When it Comes to Logos, There’s Only One Idea
The 13 stripes of IBM, the flowing ribbon of Coke, Mack Trucks’ belligerent bulldog, the blue box of American Express, the golden arches of McDonald’s, my MTV, 3M and the ultimate e-commerce brand, Dell. These familiar, iconic symbols evoke emotions, including trust, prestige, independence, innovation, and control in the minds of tens of millions of customers around the world.
Trademarks that achieve this stature are priceless. This is particularly true in businesses where product advantages are subjective, susceptible to replication by fast followers, and difficult to protect by legal means such as patent or copyright. The customer preference derived from familiarity and trust provides real competitive advantage.
How did all these different symbols gain iconic status? What special attributes do they possess that their competitors lack? The graphic nature of the logos spans the abstract and the representational. They include pictures as well as words. They are simple or ornate, fanciful or Spartan. We encounter them on packages, highways, televisions, hamburgers, charge cards, and the Web. Certainly the frequency that we’ve been exposed to them and the consistency with which they appear in all media are significant factors in their strength. And the formal quality colors of the logos are important.
CREATING AN ICONIC LOGO IS A STRATEGIC EXERCISE.
But every trademark that has achieved the exalted status of iconic symbol has one common foundation that underlies its particular design. They all express a single idea. The concepts behind these symbols transcend their products. They are drawn from the brand positioning, corporate values, and emotional profiles of what they represent.
Creating an iconic logo is a strategic exercise. It is undertaken to support larger business goals and is a key element in brand strategy. It factors in audiences and what motivates them. The desired outcome of the logo creation process is clear — express a unique product or corporate strength with creativity, immediacy, and simplicity, thereby gaining a competitive advantage in the marketplace. The creative process must begin with a clear understanding of the nature of what is to be expressed and to whom, i.e., the brand promise. In these iconic symbols, a brand promise has been distilled to its most basic, singular, and pure form.
This becomes a significant challenge when the company or product has a number of differentiating features. The creative process then becomes one of isolating different facets of distinction and creating alternative symbols that express each. In some cases a creative solution will serendipitously convey secondary meanings or promises. But the team must resist the temptation to impose too many message requirements on a single logo. In the end, a judgement must be made as to which creative solution conveys the most compelling brand story, most distinctively, in a visual language that will resonate most powerfully to target audiences.
There are many creative approaches to logo design that result in clear and memorable trademarks. Integrating the company or product name with the trademark is an elegant solution. Siegel+Gale accomplished this with Dell and 3M. Yahoo! and Google have successfully employed this technique as well. Creating a logo that is mnemonic for the brand name is another approach that has been wildly successful for Apple and Target. Appropriating or creating a character can build in nostalgia and favorability. Disney and Mickey Mouse are the epitome of this approach. Disney and John Hancock leveraged their founding fathers by appropriating their signatures. In so doing, they ensure lasting identification with powerful ideas. The handwritten scripts of the Virgin logo suggests the personal involvement and touch of Richard Branson. Strong and memorable shapes, when used in proprietary ways, can be the basis for iconic brands. The triangles of Nabisco and Bass Ale are examples of this. Sometimes a unique and proprietary package shape can become an unmistakable symbol for a brand as has happened with the distinctive Coke bottle.
It’s not hard to pinpoint graphic techniques that are common to iconic brand symbols. Distinctive silhouettes, strong colors that command attention in cluttered environments, proprietary typography, forms that evoke products, and characters that capture personality are the building blocks of excellent design. However, the very ubiquity of these elements makes it difficult to create iconic trademarks with any degree of certainty.
The special ingredient is a piercing clarity toward what exactly is being expressed, and to whom.