The Process of Logo Design

Logo design can be a more involved process than people realize. It's the one image the people immediately associate with your company, so it's important to get it right and some companies pay big bucks for a professional logo design. So how to go about it?

Personally I don't think it's worth the many thousands of dollars that some companies will charge, but there is a bit of work to get it right. To start with I think it's important to ask some key questions that help determine the type of logo design that will be suitable for a particular business image. So the first thing I do is get the client to fill out a questionnaire with questions such as:

Are there any icons of your industry?

Describe the personality you would like to portray.

Do you have a strap line or motto?

List 3 logos that you think really work for their companies.

Who will you sell to?

How many colours do you imagine using?

Any colours you are particularly keen on?

Tell us what it is necessary to show.

This information works as a great starting point. Next, based on this type of information I come up with at least 3 initial concepts to show to the client (usually a few more once I get going)

The client will then come back to me with any feedback, any modifications or changes they'd like to see, or sometimes there is one that really stands out to them that they'd like to pursue.

This can go on for a couple of rounds.

Once the client is happy with the final design, I provide the logo to them in numerous formats to use in all types of media. The initial design is always done in a program like Adobe Illustrator so that the logo is in 'vector art' format - which means that it can be scaled up or down to any size without any loss of quality. It is not limited by resolution or pixelation and will not appear with an unwanted white background or box. From Illustrator, it can also be converted any other format.

Generally it is a good idea to provide a single colour version of the logo and also a black and white (greyscale) version, as not all print media is affordable to the client in full colour or spot colours.  Then also it is best to provide formats such as jpeg and giff, that can be used in websites. There may also be some variations of the logo that can be supplied such as an icon on it's own instead of the full logo version.