What is a Logo?

What is a logo if you looked in the dictionary it will give you the definition something along the lines of a logo is a symbol a sign or an emblem so that’s the definition of a logo now we do need to talk about it a little bit more than that if we went back to store needs times we would see our human ancestors using symbols the used symbols to get across messages ideas concepts and thoughts they didn’t have written languages back then they may not have even had proper verbal communication so symbols were vitally important if we fast forward today we still use symbols to get across concepts ideas and thoughts but today we call them logos are designed for recognition of organizations for businesses or groups they’re used to build identity within or around those organizations are not identity the bigger concept of the identity around an organization is what’s known as the brand and the logo is the tip of an iceberg in a brand a logo should be original it should be memorable and it should have impact should be striking there are millions of Logos out there you need your logo if you have one or want one to stand out from your competitors so it needs to be solidly designed it needs to cover all the bases a logo is what most people and I’m talking the public will use to identify a brand they will see a logo and it’ll instantly trigger a thought or a feeling about that brand it’s basically the the larger brands that mark a lot there was a study done with toddlers two three four year olds who can identify a name well-known brands from the logos before they could even read or write that’s the power of a logo of a symbol used well you will see logos on multiple things from business cards letter heads vehicles advertisements websites social media platforms and there’s plenty of those you see logos everywhere for that reason logos also need to be adaptable they need to be able to be reproduced at sixteen pixels in the address bar in a web browser they also need to be recognizable 100 foot high or 100 foot white on the side of a billboard so as you can see logos are important and logos are essentially symbols that convey a message of a larger brand.

Kinds Of Logos: logos logos logos so many of them out there did you know though that you can categorize them down into groups there are different ways to describe certain designs of logos I’m going to talk about them today or I’m going to explain to you the different types of categories.

Symbol Or Icon Logo: the first category that you’ll have with a logo is the basic symbol or icon iconic type logo this type of logo represents a brand and a simple but bold and confident manner in most cases the image is abstract or stylized you’ll generally find these types of logos for large brands which serve the whole world the reason behind that is that if you serve the whole world you’re going to be serving populations who have different languages different traditions and you need your brand identity to be recognizable quite easily without having to understand words so having a symbol or an icon is ideal for those types of businesses examples of those businesses would be Apple and shell oil or the Nike swoosh those are all symbols and they work really well.

Word Mark Logo: Next we’ve got the word mark now the word mark is basically what it says it the logo is made up of a word in these cases what you will find is that the brand will create their logo but they’ll create their logo using a unique font they will have a designer write the name of the business but they will do it in a font that isn’t available anywhere else that keeps uniqueness with that design they won’t just jump into Mike soft word and use Arial or Comic San, examples of wordmark Logos would be coca-cola Facebook and eBay they are all wordmark logos.

Letter Mark Logo: Next up we’ve got a letter mark similar to the wordmark but a lot shorter letter marks will generally use the initials of a company there could be a few reasons for that it could be that the company’s name is really long and it’s just not going to fit well as a logo it may be that the company’s name is quite hard to pronounce so as we said about the symbol it may be that the company has a long as a German company has a long name and it’s quite hard to pronounce for people from other countries so what you do is you take the initials and you shorten them down and you make a logo from that examples of letter mark logos would be Hewlett Packard HP, BMW, and IBM.

Combination Mark Logo: the next logo category is the combination mark now a combination mark utilizes a word mark and the symbol in one so you kind of have the best of both worlds there you’ve got adaptability you could use the symbol on its own or you could use the wordmark on its on there is a danger though you would only really do that if you have a well-established brand and you’ve spent a fair bit marketing your logo so that everyone knows where it is that’s instantly recognizable only then would you be able to really take these two separate elements and use them in their own situation because you have the confidence that people would know what it is but it gives you adaptability for different marketing situations print digital screen all that sort of thing examples of a combination Mark logo would be Pizza Hut Adidas and Burger King three good examples there.

Emblem Logo: the last category of a logo is the emblem now the emblem is quite similar to a combination mark you’ll have the company name and you’ll have a design not quite a symbol though the reason it’s an emblem is that the company’s name is fully encapsulated within the design think of it more like a shield or a crest with the company name inside of it examples of that would be Harley Davidson with the name Fully in the middle bit with the shield BMW and Starbucks three examples thereof emblem logos.

if you’ve got any questions on any of these categories of logos I’d love to hear them and I will make sure that I answer them just pop them into the comment section below looking forward to future stories we’ll delve again deeper into logo design and we’ll also delve into brands and what brands are exactly and the elements that make up a brand and we’ll also look at more design thanks for reading