Logo design and branding
design are often used interchangeably, but are they really interchangeable?
Often when people think of
branding, first they visualise a logo – McDonald’s golden arches, Chanel’s
interlocking Cs or Spotify’s green circle, and then from that, they begin to
recall the knowledge they have of the company behind that Logo – beliefs they support,
memorable advert campaigns, even just really great (or terrible!) service
they’ve experienced with that company, but really although the logo is core to
the branding and to inspiring that connection, one is not the other.
When you design a logo, you
are creating a signpost for your business, the marker that people remember and
associate you with – but it is the simplest version of your business. Although
it comes first, a logo only really achieves its potential once good branding is
in place – the branding of a business is the company image as a whole – if a
logo is your defining feature, good branding is the attitude you present
yourself with and the great outfit you’re wearing to that important meeting.
When you are designing branding
you are making decisions on the fonts you use, the definitive colours of your
marketing/products and the ways in which these assets can be used to market you,
including the logo. Outside of the brand identity, things get a lot more
nuanced as the branding spans out into public opinion.
What we identify as the
‘Brand’ of a company is the public opinion – how does the target market view
your company? Who are you appealing to? When the consumer sees that logo what
associations do they have? In designing branding you are steering this as best
you can using the media you promote yourself with and the personality you
embody. Whether you’re a clothing company livetweeting the latest episode of
Love Island or a supermarket creating adverts celebrating body positivity, the
calculation behind appealing to your target market and how you do so is all
part of creating that brand.
The culmination of these two
very distinct parts – the logo design and the branding design, is what pulls
together your company image into one, unified, recognisable identity and
solidifies your business as one at the forefront of the minds of your
consumers.
