Finding New Ways Of Branding With Your Logo

The entire concept of logos has been around the block a time or two. We all know what logos are, and what they’re for — they’re there to give a brand a “face,” to help with marketing, to let you know when you’ve arrived at the correct website or brick and mortar store. Whether you have a new business or you’re looking for ways to make your existing business grow, you may think that you’re all covered on the logo front.

But don’t dismiss your logo too quickly! You could be missing out on some grand opportunities to promote and grow your brand — by strategic, effective use of your logo.

Let’s take a look at five tips to make your logo work for you in new and unexpected ways.

Craft Your Logo Around Your Brand Personality, Not The Other Way Around

One of the first expert tips is to keep your ultimate goal in mind before you even make your logo. Logos shouldn’t be designed just on a basis of what looks cool; they’re there to send a message about your brand, and to create a bridge between you and your potential customers.

This is why designers, marketers, and business gurus always recommend compiling a creative brief before you get started with branding. Before you can create a representation of your brand, you need to know what your brand represents. You also should research competition in your market, understand trends and traditions, and know your audience.

And, just as importantly, your logo must align with your brand personality, rather than the brand personality being tweaked to match the logo. It isn’t a chicken and egg scenario — it’s clear that the logo is there to compliment the brand, to further its interests, and spread its message.

In this sense, crafting your logo around your brand personality is the ultimate way to brand using your logo.

Your Logo Is Your Signature

Speaking of using your logo for digital marketing – or on marketing things— what about the email blasts that you send out to your clients to announce new services or sales? It’s likely that you use your company name in prominent places, but what about replacing the name by simply using your logo instead?

The more familiar with your logo that your clients get, the better it will be for its recognizability and memorability. And with those two factors increasing, your company growth undoubtedly will, too.

Create A Social Media-Specific Logo

Many designers recommend that you have variations of your logo to be used in different circumstances. This includes variants like:

• Small or large
• Black and white
• Color pop
• Text only
• Graphic only
• Combination mark — text and graphic

These ready-to-go variants make sure that your logo is the most effective version of itself, wherever it ends up being used.

Along with those, consider creating a specialized version specifically for different social media platforms. This means not only using the sizing recommendations for the platform, but possibly even adapting the style of the logo in order to appeal to the audience most likely found on each individual social media site. (There are plenty of social media demographic research sources to help you identify who your audience likely is on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and so on.)

Adapting your logo to your audience, while still keeping true to your brand, is an excellent way to make sure that it gets noticed.

Make Stickers, Printables, And Postcard Art

You probably know all about including your logo on business cards, pens, coffee cups, t-shirts, and so on — everyone has a free corporate t-shirt in their closet, and most of their pens are probably labeled by businesses, too.

But what about thinking outside the box when it comes to marketing materials?

Digital marketing, for instance, is a major component of the modern marketing campaign. And especially in a time of lockdown and pandemic, people are less likely to accept physical marketing pieces like business cards.

Printables are a way around that issue. Printables provide a service to your customer, often downloadable and free, and always branded with your logo. What type of printable content you use will depend on the type of business you run, of course, but it isn’t difficult to come up with some valuable information, no matter what the genre.

Along with downloadable content, consider getting artsy with your marketing by using your logo on stickers, postcards, and other creative outlets. Especially at this time, when it’s cheaper than ever to create marketing materials that can be handed out for free, it’s a great idea to look into what else you can put your logo on, rather than just the usual.

Tell Your Logo’s Story

As a final point, consider the logo itself. You know that your logo is at the center of your branding, and so does your audience. It should be obvious to any onlooker what your logo actually is.

But do they know what it means?

It may be self-explanatory, and if it’s a simple logo then it’s probably not too difficult to understand. But even with that in mind, what about the story behind the logo?

You know why you chose that logo — but do your customers know?

Tell your logo’s story. Whether it’s a section on your website, a blog post, or even just a few notes on a social media platform, invite your customers to get to know your logo, and get to know your brand better at the same time.

This works whether you’re just spotlighting your existing logo or launching a new one. It’s a great way to create brand-centered content that furthers your engagement and connection with your audience.

Your logo is there to work for you and your brand. It’s no longer just a case of slapping it on your business card and calling it good. Your logo has a story to tell, and a service to render — and using it in innovative, effective ways will help it to do all that it can to make sure your brand is a success.

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Meet Dan Jenkins, a freelance blogger with a penchant for video streaming and all things electronics. He likes to dig deep into topics he writes about whether it is graphic design or gadget reviews. He likes collecting CDs and music records.