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The most overused logos, at the moment

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Re: The most overused logos, at the moment

#51

Post by Gustomaximus »

Retric wrote: post #41
jwallaceparker wrote: post #35

When I was young my great-grandfather started a tanning business, in the sense that he was a tanner who produced leather goods. He had to buy a sign to put above his shop. The sign maker asked him if he wanted to put a logo on the sign, too. "Why?" asked my grandfather. "So people will recognize your business," said the sign maker. "That's what the name is for," answered grandfather. Even at the time I thought this w…

Logos seem more important in the physical realm than the digital one. Great for advertizing on Bilbords, shirts, TV etc but meaningless when the goal is to click the link not remember the company.

There is still plenty of awareness generation on digital ads, especially desktop. Across I few products/brands I have monitored this effect. Typically I find on desktop display ads you will generate 2-4 additional visitors for every on ad click. Mobile interestingly is significantly less, more like an extra 0.5 visitors for each click generated.

More than logos, you need consistent and recognisable look and feel to an advert. This way the companies presence is communicated at a glace, which is what most people offer to digital ads.

Re: The most overused logos, at the moment

#52

Post by Gustomaximus »

jwallaceparker wrote: post #35

When I was young my great-grandfather started a tanning business, in the sense that he was a tanner who produced leather goods. He had to buy a sign to put above his shop. The sign maker asked him if he wanted to put a logo on the sign, too. "Why?" asked my grandfather. "So people will recognize your business," said the sign maker. "That's what the name is for," answered grandfather. Even at the time I thought this w…

Given this was a 'great-grandfather' story a logo could have served a secondary purpose. As literacy rates were much lower having an identifiable business symbol like a barber pole would help people who couldn't read. Also there's no reason a name cant be a logo e.g. Google.

Re: The most overused logos, at the moment

#53

Post by grayclhn »

bhickey wrote: post #46
DanBC wrote: post #38

Can someone explain the first example? A name with an arc through the name. What's the design purpose? Because most of them look a bit like the name has been crossed out. I could understand it if the arcs were behind the name - that would mean the name is kind of hovering over a sphere. But lots of the examples show the name behind that arc. EDIT: one of the later categories is "Use of the font 'satisfaction'". I loo…

> Can someone explain the first example? I think the arc is the Earth.

"Franklin Family Foundation" is a striking example.

Re: The most overused logos, at the moment

#54

Post by GFischer »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #42
GFischer wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I was looking into this, I found two schools of thought, some people think the best thing is to have a unique name and logo, which gives no clue but is unique and rememberable. Others think it's better to have a descriptive name and logo. The first approach has the disadvantage of requiring more branding, while the second has the disadvantage of being less distinctive. I think that the first approach works best…

Descriptive names are not popular with existing businesses because they're hard to trademark.

Here's what Jason Cohen wrote on naming ideas:

http://blog.asmartbear.com/naming-startup.html

And on naming his company (Smart Bear):

http://blog.asmartbear.com/pick-company-name-brand.html

Re: The most overused logos, at the moment

#55

Post by grayclhn »

jedberg wrote: post #49

The best advice I ever heard about logos was from Mat Groening, creator of Simpsons and Futurama. He said, "Whenever I make a main character, I try to make them recognizable as a simple black and white silhouette". Think about Bart, Homer, Marge, Lisa, Bender, Fry, Leela. All of them instantly recognizable with just a few solid lines. If you do the same with your logo, it will be super memorable and recognizable. Thi…

The Heartbleed logo comes immediately to mind as well.

Re: The most overused logos, at the moment

#56

Post by anigbrowl »

ChrisLTD wrote: post #32
gkoberger wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're comparing apples to oranges here. There are 7.4 million companies in the US, and most of those are local businesses. Law firms, car repair shops, restaurants, etc. You're talking about the exceptions -- global billion dollar brands. These aren't that.

Yeah, but for a lot (perhaps most?) businesses, their offerings are somewhat nebulous and their logos can't rely on well-tread iconography. How do you represent legal services in a logo? How about high-end Asian Fusion food? Medical certification services?

Legal services: with a scales Asian fusion: fruit segment & chopsticks Medical certification: equal-armed cross overlapping a document

This took me about 20 seconds, and I don't work in design. They all seem very obvious to me. I actually think most small businesses are pretty focused compared to tech startups.

Re: The most overused logos, at the moment

#57

Post by vacri »

timthorn wrote: post #37

What's interesting to me (as an Englishman with family connections to the USA) is that all the logos feel very American. I can't put my finger on why, but there's something that marks them out as coming from that culture.

What if 'bbc' was used instead of 'abc'? :)

Re: The most overused logos, at the moment

#58

Post by themodelplumber »

incision wrote: post #19

As the article admits - 'Although, generally, the quality of work is high...' the general quality of these designs is interesting to me. Historically, low-quality art and design was a good (though certainly not conclusive) indicator of a low quality product. These days, every fly by night business can have a slick logo, every shovelware game can gleam in stills thanks to the underlying engine and every inane YouTuber…

> These days, every fly by night business can have a slick logo

As a logo designer, I'm surprised at how much I think this is true but don't actually observe it much. It does happen, but the majority of businesses still seem to pay for worse logos than they deserve, and the majority of come-and-go businesses also fall into that grouping nicely.

I'm learning, BTW, that even the website experience is a good gauge (well, better than a logo in significant ways) of the quality of the brand.

Re: The most overused logos, at the moment

#59

Post by [deleted] »

ChrisLTD wrote: post #32
gkoberger wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're comparing apples to oranges here. There are 7.4 million companies in the US, and most of those are local businesses. Law firms, car repair shops, restaurants, etc. You're talking about the exceptions -- global billion dollar brands. These aren't that.

Yeah, but for a lot (perhaps most?) businesses, their offerings are somewhat nebulous and their logos can't rely on well-tread iconography. How do you represent legal services in a logo? How about high-end Asian Fusion food? Medical certification services?

[deleted]

Re: The most overused logos, at the moment

#60

Post by vacri »

ChrisLTD wrote: post #32
gkoberger wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're comparing apples to oranges here. There are 7.4 million companies in the US, and most of those are local businesses. Law firms, car repair shops, restaurants, etc. You're talking about the exceptions -- global billion dollar brands. These aren't that.

Yeah, but for a lot (perhaps most?) businesses, their offerings are somewhat nebulous and their logos can't rely on well-tread iconography. How do you represent legal services in a logo? How about high-end Asian Fusion food? Medical certification services?

high-end Asian Fusion food? You're being way too specific in your requirements for a logo, if you need the logo to unambiguously describe the company to that degree.
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