Who is the target audience? A logo needs to represent what a company stands for, and how to communicate directly to its audience. Which means you need to do research into the market of the company. Look at other competitors to make sure you are not too close or completely out of the ballpark in comparison. You want to stand out from your competitors. One of the worst things I’ve heard someone say is “Uh, pretty much…something like this.” It’s okay to have some inspiration from somewhere, but you need to be able to say what you like about it. Your logo needs to speak of your company. Not you, but the company. Unless you are marketing yourself. Keywords are a big part of the design process. What adjectives come to mind that represent what the company stands for? If the client does not have some already, I will come up with some, derived from the research. In the overall picture, simplicity is greater than complexity. Less is more. You have to think about how it will look really small versus really big. You also want to probably stay away from trends of the time. If you think about how fashion styles come in and out of style, so do design trends. And when you see that design a little down the road and think “wow, that’s pretty dated.” You definitely don’t want people to think that at first sight. You want your brand to be solid and stand the test of time. When getting into more details about which direction you want to go, do you consider a word-mark or an icon or a combination of the two? It depends really. There’s plenty of times when a company will need a logo in various forms as well, once it has been finalized. Like a vertical/ stacked format versus a horizontal or the stand alone icon. Or even different color combinations. The color pallet is a sensitive process. You want the color to represent the mood and colors do have moods. There are psychological representations of color, that can subconsciously affect emotions of people, so it is important to have a color pallet that suits your company and what it stands for. Font selection is a crucial part of the design. “There are so many fonts in the world, but so little uses for them. - Jim Davis” No, really, there are some good and bad fonts, but each have a personality or voice that communicates. You want to consider, do you want a sans serif font versus a serif font? Or a script verses a hand drawn? All have their proper place for various uses, but knowing when and when-not to use needs to suit the overall representation. These are just a few things to consider, when you are in the process of having a logo created for your company. Written by Jim Davis.