**Plus 32 other logo design pitfalls made by project managers and how to avoid them.** A melodramatic guide for commissioning a great logo design. A logo design process for corporate America. # So your logo looks like a dick You can get a great logo design out of any designer, and in this guide, I will show you how. When we see a bad logo design, we inevitably say damn who approved that? And not damn who made that? Because bad logo designs are a reflection on the company that commissioned the project. Before I provide a quote for any project, I like to speak directly with who I'll be working with. If I believe that someone is an inexperienced project manager, my pricing reflects that. This is more true for logo design than any other service I offer. In fact my acceptance rate for logo design projects are among the lowest. No amount of money is worth an anxiety inducing client. Dicks aren’t so bad. In the right context, they can be downright charming. But no one wants to be blind sighted by one. Have you ever saw one when you were expecting it? It can be quite upsetting. So let’s keep dicks between two consenting adults. Or a physician and their patient. Or, say, you have the apartment to yourself with five minutes to spare and-- listen, my point is, unless you’re a sex shop, you probably want to avoid your logo resembling any genitalia. And if you think that such a scenario is rare, you’d be wrong. So many logos-- like, a weird amount of logos— look like a straight-up dick. Or a vageen. Or a b-hole. And it’s never on purpose, right Sigmund Freud? > [!NOTE] Pareidolia > A phenomenon where you see something familiar, oftentimes a face and other figures, in an abstract shape. Because when you think about it, our bodies are really just a combination of circles and other oblong shapes. So are most logo designs. It makes sense that these things happen sometimes. It's your job as a project manager to make sure that version of your company logo never sees a billboard. Here’s the other thing— there are a bunch of other objectionable shapes you might want to avoid. For example, a Swastika. Or, the lesser-known “SS” symbol also related to Nazis. And then there's other, less objectionable associations that you may want to avoid in your design. The Pepsi logo redesign of 2012 just so happens to look like a person’s belly bulging out of some blue jeans and a red t-shirt. I'm all for body-positivity, but if you're selling sugar water, you might want to avoid any associations with gaining lots of weight. ### What about the name? Everyone loves Pen Island until some weird kerning accidentally spells out Penis Land. What weird quirks does the name of your business have? ### How to avoid a pareidolia logo design crisis Okay, so we know that logos can look like dicks, and swastikas, and bloated soda drinkers. _We’re all sufficiently terrified, thanks Jason!_ What can we do to protect our logo designs from this outcome? #### 1. Ask The best thing you can do is ask. Don't beat around the, uh, bush. Ask around and be direct (without warranting a visit from HR). In this guide, I'll speak a lot about minimizing the number of people in your design committee. Ignore this advice when it's time to do your Nazi Dick challenge. Ask far. Ask wide. Ask _privately_ one-on-one, over a phone call or in person. Preferably not during lunch. Choose people who have never seen the design before. Ask your husband or wife. If you have not identified any potential issues, you may want to ask directly, “does this design look like genitalia, Nazi symbolism, or some other objectionable thing? If you have identified a similarity, don't make them look for it. Point it out in the design and ask “do you see (enter the objectionable thing you see) in this logo design? Just because it may be hard to spot at first, doesn't make it any less objectionable. Remember the Little Mermaid VHS covers? We went years before someone raised their hands and was like, “um.” #### 2. Rotate Don't be satisfied if after careful review, you don't see anything in the design that's objectionable. You have to _look_ for that pee-pee, man. Turn the design upside down, and sideways, and inverted. Make it black and white. Invert the colors. Make it big. Make it tiny. #### 3. Communicate with your designer So much of a good project manager’s duties is effectively communicating your company's vision and expectations. It's worth mentioning any brands, industries, and objectionable objects you want the logo design to avoid having an association with. Beyond that, there are other common pitfalls through the logo design process that a project manager may want to avoid. And I’m here to identify them for you. ## Why, Who, and What Why I wrote this guide, who this guide is for, and what you will learn. ### Why I wrote this guide I wrote this guide for a young marketing manager named Jason who had absolutely no fucking clue what he was doing, and compensated by kind of being an annoying know-it-all. Show me an office worker who has managed a logo design project, and I'll show you someone with a little less life in their eyes. For every iconic, well-designed logo, there are a hundred Frankenstein designs that were told it was a logo but are actually a billboard advertisement. It doesn't have to be that way. Almost anyone can project manage a great logo design without having to be Saul Bass (we’ll get to him later). ### What this guide will help you achieve 1. A logo design you will love 2. A logo design that meets all of your needs, even the needs you have yet to identify. 3. How to get the absolute best price for your logo sign. 4. And last, but not least, how to make sure that your logo doesn't end up looking like a dick. Or a fascist symbol. # 32 common pitfalls to avoid ## Failing to do the preparation work You know how it is, when an executive gets it in their head that an initiative is mission-critical, they want it done yesterday. But bosses rarely account for all the preparation work leading up to the "start" of the project. So they'll falsely assume that the first project milestone is viewing a first pass design of the new logo. This is simply a matter of you setting expectations early. When you get the green light on a logo project, list out all the tasks you must complete before a designer can move the first pixel. Don't be so detailed that it looks like you're sandbagging, but just enough so your boss has a feel for the preparation needed. Then, as you complete your pre-project tasks, you can update them and they can feel like we are making progress. ### Identify your stakeholders early Who has the final approval? Is that person available to stay engaged throughout the entire project? Establish a small group of stakeholders. Kindly set a limit to the number of people involved in the project, then make those stakeholders known to the rest of the company. If you are having difficulty with keeping the number of stakeholders and decision-makers to a small group, let everyone know that the more colleagues providing feedback, the longer the project will take and likely the more **expensive** the project will become. Do this before you get a quote for your logo design. No one wants to be the reason that a project is missing its deadline or is over budget. People will back off. ### Establish a direction for the design If you have a logo design that you like, or a style that might work for your brand, don't wait until your designer submits their first pass before you share that information with them. Provide your designer with everything you're thinking before they start designing the logo. Not only will this lead to a design you're happy with, you may gain valuable context on your preference that you wouldn't have gained if you didn't first bounce it off your designer. The key to a successful logo design project is preparation. ### Communicate your process for feedback Hint: Its not sending a design to the entire corporate office. ## Choosing the wrong designer As project manager, you ultimately bare at least some responsibility for the final logo design. It's only fair then, that you get to choose your designer (assuming they are within your budget and in good standing with your company). Do not choose your friend. Do not choose your lover. Do not choose some department head's nephew who has a passion for graphic design. Down that road you will only find heartache and pain. So find the designer that best fits the specific goals of your project. To choose the right designer, you must have at least some idea of what you want your logo to look like. This is where your project preparation comes in. If your company is leaning more towards a lettermark logo, find a logo designer who specializes in font-forward logos. If you're a plumbing company whose owner wants a Mario Brothers-like logo to slap on the side of their vans, find a designer who has a lot of mascot logos in their portfolio. When speaking with a potential designer, ask what they specialize in, then request to see their portfolio. If you're considering an agency, know who your designer will be *before* you sign anything and ensure that the designer you chose is guaranteed in writing in the contract. You don't want an agency selling you on their best work, only to assign a Junior Designer to your project. ### Check references I'm going to lie to you, I always check a vendor's references. Listen, if I limited this guide to things I always do myself, I might as well just shoot you text message. Checking a designer's references is not only important because of the off chance they're a criminal master mind, cashing the first half of their payment before disappearing into the night, but because you want to if this person is an asshole. Take it from someone who as both been and worked with the asshole, it's so much better for your sanity if the people you work with are pleasant. ## Setting the wrong scope, terms, and deliverables You'd think that three design choices, and an unlimited number of revisions will ensure you the best logo design, but you'd be wrong. Such terms will guarantee a lower quality of designs and an endless feedback loop that'll make you wish you got into Accounting instead. Speaking of accounting, don't let the bean counters anywhere near these designs. More on that later. You want two design choices (at most) and a limit of three rounds of revisions. You then want to include the cost of a third logo design if needed, and the cost for additional rounds of revisions. You then want to establish a definition for "revision," which should be something similar to "a minor change to the design of the chosen direction." Do not mistake a client requested revision with dozens, sometimes hundreds of small iterations made by the designer in which the client never sees. As the project manager, you want to minimize the number of client requested rounds of revisions and maximize the number of expert iterations. Part of completing a logo design project is securing the correct deliverables. ### Never send a logo for feedback that you know has an error on it Note: put this section elsewhere, jason. ### Scope Two unique design choices Three rounds of revisions for the chosen design Three logo variations of the chosen design— Stacked, Horizontal, and Abbreviated. One round of revisions for the variations. ### Terms Cost for each additional logo design requested Estimated turn around time for the additional work Cost for each additional revision Estimated turn around time for the additional work. Clearly defined definition for the term "revision." ### Deliverables 36 files Stacked, Horizontal, and Abbreviated versions each in monochrome black, monochrome white, and full color. File formats for each are SVG, PNG, Design File, and PDF. ## Bike-shedding Bike-shedding is a phenomenon where project managers hyper focus on a single element of the project, usually something with little importance, because of a lack of experience on the subject matter. If you find yourself spending four hours fiddling with your logo’s color palette, instead of leaving it up to your designer, chances are you're bike-shedding the project. ## Designing by large committee There is no better way to ensure delays, frustration, and ultimately a subpar logo design than packing the room with opinion-havers. Let me be clear, I am in no way suggesting that well-informed feedback won't lead to better designs. I am suggesting that you do not have that many logo design experts in your company, and all it takes is one well-intended email to `all` for that logo design project to go off the rails. ### Three stakeholders Try your best to limit your committee to three stakeholders. This includes the CEO or owner who wants to give the final approval. Make sure your committee members have enough time to provide meaningful contributions to the project. This includes helping (or paying attention to) the early stage of the project where you identify purpose and goals. If they cannot time commit to participating in the project from start to finish, kindly ask them (ahead of time) to forgo their place in the committee so that you may avoid unintentional delays, confusion, and consensus building that goes nowhere. Obviously you can't just tell your CEO to sit this one out, champ. So, if you anticipate a stakeholder who may pop in and out of the project, find ways to keep her engaged. If she's not responsive in email, walk the latest design over to her office. If she missed the planning part, ask her what her goals for the logo design are at lunch. What you're trying to avoid here is a seven o'clock email from your CEO who now has cold feet on the design, just after you gave your designer final approval. ### And, a secret trusted advisor You know that one friend (or if you're lucky, colleague) who knows a weird amount of stuff about fonts and typesetting. That one weirdo who yells out the font's name for every sign you pass on the street. Or maybe your roommate from college who had a poster of Saul Bass in their room. Whoever this person in your life may be, ask them if you could seek their council every so often during your logo project. This person is off the books. Ask them their opinion about the design. What's good about it? What's bad about it? Does it convey its intended message? What questions should you be asking but aren't? Having a trusted third party give you private feedback is a win-win. You can take or leave their advice. The choice is yours. Worst case scenario, you take an old friend out to lunch and catch up. Best case, you sound extra smart and thoughtful in your next process meeting. ### Identify the decision maker At Apple, project teams have what's known as a Directly Responsible Individual. This person, usually the project's manager, has direct responsibility for the outcome of the project and is therefore the person who makes the final decision. Whether your company could ever allow such a concept, depends on company culture process, and a bunch of other things That are out of your control. However, establishing how decisions are made within the project, and who has "final decision making authority "will help your project run smoother. As project manager, that person should be you. However, like I said, it depends on the company you work for. What you don't want is an ill defined decision-making process where feedback is indistinguishable from consensus, and no one ever makes a decision. ### Expanding your committee won't solve your problem If you're unsure about a design element, or your committee is in a stalemate, set it aside for a day or two, then come back to it. Don't bring in more people in an attempt for clarity. It'll have the opposite effect. Worse yet, some project managers will try to achieve a company-wide consensus on a design in fear of being wrong, or being blamed for a bad design. Fight that urge. The moment you open the floor to all opinions, is the moment your project dies. It may will cause you far more stress and grief than just making a decision. This doesn't mean that additional insight is always bad. If you want a colleague’s opinion because you believe it will bring value to the final product, ask for it in private. Preferably by walking over to their desk or video chat. ### Don't be weird If the IT guy happens to walk by your computer monitor just as you're opening up the file for the logo design's first pass, and he pops in to give feedback, just let it happen. Don't try to turn your monitor off, or tell him that he's not invited to the feedback party. Graciously jot down any feedback he provides, give a genuine smile and thank him. Then, without pause, ask him about his computer set up. "You got three monitors, eh? Pretty sweet set up. Is it better than the one you have at home?" And then you sit there and you listen. You listen so damn good. A couple of minutes in, you pretend like you're checking on an important email and you minimize that PDF file. Listen, the goal is to commission a great logo design. But there's no reason to get all fascist-y about it, you know? Sometimes the best thing you can do is just listen. People want to be heard. And hey, there's no rule stating that IT folks can't provide helpful feedback on design. You just want to avoid the entire department walking over without any idea for the projects objective providing a flood of feedback. Before he leaves your cubicle, lean in, thank him for the feedback a second time, then ask if he could keep this convo on the hush hush. Not everyone will give as good feedback as him. We don't want Bill from HR walking in here asking to add a baseball bat to the design. Your IT guy will understand. ### Beware of the opinion bomber Nothing derails a project like “Opinion Bombers” who come in the room in the eleventh hour and anxiously attempts to change everything your team has been working on. My heart rate is increasing just thinking about it. All the times when everything was going so well. All the stakeholders were on the same page. The project… I… I requested the final files from the designer and everything. Then suddenly, boom! I'm blindsided by a stealthy opinion bombing by the jackass I least expect it from. The opinion bomber won't attend the kickoff meeting. They won't reply all to any email updates, or even so much as feign interest in the new logo project underway. No, they're far too busy doing important business work to bother with graphic design. “You go on child,” they'll say to you. “Draw your little shapes.” And you'll go about your business, happy there's one less stakeholder to answer to. You fool. It's a trap! When this happens, drown their ass is bureaucracy. Be kind. Always be kind. But make it known that their eleventh hour power trip comes with a price. Both in time and Benjamins. You see, the Opinion Bomber likes to posture, but never at the expense of, well, expense. _Your_ time can be wasted sure, but they don't want you wasting executives’ time by consensus building in their name. And they definitely don't want to be the face of a deadline delay or added hourly cost. Accept the feedback appreciatively, but let it be known what incorporating their feedback will cost the project. They'll back down and find someone else to posture with. ### And then there's the fun executive The fun executives are the accountants who think that design is the fun part of their job. It's like an arts and crafts project to them. No real skill is required to make a logo so why no chime in? ### Shit happens anyway Sometimes, no amount of planning in the world can stop an unruly operations director from storming into your cubical with sketches for how he thinks the logo should look like. I've had this happen twice. And each time I honest to god thought it was a prank. Sometimes shit just happens and you must roll with the punches. Take a deep breath. Revisit your project objectives. Send that ops dude a thank you email with a liberal use of exclamation points and smiley faces. Then, because you spent the extra time detailing the scope of the project and limiting the design options to two, attach to the email a quote for turning his sketches into designs and an estimated number of days the new designs will push the project outside its deadline. You will not hear back from him. ## Neglecting the story Good logos have good stories. That may seem like an insignificant part of the process, but it matters. No matter how hard you try to maintain a low number of opinion havers, ultimately, it's likely that you are not the final decision maker. If you like a particular design, have a compelling reason why. Build a story around the design that speaks to the company’s history or mission. Sometimes, a compelling story makes all the difference. Also communicating all the challenges you overcame, problems you solved, that brought you to this design. The more intentional you are with your design choices, the easier it will be to sell. ## Lack of curiosity Ask the designer about their design decisions. Especially if you don't like the decision. Context is everything. Doesn't mean you have to like it with context. But it could reveal something you didn't see before. Imagine if someone objected to the kerning of the FedEx logo and demanded it changed. They would've missed out on the cool arrow. ## Conflating quality with difficulty People will tend to judge your logo’s design not on the perceived level of difficulty, but on how well the intended concept was executed. Apple, Nike, and Twitter all have logo designs that I can make it twenty minutes or less. That doesn't take away from how great those designs are. Sometimes it's just as much about what logo wasn't made than what was. Arriving at the right design for the right company is a skill. ## Confusing feedback with consensus Feedback is not necessarily a decision. Some first time project managers will make the mistake of collecting everyone’s feedback and dumping that into an email for the designer, not realizing that Janice’s feedback contradicts Jose’s feedback. Communicating changes with your designer sometimes requires consensus building. When collecting feedback (hopefully not from too many people) make sure there is a common thread that you can share with your designer. If there are conflicting feedback, make an informed decision or ask for clarification. ## Cramming too much info into the design Unless you're Apple, it's unlikely you'll commission a stark white billboard with a black logo in the center. Your logo will never exist outside of additional context, so there's no need to add a slogan or tagline to your design. Instead, add it to the marketing piece you've created. New business owners can make the mistake of thinking that a logo’s purpose is to explain what it is their company does, so they’ll add a slogan or some other unnecessary context. You don't have to do this. Your logo will always be accompanied by a flyer, website, billboard, business card, or any of the hundreds of mediums used to get the word out. ## Adding an established date to the design Chances are, the date in which your company was founded is not notable, unless you have a hundred year old business. For simplicity’s sake, leave the date off. You can always add it to the flyer or website your logo is displayed on. ## Too many colors on the logo Limit colors to two. If you can use just one, even better. Logo designs become less memorable the more colors it has. You run into issues with printing your logo on a shirt or other printed promotional items with too many colors. ## Locking logo files away Chances are, you won't stay at the position or company for the rest of your life. Share your logo files far and wide. This not only helps with reducing the chance of losing files, it helps with brand consistency. A good method is to attach your files to a public facing site, like your company website. Create a web page with downloadable links to all your files, color palette values, and best practices. That way, you have something to send vendors. Most Fortune 500 companies have some form of public facing brand guide on its website with available logo files. ## Longevity Project managers will often worry about their logo’s lifespan. They mistakenly believe that the logo they design today must last a decade. They envision a scenario where they're spending thousands of dollars on a rebrand years down the road. So they try to commission a logo that considers everything. This line of thinking leads to bad logo designs. It's how you end up with a tagline or an established date on your logo. You don't want that. Virtually every company on the Fortune 500 has a different logo than the one it started with. Get comfortable with the idea that you might need to change your logo in a few years. Not only is a rebrand five years in not a big deal, it's a privilege. It means your business is alive, growing and successful. Your goal is to commission a simple logo that works for you today. ## Using the incorrect logo variation Social media profile photos should use an abridged version of your logo, like an icon or spark. Website navigations should use a horizontal logo variation. The medium in which your logo appears, matters. ## Never ‘email all’ an unapproved logo design It's four thirty on a Friday. Your designer just emailed you a couple of logo designs. You're excited. Both options are pretty good for a first pass. You especially like option A. Wait. Actually, you love option A. It's so cute! So, you forward it on. To everyone in the corporate office. Time of death: five minutes later. ## Never present a logo design on a stark-white background You think your logo just fell out of a coconut tree? Design exists in the context of all in which it lives and came before it. > Bass’s presentations to clients were legendary, and the amount of work that went into the Bell System film – entitled, simply, Design – is astonishing. — *The Untold Stories behind 29 Classic Logos* # Other tips ## Consider the creative process For a designer, delivering on a great logo rarely is as simple as sitting in front of a MacBook Pro at their favorite coffee shop, and spending the exact amount of hours it takes to move the exact number of pixels that comprise the final design. A great logo design requires research and pixel pushing and email authoring, yes. But it also requires power naps on the couch, and long walks in the park. No, seriously. It requires many, many, false starts and deleted concepts; piles of crumbled pieces of paper and hours of seemingly aimless inspiration seeking on the internet. And, more often than I would ever care to admit, a great logo design requires the occasional ugly cry under a steamy shower head. So, if we want the best work out of our logo designer, it behooves no one to pretend like creativity isn't what it is— a messy, non-linear process that will inevitably have your designer questioning every fiber of their being up until they get an email from you stating “approved.” I have been on both sides of the logo design process, and I can say with confidence that logo designers live with a great shame that they can't always sit down and design a logo at will. Logo project managers fear what's on the other side of that attachment they received in an email three days past the deadline. So, designers will hide the creative process from their clients and project managers will attempt a creative coup if the designer doesn't get it right on the first try. Designers make up an excuse for why they're a little behind schedule. Project managers make up an excuse for why they need the design by the first of the month. Designers send update emails that aren't really updates, explaining that they're putting "final touches" on a design. Project managers will ask to see progress for what is surely an unfinished design. Designers will, I shit you not, shave hours off their final invoice. Yup. Designers lie. They're afraid of being thought of as a bad designer. Or that the client will push back on cost and—gasp—they'll be forced into conflict. And Project managers will, at no expense to them, work the designer on price until there isn't any meat left on that bone. But most of all, designers lie for fear that the client will attempt to take over the project in a frantic haze. And project managers freak out because they don't trust the creative process. Because there isn't one, as far as they're concerned. This dynamic happens _all the time_. And it's always detrimental to the process and final product. *Always.* But that won't happen with you, my dear logo design project manager. Not _you_, because _you_ are here with me right now, and we’re learning how to maximize our chances for cultivating an exceptional logo design. Here's what I believe to be the most meaningful tip in this entire guide. Foster a working environment where your designer feels comfortable expressing creative setbacks without the fear of trying to micromanage your way out of it. If your designer requests a two day extension, and it's in your power to grant it for them, do it. Because the secret is, 95% of the actual work designing a logo comes at the tail end five percent of the timeline. The rest of the time was spent tearing our hair out trying to ignite that spark of creativity that will lead to a great design and a happy client. A two day extension to allow that creativity to hit is almost always worth it. So long as you give them room to create and offer some encouragement. Even the smallest gesture can make a world of difference. Our job as a project managers isn't to micromanage our designers into a stray jacket. It's to provide them with everything they need, so when that spark of creativity does hit, they're able to make the logo we need. In this guide, I will teach you to do just that. Plus a bunch of other cool stuff that you would've never thought to thunk. It'll be great. I promise. ## Design and Art and Noise The terms design and art are not interchangeable. There's a fundamental misunderstanding of what design sets to accomplish. Scrolling design-focused forums, you get the sense that design and art are viewed as interchangeable ideologies. We've somehow formed the belief that design, like art, can exist for its own sake without any consideration for function or purpose. By all accounts from great designers, this aesthete view of design is a misguided dogma. Design can absolutely be a work of art. But unlike, say, a painting, a logo design derives its beauty from function. Therefore, functionless design is by definition ugly. One reason why I love art is its ability to exist without any justification. It is art, and its purpose is simply to exist. Design, however, must prove it is worthy of existence by demonstrating a functional ability. If design fails to meet this threshold, it is neither art nor design. It is noise. Art is dog. Design is cat. ## What is good logo design? Good logo design is about informed restraint. As a project manager it's your job to get the best logo design from your designer and not an inch more. Accountants, executives, and operating managers, love design and marketing because they falsely believe that design is a discipline without constraints. It is an opportunity to take a break from rules, principles strategies, etc. And it's not like bean counters, dislike constraints, and rules. They in fact, love it! It's why they got into the biz. Talk to someone with a masters of business association degree about making a deal work on a shoe string budget and watch their face light up with excitement. Ask your CFO to provide the merits for both cash and accrual accounting methods And buckle up for a 20 minute TED talk. The reason why most be counters believe design has no constraints, is because the last time they practice creativity was when they were eight years old, drawing outside the lines of their favorite coloring book. To be fair to them, few marketing and design folks are good at communicating the disciplines of design. That, or they talk about it entirely too much and everyone thinks they are annoying. Guess which group I fall under? So if you want your colleagues to grass, the idea that design is a discipline, and trust me, you do want that, then you have to get good at communicating what makes for good design. ## Trying to do the designer's work Companies will mistakenly try to provide the designer with a design style, usually one someone on the team likes personally, instead of focusing on the message they want the logo design to convey. ## Choosing the wrong logo type Most online articles tell you that they are seven types of logos. This is true. They will then go on to tell you that the type of logo you need is dependent on your needs. This is also true. And then they go onto describe us. That doesn't exactly tell you the type of logo you need. The type of logo you need dependent on your flagship location. Where will your logo appear the most. Are you a plumber? Who needs a big mascot on the side of your van? Are you a restaurant tour? Would love a lovely sign above your door. Are you an apartment complex, with signage outside your front? ## Questions for your designer that will produce better work If the logo is close to your liking, ask "how many more iterations would you like to do on this design?" What was your thinking on this? ## Cheap design is expensive My sister in Christ, listen to me when I tell you that you are not actually saving money going cheap on a designer. You are hiding the full expense in other future line items. It's adds up to more money. And the result is a worse logo design? Why? Let me break it down for you. Now, if you don't have the money, you don't have it. Maybe it makes more sense to buy a cheap logo now, then amortize the other expense over a couple years, which will almost certainly include needing a new logo design. ## How much should you spend on a logo? This depends on where your company is at when commissioning your logo. ### Kid with a dream Are you a seventeen year old kid with a dream and some saved up allowance? Get your cousin to do it or go to Fiverr. Get a placeholder logo with a 2-tone color palette. Keep it simple as hell and be sure to at least get an SVG and PNG file for the design. Ask the designer to include the appropriate color values, and if there's a font used, ask for the name. You'll want either a horizontal combination mark logo, or a lettermark. Go with just a pictorial mark if you're bold. I did. Ten years later, it's still my company logo. #### Here are your deliverables: 1. One Logo, 3 files. 1. SVG file format, unflattened, no padding. 2. PNG file format, transparent background, no padding. 3. PDF for print in 320dpi. 2. HEX and CMYK values for 2-tone color palette. 3. Name of font (if applicable). > [!NOTE] The design file > If you can get the design file, get the design file. Some designers are weird about that and charge extra for it. Most design files end in `.ai` or `.affinity`. ### Corporate freak turned freelancer Are you a corporate freak who "left the industry for good" to find yourself? Then, while in an AirBNB in Puerto Rico, it hits you, "I should start my own company." Then you tell your girlfriend who was supportive but you felt could be a little more excited? And yes, I'm talking about myself. In this case, reach into your savings and set aside a few Benjamins. Truthfully, there's likely little difference in design quality between a two hundred fifty dollar logo and a five hundred dollar logo. But you'll need more logo variations which means more files and that takes extra work. So spend at the higher side of your budget. #### Here are your deliverables, freak: You will need three logo variations, each with three color variations, all in four file formats. You get that, weirdo? That's 36 total logo files. - Logo Variations - Stacked - Horizontal - Abbreviated - Color variations - Full color (3 colors max) - Black - White - File formats - Design file (`.ai`, `.affinity`, etc.) - PDF - SVG - PNG - HEX and CMYK values for your 3-color color palette. - Name of font (if applicable) ## Storing your logo files Logos are the only thing I can think of where people will spend money on something and then don't bother to open it up immediately upon delivery. I can't tell you how many companies I've worked with that do not have their logo files. They end up sending me a 200x200 png files that's pixelated to hell. If you're a small business without a marketing department, here's what we're going to do. You are going to go into the file folder on your computer or cloud platform where your tax documents are stored. You're going to create a new folder and name it logo files. You will then go to the email subject line final logo design files. You will then either download the attachment, or click on the link to the cloud platform and download the files from there. finally, you will move those files from your download folder to your newly created logo files folder. Then I would suggest forwarding those files to everyone else in your business. Logo files are not secret documents. They don't need to be secure. The worst case scenario a rogue graphic designer makes you an unexpected flyer. You'll be fine. Share your files with your employees. ## Minimizing After our weekly meeting, my client asked if I could make a quick website for him. "Nothing really complex”, he said. "Just a couple of pages, really”. It won't take much time." It won't take much time. I flinched. That sentence burrowed deep into my ego. Now, he knows that I know how long developing a website will take. He wasn't trying to help me scope the project. In fact, he hadn't given me any details yet except for how easy the project will be for me. What he was doing was minimizing. He wanted something well-made and he wanted it fast. But he also didn't want to pay much for it. The problem of course is, fast, cheap and good doesn't exist in project management. You can only pick two. He then proceeded to say, I'd do it my self since it's so easy, but I don't have the time. ## How to write a good project brief A good designer will ask you a lot of questions before they get started on a design. As a good project manager, you should have your project brief before you decide on a designer. ## Accessibility Color contrast and other stuff. # Famous corporate logos Stories and cautionary tales about some of the most iconic logo designs ever made. - Twitter - Nike - FedEx - Instagram ## Why new companies make shitty first logos If you need proof that project managing a logo design is a skill set, I want you to look up Apple's first logo design. Twitter has, in my unhumble opinion, a perfect logo design. It's distinct while understated. It is unburdened by any accompanying text, so it's the perfect 1:1 aspect ratio. It is distinguishable in any size. From a 16x16 pixel favicon, to a six foot billboard, that sky blue bird is recognizable anywhere. It looks good in blue, black, or white, and can adapt to any background on any medium. And there's just something about its shape that is deeply satisfying. But that perfection didn't come overnight. It took the folks at Twitter six years and five logo changes to arrive at the now iconic blue bird. You might be surprised to learn that Twitter's first logo wasn't a bird at all. It was a slime-textured green tube that spelled out the word Twttr with a light splash at the end. It was a design perhaps better suited for a Nickelodeon game show than a trendy tech start-up. I'm mincing words, here. The design was straight ass. It has no balance, too much gradient, and for some strange reason highlighted the "w" in the word twttr. The worst part is, the logo would've looked terrible on a mobile app, something the founders would've deeply regretted if they kept the design past development of the website. A shitty first logo is not a death sentence for new companies. In fact it's almost a right of passage. There are many examples of massive Fortune 500 companies that started out with a head scratcher as its first logo. But they try again, and continue iterating until a logo design matches the company. Apple's first logo looked like a work of art, which is to say, it made for a pretty terrible logo design. The list goes on There is one mega corporation that got it right the first time. It started out as a small US distributer for a Japanese sneaker company, and is today is the largest sneaker and athletic wear brand in the world. That's right, Nike. Speak to an MBA student about Nike's branding history, and they might mention that the founders paid just thirty five dollars for the now iconic Swoosh logo. Ah, we start them young with not paying for creative work. More on that later. The price of the logo isn't the real story here. I will mention, to a previous point, that the designer Catherine stated she remembers spending a lot more than the seventeen hours she was paid. Anyway, the real story is how Catherine managed to design a logo that has served Nike's brand for decades with minimal changes. If all company's make a bad first logo, what makes Nike so different? The answer has to do with purpose. Most people starting a new company will commission a logo design because they know that's something all company's should have. But rarely do they know their logo's purpose. I don't mean the grand purpose of all logos. But, yes that too. I mean the logo's purpose for their specific company. How can you commission a great logo if you've never considered its purpose or intended use? Where will this logo spend most of its time? What message do you want this logo to convey? Catherine and Nike got it right the first time because Nike needed a logo they could slap on the side of a sneaker. When Knight commissioned the logo, he specifically requested an Adidas stripe. So as Catherine designed Nike's logo, she considered how it would look on the profile of a running shoe. She placed iterations of the logo design over an outline of a sneaker until she found something that worked. And that's why to this day, most Nike sneakers have basically the same swoosh from Catherine's design fifty years ago. ## FedEx logo Don't let an accountant fuck up a brilliant logo. When first presented with the new logo for FedEx with the hidden arrow in the design, some of the executives thought the arrow was too subtle and wanted to highlight it by changing the color. They wanted to give it more... pop.