make it near impossible to become a premium brand.

Let me tell you a real life story.

Just recently, I participated in a Facebook discussion about logo design prices. Many people voiced their opinions—designers and clients alike. The advice varied from “Great logo design costs good money” to “I know someone who will do it for cheap”, and from “Don’t use Fiverr or 99designs”, to “Fiverr is awesome”.

One jewelry designer chimed in and boasted that she was super pleased with her “incredible logo design” that she only paid $25. Apparently, she hired 5 different people to do a logo for $5 each, and one of them came out OK.

(Let’s pause for a minute and think about this: if you bought groceries in a store and 4 out of 5 were spoiled, would you accept that? Of course you wouldn’t, you’d stomp right in and ask for your money back—but apparently, people are comfortable throwing money at Fiverr knowing to expect a crappy service.)

She posted a photo of her “incredible” logo, and it immediately got me suspicious. The logo had an attractive icon to it that looked like something above the $5 designer’s pay grade. I needed to know for sure, so I ran it through some image search engines, and there it was:

I’ve found 3 other companies using the same icon within 2 minutes.

It wasn’t a similar icon—it was the very same graphic. Same shapes, same colors. Not even a little detail was changed.

After a little more searching, I’ve identified the source of the original drawing: it was a cheap vector stock graphic from a service called Fotolia. The entire pack of vectors cost about $5 and had 6 different shapes in it. The “designer” from Fiverr was re-selling these as custom logos at a profit. Their work involved adding the company name to a ready-made graphic.

I’ve notified the jewelry designer of my findings because I wanted her to know the truth, but I also had self-serving reasons—I want to bust the myth that you can get a good, unique logo for cheap within a few days. That’s simply not feasible. (I wish it was, really—I’d be pumping out a dozen awesome logos a month and have hundreds of clients on my reference list.)

In the interest of preserving this business owner’s privacy I don’t want to share her logo, but here’s an example that recently came under the scrutiny of Croatian design community. The Zagreb International Airport logo uses a free stock vector, the same as many other companies have used. I don’t know the story behind the logo design—it could be that someone within the company designed it, so they’re fully aware it’s not an original symbol. Even if that were true, it’s still pretty bad from a branding standpoint.

Spot the differences

Be wary when you get an offer that seems too good to be true—it usually is.

Quality logo design can’t be rushed.

Logo design is not just about arranging a couple of elements or quickly drawing a symbol. It involves detailed communication with the client to learn about their goals, needs, and target audience, researching the market to ensure our design is original, creating dozens or hundreds of different ideas in order to be able to choose the best one to turn into a final design, all the while thinking about the deeper symbolic message behind the logo.

How fast someone can draw is irrelevant, because drawing is the smallest part of the logo design job. Coming up with fresh ideas that suit our client, and then polishing them until they’re just perfect is our job.

So apart from avoiding the back-alley designers, what else can you do to protect your hard earned money?

Do a reverse image search on designer’s portfolio pieces

Search engines have gotten really smart in the past few years, and now they can recognize the contents of graphics and photos, and even match a photo with a person’s name. You can use this capability to see if the visuals your potential new designer are genuine, or lifted off from stock sites or even worse—other companies that might sue you.

Here are the reverse image search engines to run your samples by:

• Google
• TinEye
• Bing
• Yandex

Use the camera icon to select a photo to match in the search. On Google, scroll down and click the link “Visually similar images”. I recommend using all of the search engines, because their methods and results differ. Typically Google and TinEye give more accurate matches.

Please note, if the results don’t show anything, this doesn’t mean the image is definitely not plagiarized, but you can use it to eliminate the worst offenders.

If a designer uses plagiarized logos in their portfolio, run.

Look up the designer on social media

I’ve heard numerous stories where someone impersonated a freelancer with a good reputation on websites such as UpWork and Elance (exhibit A, exhibit B, exhibit C, exhibit D). The impersonator didn’t have the expertise to do the project as advertised, so some of the clients ended up harassing the real freelancer for their money back.

Verify that the person you’re hiring through a freelance marketplace is who they say they are. Message them on social media channels (like LinkedIn or Twitter) to check if they’re the ones who responded to your offer.

Ideally, set up a Skype video chat during the hiring process to see that the face behind the camera matches the photo on their profile. If the freelancer isn’t willing to show their face on video, they may be hiding something.

Vet their previous clients

The designer’s previous clients can tell you a lot about the quality of designer’s work, and their expertise. (This might be a bit of a shortcut on doing extensive research, since you’re relying on the fact that other people did their research.)

Look up the websites of the clients and see if they’re still in business. Oftentimes you’ll see people hire cheap logo designers for low-priority or test projects that never work out, because it means they won’t have sunk too much money in it.

Question for you: is that the kind of company you want to be in? Or would you prefer to work with a professional whose clients are successful and making stuff happen?

If you find a client in their portfolio that you have a lot in common with, check in with them and ask them what their experience was like. If they’re full of praise, that’s good. If they seem reserved, maybe their experience wasn’t so great. Better be on the safe side.

And when it comes to safety…

Sign the contract before money exchanges hands

Contracts are here to protect both sides. My number one red flag for a bad client is when they don’t want to sign a contract—and it should be a red flag for you if the designer never offers a contract to sign.

Contracts are used to define situations such as:

• What the scope of work is
• Price and payment schedule
• What’s the time frame of the project
• Intellectual property rights on completed work
• What happens when one party wants to back out of the project.

Pay attention to the intellectual property rights in particular: the designer is the legal owner of all the work they create during the course of the project, unless stated otherwise in a contract you both sign. For logo designs, it’s crucial that the business owner owns the rights to use the logo for an unlimited time, in whatever media they want, worldwide.

I transfer copyright of the final logo to the business owner upon full payment. Protecting and enforcing those rights becomes their responsibility. (I keep the author moral rights, as well as copyright for the sketches and unused proposals I create during the process.)

To protect your investment, make sure the contract you sign contains the following:

• The scope of work that includes vector image formats (EPS, AI or SVG)
• Statement that the designer will create a unique logo that doesn’t violate a third party’s copyright
• Statement that copyright of the final logo will be transferred to you upon full payment
• What happens if the designer has to back out of the project (do you get your money back, or the half-finished logo?)

The designer will have clauses that protect them from your potential misconduct as well. When both sides feel safe and protected, that’s when trust and collaboration can flourish.

By now, you should be safe that the designer you’re working with is solid, and has your best interests in mind. Still, if you feel for any reason that the designer might be attempting to cheat you, you can double-check their results.

Ask to see the thought process behind the logo

Some designers will provide an in-depth presentation of their design solution complete with inspiration, sketches, logo construction, examples of use etc. which is what I advise my colleagues to do.

Logo design requires a lengthy iterative process that for the most part goes unseen by the client. When we show just the final logo, clients may dismiss it as something easy, when in fact it took dozens or even hundreds of sketches and versions to get there. Showing how we got to the logo and what the thinking process was helps us “sell” the idea to the client.

But it also does something else—it shows to the client that our creation is original.

If your designer isn’t forthcoming about their thought process but only shows you the final solution, prod them to explain their process. Ask them if you can see the sketches or inspiration that lead them to the final solution. We love geeking out about design with anyone that will listen, and if you show genuine curiosity, it might actually impress them.

Check your new logo with reverse image search

When the designer sends you a proposal of the logo, and you’re worried that it looks too much like something else you’ve seen, do the reverse image search on it using the methods I’ve mentioned before. Same if the designer gives you a vibe like they’re hiding something.

If you know of a competitor or a high-profile company who uses very similar visuals, let the designer know—they may be genuinely unaware of this and not intentionally copying anyone. Even so, you want your brand to be easily recognized in your niche so you can register the trademark and protect your intellectual property.

Do all of this before you pay the remaining amount. If you’ve already parted with all your money, it will be more difficult to enforce your rights.

A good designer will check for duplicates before they even send the proposal to you, but they might miss something. You need to be sure that the intellectual property you’re buying is legit so you don’t get sued and forced to change the logo later.

It’s not fair that you need to do the extra work, but you can’t rush into a professional relationship.

I wish we lived in a world where everyone was honest and fair. Unfortunately, many people feel a lack of confidence in their ability to earn money in an ethical way, so they resort to deception and theft.

If you did get ripped off in the past, it’s not your fault. It’s no wonder you’ve missed the red flags—you weren’t looking for them, because you trusted people. I hope this didn’t destroy your trust in all creative professionals. Not all of us are like that.

I suggest that you start looking for a designer as early as possible (months before you plan to start the project) so you can thoroughly research all the options instead of making a rash decision forced by panic. If you decide to hire a freelancer you’ve met online, follow the steps above and you’ll be safe.

If you’ve already found a designer and want to do your best to make the project a success, read my guide on how to write a design brief and be a glorious client.

And if you’re still looking and would like to work with me on your new brand identity design, I invite you to do your research—you’ll find that I’m an open book 😉

Struggling with your brand strategy? Start here.

PUBLISHED BY NELA DUNATO ON JANUARY 6, 2017 AT 08:06 IN BRANDING

http://neladunato.com/blog/struggling-with-your-brand-strategy/

If you had to figure out your brand strategy right now would you be able to do it? Would you know which steps to follow to get to a coherent brand that is easy to maintain for you, and attractive to your ideal clients? If your answer is “No”, or “Maybe”, or “Uhhh, I’m not sure…” that’s OK, because today we’ll get that confusion out of the way.

A while ago, someone asked me a question about branding that I expect a lot of people to have:

I’m struggling with branding so much I don’t even know what to ask. I tried creating a board with colors and fonts yesterday, but there are so many options I don’t know where to begin.

I think the real problem may be that I can’t settle on what my brand is. Where do I begin?

Does this sound in any way familiar? That’s a very common struggle among all business owners – yes, even those of us who do branding for a living.

Here’s my answer to this question.

You begin with you.

Starting with a visual brand moodboard is putting the cart before the horse. The visual brand is designed to communicate the essence of your brand to your target audience. You need to know what you’re trying to communicate first, in order to start working on your visual brand.

I’ve created a branding framework specifically for service-based businesses and artists called The Human Centered Brand. I’ve found that the way corporations and start-ups approach branding usually doesn’t work for service businesses, because of the essential difference in the business model. (You can use this framework to design your own brand by getting my book or following this free class, and it’s especially useful if you’re not primarily a visual creator.)

This approach consists of 5 brand elements that are defined in the exact order, since each step is built on the previous one. This concept is best illustrated with this pyramid-shaped graphic:

We’re building our brand strategy the same way we’re building a pyramid: first the foundations, then the lower levels, and then the higher levels. As you can see from the image, the visual brand is the very last step. You can only determine the right colors, fonts, photos, illustrations, your logo etc. after you’ve completed all the previous steps.

I’ll explain in more detail how you can go about discovering your own brand values, qualities and finally, your visual brand.

1. Core Values

Your core values are inherent to you as a person, and this also makes them inherent to your business. The very reason you’ve started your business was likely that you wanted to bring in more of these core values into your life, because your previous career wasn’t doing it. However, most people don’t consciously think about their own values, and aren’t even aware of what they are. This is a critical mistake, because shared values are how you connect to your ideal clients. Those clients that have the same core values as you appreciate your unique approach to business, and your personality as well.

How do you identify what your core values are? It takes some (okay, a lot of) introspection and thinking back to your childhood, school years and early career. Answering questions like “What motivated me to start doing this?” and “What kind of emotional fulfillment am I getting from my creative work?”

Another helpful question to answer is “What values would I never want to compromise, no matter what the reward?” (This is drawing a line in the sand of what you’re willing to do in your business in order to live in integrity.)

Think about why you do the things do, and how you do them, and what are the main qualities you’re expressing through that.

For a more in-depth view into your core values and how to find them, read my post Why you can’t separate “business” and “personal” – Introduction to Core Values.

2. Unique Value Proposition

The unique value proposition (or UVP) is what makes your offers different from the offers of your competitors, or any other businesses that are trying to solve the same problem for the same people you are.

Think about what you do best: what problem you’re solving that your competitors aren’t, or what you’re doing differently that makes you stand out in a positive light.

If you really don’t know how your service differs from that of your competitors (and you think it doesn’t), focus on your core values and examine how they influence your work. A freelance writer with the core values of “freedom, creativity, spontaneity” has a different unique value proposition from one whose core values are “trust, compassion, depth”. One of them may be more suited to write for travel magazines, while the other may find a niche in a field like health or human rights – their core values make them the perfect candidates to write on the topics where their approach fits in best.

I wrote a more in-depth post on this called What is a unique value proposition & how to create one, since it’s one of the most difficult elements of your brand strategy to define.

3. Brand voice

What I mean by “brand voice” is the topics you cover with your content, and the style you use when you talk and write. It’s important to bring it out of your head and actually define and write down what is the topic you most want to be known for, and how you naturally express yourself.

Your brand voice can have different qualities such as uplifting, intellectual, metaphorical, deep, empathetic, humorous etc. Look back through examples of your own best writing (something you personally consider best, or the content that your audience responded to very well). Try to find what all these pieces of writing have in common, and make note of any qualities that jump at you as those that are essential to your style of expression.

Your main topic and your style of expression also relate to your core values – they are the lens through which you view your profession, and you can use them to spin the boring topics all your peers cover and come up with something refreshing and original.

4. Ideal clients

A lot of brand strategists and marketers will tell you to start here. My opinion is that you cannot start defining your ideal client until you’re clear on who you are in your business (which is what the first 3 steps are for).

As service providers, we spend a lot of time with our clients and we can’t afford to work with the wrong people. Identifying your right people – those who need what you offer the most, who are willing to pay for it, and who want to work with you specifically – is crucial for the success of your business.

Your ideal clients want the unique value you can provide, share your core values, and appreciate your personality and your brand voice.

All of these must be true in order for someone to qualify as an ideal client. Friends who like you as a person, but don’t have the budget to buy your services are not your ideal clients. People with the right needs and budgets who think you’re too quirky are not your ideal clients. This doesn’t mean you’ll never work with them (although I would advise to avoid it if possible) – it means that you’ll be focused on attracting the clients that are ideal for you.

Identifying your ideal client is a process of elimination. First you start with the general world’s population (or a specific geographic area if your business is local), and then you narrow it down based on questions like:

• Are these people in a certain stage of their life or career?
• Have these people already tried some alternatives that didn’t work?
• Do these people need to have a certain minimum income in order to afford your services?

As you answer these questions, you’ll get a better idea of what your ideal client’s concerns are, which provides plenty of ideas for marketing, as well as creating more offers that provide better value for them.

And finally, we get to the last step…

5. Visual Brand

Your visual brand serves as a bridge between your brand essence and your ideal clients. The visual brand communicates your core values and your unique value proposition, and is aligned with your brand voice, so that the message that your audience gets on a conscious level (using words) is the same message that they get on a subconscious level (using colors and symbols).

For a non-visual creator this is a challenging assignment, which is why many business owners decide to hire a professional to design their visual brand. However, I get that many aren’t yet in a situation to afford one, and there’s an exercise that you can use on your own to find the qualities of your visual brand: creating a brand moodboard.

Your visual brand moodboard is a collage of different graphics that represents the colors, textures, atmosphere and style of your visual brand.

Online services such as Pinterest or Moodboard are often used to do this, but you can just save images to a folder on your computer you’ve named “Brand Moodboard”. (You’re allowed to use images that other people have created in your moodboard, but you’re not supposed to directly copy these graphics, as that would be a copyright violation.)

Include the following in your moodboard:

• photos and other graphics that portray your core values
• photos and other graphics that portray your unique value proposition
• photos that carry the “atmosphere” of your brand voice qualities
• photos and graphics that describe your ideal client – what they’re like as people, and the problem they want to solve

Try to find 30-50 different images at a minimum so you get a good sample for your next step. I recommend spending at least an hour on collecting your source images.

After you’ve assembled your moodboard, examine it carefully and start looking for patterns:

• What colors are repeated throughout the visuals?
• What atmosphere dominates the visuals? Is nostalgic, or romantic, or wild, …?
• What style dominates the visuals? Is it minimalist, or hand-crafted, or vintage, …?

Your brand moodboard can then guide your choices of colors and fonts that are aligned with all the other brand elements we’ve talked about. (I go into more detail on how to do that in the free class.) Once you have a great foundation for your brand, this process becomes easy and fun.

Do you have to go through the whole thing if you already have a brand you want to change up a bit?

This 5-part framework still works no matter whether you’re starting from scratch, or reworking a brand you already have. If you think some of the elements of your brand haven’t changed since you’ve first decided on them, you can keep them in place and work only on the parts that have changed. However, a change in the bottom levels of the pyramid will trickle out to the upper levels, as I’ve explained in my article: Rebranding 101: Why & how to update your existing brand.

Create a resonant, remarkable & sustainable brand

My new book The Human Centered Brand teaches you how to create a magnetic brand in a way that’s natural for you, and easy to implement.

In the book, I lay out my best advice for creating a lasting and memorable brand and provide clear steps you can take to make progress immediately. It’s written specifically for service based businesses and creatives who want to grow authentic relationships with their clients and their audience. Find out more about the book.

Enter your contact details in the form below this post to receive the free chapter and additional book bonuses! If branding has been on your to-do list, this is the perfect resource to get started.

Branding guidelines (style guides) demystified

PUBLISHED BY NELA DUNATO ON SEPTEMBER 21, 2016 AT 06:13 IN BRANDING, GRAPHIC DESIGN

http://neladunato.com/blog/branding-guidelines-style-guides-demystified/

If you’ve been exploring logo design services for your upcoming branding project, or you’re learning how to design logos on your own, you’ve probably encountered the term branding guidelines, also called brand identity guidelines, branding manuals, or brand style guides. (I don’t know how we’ve ended up with so many synonyms for this thing, and I’m sure it sounds confusing to people who aren’t brand designers themselves.)

Branding guidelines are a document that contains a set of rules for how a brand will be visually represented through different media (printed, electronic, video, photography etc.) They’re supplied by the brand designer, usually as a PDF booklet, though some may also give their clients printed copies (which is more common for high-end branding projects). Sometimes these documents also include guidelines on the verbal communication (voice and tone) and other areas.

Why do brands need these guidelines?

Branding guidelines enable people to create designs that are aligned with the brand, and look consistent and professional.

A brand is an ever evolving creature, and will be used by several, sometimes even thousands of people throughout its lifetime. Not all these people are designers who understand how brand design works. Giving people just the logo, and sending them on their merry way without any instructions can end up in a disaster.

The designer creates a logo with a set of constraints which are defined by the client before the project starts (for example, where the logo will be displayed, and what technology will be used to apply the logo to different surfaces). During the logo design process, the designer makes sure that the logo they’re making will fit those constraints. If the client will use silk-screen printing on T-shirts, the logo must look good in a single color (like white on dark). If the client will apply the logo to the uniforms using embroidery, then the logo must look recognizable even when slightly “pixelated”, so it can’t contain too much delicate detail, or too many shades of color.

At the end of the project, the designer’s job is to reiterate those constraints back to the client and everyone on their team, so the correct logo is used for each application.

Which brings me to the next issue I often see in logo design:

You can’t just give the client one logo variation and be done with it.

What do designers on Fiverr, 99designs and other cheap marketplaces have in common? Since they charge unreasonably low prices for their work, they try to get away with the least effort possible (so it would be worth their while). Now, there may be design students who are there because they’re learning and they’re really giving their best, but often what you get as a deliverable of a logo project is not even a vector, let alone a logo optimized for different uses.

One logo graphic file is not enough in most cases. If a designer has sent you a single logo file, they probably don’t know what they’re doing. The only exception to this are logos that are intended to be used in a single color throughout all the media, and this color happens to be black. In all other cases, you’re looking at two variations at a minimum.

I usually create 9 logo variations for each project where an icon is involved – vertical composition, horizontal composition and icon alone in color, black and inverse palette – each in 2 file formats (vector and raster), and I’m not even counting RGB, CMYK and Pantone color system variations here. This amounts to a whole lot of files. (I don’t even keep count.)

Different color variations for the Nubeculis logo

If I just gave my clients these files with no explanation, they would be lost as to which one to use when. So even in my most basic, no-frills logo design package, I provide a document to explain which logo variations the client has at their disposal, and in which contexts they’re used.

So, correct logo usage is the first reason why brands need guidelines, but there are more.

I’ve explained in my post on the vital elements of a premium brand that you need a consistent color palette and typography if you want your brand to be taken seriously. (Do these two well, and you can even get away without having a logo.)

Each typeface has a different personality, a unique “voice”, which represents your brand voice in written communication. There are no right or wrong fonts in general, but there are inappropriate fonts (think, Comic Sans for anything other than a children’s birthday party).

Color is one of the most memorable elements of a brand, and while the color symbolism doesn’t matter as much as some people think, the colors should be appropriate for a brand.

The logo designer chooses a typeface that communicates the qualities the client wants to project through their brand (like their core values). In the case of a hand-lettered logo design, the designer chooses a typeface that is in harmony with the hand-lettering that will be used in all the brand’s communication.

The color palette includes the colors that are in the logo itself, but it should also be expanded to a few more colors. The need for different colors is especially obvious on the web where you need neutral colors (for paragraph text and large surfaces), accent colors (for headings, graphics etc.) and action colors (for links and buttons). This enables the website visitors to easily distinguish the most important and clickable elements from the rest of the content.

When a designer gives the client their branding guidelines, it’s like giving them the keys to their new car – they can now take full ownership of it.

If the designer gives the client just a logo without any other guidelines to rely on, they’re essentially keeping the “keys” to themselves. If the client wants even the simplest thing done, they must come back to the original designer if they don’t want to risk messing it up. You have a car in your garage, but you need to call up your driver (who is also driving several other people at any given time) and check then they’re available – that’s crazy.

And what if the designer is unavailable – they’re on vacation, parental leave, sick leave, or are booked 6 months in advance, or went out of business? The client is stranded and needs to find someone else, and pray that the new person will be able to recreate what the previous designer did.

Branding guidelines empower business owners. They answer questions like:

• Which font is used in the logo?
• Which colors will go with this?
• Can I put the logo on this photo? What about that photo?
• What if I don’t have the last say in the design where my logo shows up, how will I keep my brand integrity?

You may not be thinking about these questions now, but they do pop-up frequently after your logo is done. Having clearly spelt guidelines makes all the design decisions much easier.

Any person who does any part of the communication for the brand needs to adhere to the branding guidelines

Have a virtual assistant? Give them your branding guidelines. Hiring a web developer? Give them your branding guidelines. Hiring a marketing strategist? Give them your branding guidelines. Taking on an intern during the summer? Give them your branding guidelines.

While investing in branding guidelines may seem like an unneccesary expense, they’ll actually save you time, money, and frustration in the long term.

If it’s obvious that your website, business cards, posters, brochures and social media updates are all done by different people, this means that either:

1. You don’t have branding guidelines in place, or
2. You do have them, but people don’t respect them.

Both of these spell trouble for your brand.

Branding guidelines are developed for a reason. They’re not open to “artistic interpretation” by any team member who happens to know how to use Photoshop.

What goes into a brand style guide

In my studio, I have two levels of logo & brand design service: the logo design, and the full branding package.

The logo design package contains the logo (duh!) and what I call the “mini” logo usage guidelines. The larger branding package contains everything in the mini guidelines, plus additional graphic standards for various uses.

Here are the essential elements of a brand style guide.

1. Logo variations

As I’ve mentioned before, having multiple logo variations for different uses makes sure that no matter where your logo is applied, it looks its best. Printed color brochure? Check. Website and mobile apps? Check. Black rubber stamp? Check. Laser-cut aluminium signage for your building? Check.

A page from my Nubeculis branding guidelines

The logo usage guidelines contain all of the logo variations, and explain where each one is used.

2. Minimum clear space

Minimum clear space is the area around the logo that must remain empty to preserve the integrity of the logo. If you put other graphics or text too close to the logo, it will drown in a mass of content and the resulting look will be unprofessional and unflattering for your brand.

Clear space for the 4D-monitoring logo

This part is especially important if your logo is displayed in media you have no control over, like a partner’s website or a poster for an event you’re sponsoring, where your logo is likely to be displayed along with many others. Whenever there are other people involved in representing your brand in the media, insist on them respecting the logo clear space.

3. Minimum logo reproduction size

Remember those constraints I’ve mentioned earlier? When a client defines where the final logo will be used, this affects the design process. Logos that will be used in app icons and website footers are designed differently from logos that will be shown on TV commercials and billboards.

Some logos look great when they’re small, but a little too simple when they’re blown up. Some logos are gorgeous and interesting on posters, but if you resized them to the size of the stamp, they get blurry and unrecognizable.

When I design the logo, I print out copies of it in a variety of sizes and take measures with my ruler to determine what the smallest acceptable logo size is. This size is noted in the guidelines in millimeters and pixels, and going below that size is not recommended.

4. Logo backgrounds

Logos are designed with certain background colors in mind. Certain variations are designed to be placed on light backgrounds, others on dark backgrounds. Mixing them up would result in poor visibility of the logo.

Savarakatini logo on different backgrounds

Some logo designs allow being placed on photographs, others don’t. Usually putting a logo on a uniform photographic background is OK, but you need to be careful and make sure the logo reads well. When in doubt, solid colors are better.

5. Incorrect logo usage

The main rule of proper logo use is: don’t change the logo in any way. Don’t change the logo color. Don’t change the font. Don’t change the orientation. Don’t change the aspect ratio. Don’t add drop shadows, outlines or any effects to the logo. Just… don’t change it.

Incorrect logo usage sheet reinforces this message with visual examples of what you’re not supposed to do.

Basically, you just need to use the logo files supplied. That’s it. If you need more logo variations for a specific use that the designer didn’t anticipate (like something to put on dark backgrounds), let them know you need it and they might be able to provide it.

6. Typography

Typography guidelines can be either pulled directly from the logo design (if it’s based on an existing font), or be chosen based on the compatibility with the logo. This is especially the case when the font used in the logo is not appropriate for larger blocks of text (like script or all-caps font), or the letters are designed specifically for this logo (ie. hand-lettering).

Typography definitions from my own brand style guide

Typography guidelines may define several different typefaces: a primary typeface, and a secondary typeface used when the primary isn’t available (for example, on the web). They can also define more than one primary and secondary typeface, and how they’re used.

7. Color palette

The primary color palette is defined from the logo design itself and includes all the colors present in the logo design.

The secondary color palette is expanded to include more colors that are compatible with the primary palette, and will enable designers and illustrators to create interfaces and visual art that’s visually appealing and easy to understand.

Color guidelines may also explain in which cases the secondary colors are allowed to be used, and how large the areas of color are allowed to be. Certain colors may only be used in small quantities.

8. Additional graphics

Now we venture into the area of the full branding package which, along with the logo design and a basic set of guidelines, includes the extras that help your brand stand out from the rest of your peers.

These graphic elements may be used across your marketing communication to signal your brand in a subtle, or an eye-catching way. Some examples include:

• Decorative details
• Icons
• Patterns
• Illustrations

The letter S from the Savarakatini logo is used as a pattern. The female demon illustration can be used to draw interest on promotional materials.

Designing marketing communication is so much easier when you have a predefined set of resources you’re able to use, and better yet, you get instructions on how to use them. With them, you don’t need to rely on stock libraries and end up using the same graphics as your competitors. It’s a step that many brands don’t make, but that can be a game changer from “same old, seen before” to “whoa, that’s pretty cool”.

9. Application for specific media

As a part of my complete branding package, along with designing the logo, I also create graphic designs for all the promo materials the client needs to start with. All these designs are then documented in the branding guidelines. If someone else were to step in and continue creating designs for the client, they could easily follow the instructions so all the new graphics are exactly the same as the old ones.

The guidelines may include design solutions like:

• Business cards
• Letterheads & envelopes
• Website, apps and social media graphics
• Email signature
• Signage
• Documentation

Instructions for business card and letterhead design I created for Adria24

Once I create the guidelines, the clients are no longer bound to work only with me, unless they really want to – any decent designer will be able to translate them into any medium.

10. Photography and art direction

These are not a common part of a style guide, but I like to include this part for the clients which anticipate a lot of stock photo or commissioned art use.

Photos and artwork can impact the brand more than any other visual tool, and they must be aligned with the guidelines in order to be effective and to convey the atmosphere you want your customers to experience. Photography is one of the 6 vital elements of a premium brand, and I wrote more in detail about it in that article.

My guidelines are loose and the client is free to deviate from this direction, but for best results it’s recommended to keep the photos and art consistent.

But what if my branding guidelines don’t define a specific use?

As your brand grows, your branding guidelines can be expanded to include an application that wasn’t anticipated in the beginning, or you didn’t have the budget to prepare for it then.

If you need a style guide for a new brand application, contact your designer and ask them to update your guidelines to address the new medium. (Keep in mind you’ll need to pay for that, as it’s beyond the scope of the original project.)

Where do you keep the guidelines?

Some companies and non-profits choose to publish their vector logo files and branding guidelines on their website, so they’re accessible to all the employees, partners and press. If you expect to deal with press and advertising agencies a lot, I recommend creating a “media kit” page where anyone can access them.

Here are some examples:

• LinkedIn branding guidelines download
• Ubuntu brand assets
• West Virginia University brand center
• Asana logo and design styles
• Red Cross brand identity “at a glance” poster (PDF)

If you don’t deal with press, and don’t want your branding assets to be visible by everyone (many business owners are very protective of their logo and guidelines), I recommend uploading them to a cloud service like Google Drive or Dropbox so they’re always accessible to you, and you can easily share them with your team members and vendors.

Bonus point: create a friendly link (using bit.ly) that you can remember by heart, so you don’t have to look up your files every time someone asks you for them.

And of course, always keep multiple backups of your logo and branding guidelines. Don’t expect your designer to keep your files forever. (We deal with a lot of client projects, and sometimes purge our disks to make room for more.) Make as many copies as you’re able to.

Design your own brand guidelines like a pro

If you’re in the startup phase and aren’t able to invest in a professional brand, I get it. I recommend that you get started with my book The Human Centered Brand. The Book + Brand Style Guide Bundle offers fill-in-the-blank templates you can use to create professional-looking branding guidelines for your own business.

Prefer to let someone else do this?

I get it, you’re too busy to do this on your own. If you want your business to look its best and need professional help, I’d love to hear from you.

Check out my logo & brand design services and contact me, so we can chat about your project and see if my approach is what your business needs right now.

The difference between the $100 logos, $1.000 logos and $10.000 logos

PUBLISHED BY NELA DUNATO ON MARCH 23, 2017 AT 07:00 IN BRANDING, GRAPHIC DESIGN

http://neladunato.com/blog/logo-pricing-difference/

“My designer quoted me $600 for a logo. Is this a fair price, or are they ripping me off?”

“That’s way too much. I can recommend someone who can do it for $50.”

I’ve witnessed this kind of conversation many times. I’ve decided it’s about time I talk about this heated topic here on my own blog to explain what the whole deal with pricing logos is about.

Discussing prices is touchy because people can easily become defensive. It’s not my intention to belittle anyone whose budget can only afford them low priced logos, nor to convince anyone that they should buy a more expensive logo. I want you to become aware of what you’re buying. I want you to have realistic expectations of what your budget can afford you, so you don’t end up disappointed because you didn’t get what you wanted. There’s a logo for every price point, and there’s a good reason why they cost as much as they do.

People outside of the design industry who don’t understand the nuances behind logo design are legitimately confused by the prices. Logo prices vary wildly, from 5 dollars to millions of dollars. What’s the deal? How can the same thing cost $5 and $5 million?

That’s the point—it’s not the same thing.

While this topic is a lot more complex than I can cover in a single article, I’ll simplify things a bit and divide the typical logo ranges in 3 tiers: the low-end ($100-$999), the mid-end ($1.000-$9.999) and high-end ($10.000+). I’ll explain what happens at each of these levels, and why it costs as much as it costs.

First things first: What is a logo?

In order to qualify as a logo, a graphic must satisfy several conditions. It must be:

• A vector graphic, blown up to any size without any loss in quality.
• Clearly convey meaning even when scaled down to the size of a stamp or an app icon.
• Suitable for use in a variety of media (print, digital, engraving, embroidery etc.)
• Unique—there are no other businesses using the same graphic.

If a graphic fails one of these checks, it’s not done to professional standards, so it cannot be considered a real logo.

Logo design for Wild Moon Spirit.
The shapes remain recognizable even when scaled down, or converted to a single color.

$5 “logos” are not logos

The reason I’m not even considering Fiverr gigs a part of the legitimate logo design industry is because the results you get from those gigs are not logos. What you typically get are plagiarized graphics placed on a white background (if you’re lucky), which makes them literally useless for any practical purpose.

So let’s move on to actual logos. What’s the difference between low, mid and high end logo design services?

The main difference is the process

When I said that $100 logos, $1.000 logos and $10.000 are not the same thing, what I meant is that the process used to get to these logos differs. While the result might appear similar to an untrained eye, the work that went in it is of a different order of magnitude.

I’m not even talking about the operating costs here.

A legitimate business pays taxes, their own healthcare, bookkeeping fees, expensive professional design tools and equipment. People in the Western Europe, North America and Australia have higher costs of living than those in Eastern Europe, South America, Africa or most Asian countries. All of these conditions factor into the designer’s rates—someone might be able to offer the same level of service for a lower price because their operating costs are lower. (That’s why my services are cheaper than that of an American or British designer of comparable level of skill and experience.) But let’s put that aside for now, because we could be here all day analyzing spreadsheets.

Before we get into the process thing, I’d like to point out one other difference that’s rarely discussed in the design circles.

Logo price also depends on the client

The value of the logo is not solely in the designer’s work: it’s in your company’s potential to profit from it. A corporation who will profit in millions every year from a branding project should pay more for a logo than a non-profit or a small family business.

Non-profit organizations and local micro-businesses have lower budgets and don’t expect a big return from a re-branding project. Designers often decide to lower their price, or even offer pro bono services in order to meet the needs of their less profitable clients.

Businesses who are serious about using design to gain more customers and be perceived as a premium brand are willing to invest more money, because this investment will lead directly to higher profits.

Two different companies may pay a different price for what can be considered the same amount of work, and this is not unfair: it’s called value based pricing. If the logo will help you get more customers at a higher price point, this translates into profit. Designers who help you achieve that deserve a piece of that pie.

Now that you know the two other factors of logo design prices—operating costs and value based price—let’s circle back to the main topic of this post: the differences in the design process.

The $100 logo design process

$100 is the least you can expect to pay for a decent logo, though by First-world standards that’s still cheap.

I have two explanations for how it’s possible for designers in developed countries to charge $100 per logo and still make a living:

1. They’re not full-time designers.
2. They create 10-20 logos per month.

If someone has a second job that’s paying the bills, or is still in the university and their life is funded by parents and student loans, it figures that they won’t value their services as much. They don’t need the money to survive—they can afford to put a ton of work into a project and only get a fraction of what they deserve.

If we’re talking about a full-time designer that’s still somehow managing to make a living off of $100 logos or cheaper, you have to wonder: how much effort are they able to put into each one? If you know your logo is just one of half a dozen they’re working on this week, can you be confident in the quality of what you’re getting?

When the designer is forced to rush through a project, they have to cut corners.

There is no way logo design can be optimized like a factory and be done in a few hours every single time. Creative process doesn’t work that way.

Typically, the first thing that suffers is research.

Design research is the first step in the logo design process. It’s an essential step, because logos are not created in a vacuum—we need to establish what’s already present on the market, and how to differentiate from your competitors. If we don’t do that, the results will likely be a generic cliché that’s already been seen a thousand times.

That means that the designer has to work based on client’s input alone, and jumps quickly into the creation process. Such process might involve:

1. Asking clients for design direction (favorite colors, fonts, symbols, moodboards etc.).
2. Creating several variations quickly and offering the client to pick their favorite.
3. Refining the chosen option based on client’s input.
4. Sending the final logo and the invoice.

This can realistically be done in a few days, so it explains why the price is so low. The question is, do you want to put the symbol that will represent your company for years to come into the hands of a student, designer with a second job, or a designer who is juggling many other projects alongside yours?

The $1.000 logo design process

For $1.000 or more, you can get a pretty good design solution, provided that the designer has plenty of experience and adheres to professional standards.

A complete logo design process involves the following phases:

1. Researching the client and the competition.
2. Setting the design direction (through the use of a design brief and/or a moodboard).
3. Creating many design concepts.
4. Refining concepts with the most potential.
5. Choosing the concept that best communicates the client’s values and brand message.
6. Presenting the logo proposal to the client (with examples of everyday use).
7. Revising the logo based on feedback (optional).
8. Preparing multiple color and composition variations of the logo.
9. Designing the branding guidelines.

You can see there’s a lot more involved in the mid-end design process than it is in the low-end. A single project can take anywhere from 30 to 50 or more hours to complete. The project can last between 2 and 6 weeks, depending on how many projects the designer is working on at a time, and if there’s additional graphics included with the logo.

The phases in my own logo & brand design process

Experienced freelancers in the US and the EU will typically fall into the 4-figure dollar price range, but there are also freelancers charging 5-figure rates.

Is a mid-range logo design project in your budget? Then you’re in luck, because that’s how much my logos cost.

Check out my logo services

Next, at the 5-figure range and beyond, we have branding agencies.

The $10.000 logo design process

The high-end logo design process follows a similar structure as a mid-end one, with one key difference: it involves a team of designers and marketers.

Instead of one dedicated professional, you get 2, 3 or more, all working to make your project a success. Since there’s more people and resources involved, you’re getting a lot more done:

• The research phase is more thorough.
• More designers equals more ideas.
• Design may involve active participation of the client or a customer focus group.
• Business naming and taglines are often included in the agency brand design package.

This type of process can last several months. Large companies with so much at stake wouldn’t dare to rush it because if they don’t let the agency get it right, it might cost them a lot of money.

With so many people involved, and all of them giving their focused attention to your project, prices of the agency logo designs practically have no upper limit—they can go up to millions of dollars for big clients like MasterCard, Pepsi and Airbnb.

Different design processes deliver different results

A “deliverable” is an item that you as a client get once the design is finished. The more money you invest, the more deliverables you get to take home.

With a low-budget logo, you get a logo. That’s it.

With a mid-budget logo, you get:

• Multiple logo variations (color, black, inverse, vertical, horizontal, icon etc.)
• Brand style guide.
• Additional graphics (optional, depends on how much you’re paying).
• Brand strategy (optional, not all freelancers do this).

With a high-budget logo, you get:

• Brand strategy.
• Multiple logo variations.
• Brand style guide.
• A comprehensive selection of all the graphics you will need.
• Optionally, brand name and tagline.

I hope this post has clarified why the logo prices vary so much. It’s not that designers are trying to cheat you, it’s that logos are not trivial.

I see logos as the most challenging type of design project there is.

Not every designer can do logos well—it’s a highly specialized skill. I don’t teach business owners how to design their own logos because honestly, by the time you learn how to do it properly, you spend so much time that simply paying someone else would be faster and easier.

There’s no template or “best practice” that guarantees a logo everyone will love. So much can go wrong when an inexperienced designer takes on a logo project (for example, ending up with an unintentionally vulgar logo). The company’s reputation is at stake, because logo is a business tool that wears many hats.

If a logo design project turns out unsuccessful, re-branding will invite even more costs. You’ll need to re-design and print all the promo materials over again, like websites, apps, brochures, signage, vehicle graphics, business cards for all employees… The costs just add up, which is why companies avoid re-branding if they can help it.

Saving money on a low-cost logo today might mean having to invest more money later to fix what isn’t working.

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That said, my advice for you is:

Don’t rush into a logo design project.

If you don’t have the budget for what you want right now, save up for it rather than spending money on something you won’t be happy with. And if you choose to stick with a low-priced logo, I support your decision—but please, do your research so you don’t get ripped off by a logo designer.

Hand-lettered logo design is my specialty

If you like my work, you’ll be glad to hear that my logo design services come in two packages. You can start with a smaller package right now, and add other graphics as you need them later on. This is a cashflow-friendly option that many business owners choose when starting out.

If you have any questions about the logo design process, contact me and I’ll be happy to answer them—no strings attached. Or, you can ask your question in the comments below.

Really, I’m just looking for an excuse to talk about logos because I’m so passionate about them—like you’re passionate about your work.

EDIT: Note to designers on raising your prices

This post is making rounds in the design circles, and I’m very happy about that, because it means more designers will learn how to earn a reasonable living from their work. Several designers have reached out to me to say that they have realized they need to raise their prices after reading this article. That’s wonderful.

But.

You may not be able to raise your prices overnight.

I teach business owners all the time how your price needs to reflect not only the quality of your work, but also your professional presentation. In my article Is your business a bargain bin brand? I described what happens when your presentation is not at the level that we tend to expect from “premium brands”, ie. brands that charge higher fees. You can’t sell expensive champagne in a plain bottle, and you can’t sell $1000+ logos on a free Wix site.

Before you raise your price, ask yourself:

• Are your services already in demand?
• Do your clients recommend your services to their friends and colleagues?
• Is your portfolio filled with high quality logo designs that you’re proud of?
• Do you have your own website on a custom domain that looks professional?
• Does your website contain useful content that helps clients decide whether you’re the right designer to help them?
• Are you regularly getting to know new people who might become potential clients, or refer new clients to you?

If you don’t have a solid foundation in your design business, raising the price alone won’t do you any good. All this stuff we tell our clients—how having a great looking brand will help them get more buyers—is twice as important for you. You have no excuse, you are the designer. If you can’t come up with a beautiful and professional brand presentation for yourself, how can you do that for your clients? You’re not walking your talk.

On top of looking like a professional, you also need to show a compelling reason why they should choose you, instead of someone else. That’s the unique value proposition, and in our line of work “I can draw really nice logos” is not enough. You may decide to choose a niche, or a style, or some other way you want to differentiate yourself, but you need to think of something. Otherwise, no one will pay you thousands of dollars.

It’s not just about money (it’s never just about money). It’s about how you present yourself as an expert, and how you connect with clients. Money is a result of that. If you just change your pricing and nothing else, it might not work because the clients can’t see why $1000+ is worth it.

This is a whole different topic that deserves a more in-depth article, but I put the short version here to make sure that every designer who reads this article knows what they’re getting into. Good luck.