[Cache – #72]
SPECIAL GUEST BLOGGER:
Faith Seekings
President & Creative Director
Rapport Communications & Design
www.rapportinc.ca
I’ve heard more than one branding expert, including my good friend Andris, use TD’s green chair as the perfect visual icon to sum up a brand. It’s recognizable all on its own and evokes emotion. People get the concept – banking can be this comfortable.
Hitting on this perfect icon is the top goal and biggest challenge of logo design. Andris uses it to educate clients on what brand is all about, and then challenges them to come up with a green chair of their own. But pulling out that perfect idea is tough.
After 16 years of designing logos, I can tell you where we won’t pull a great idea from – thin air. It’s the visual the public sees, but we can’t start there. I wasn’t involved in the green chair creative, but I guarantee there was a lot of discussion and strategy leading up to it. The green chair is the cherry on top.
With a basic brief (company name, industry, target audience, and maybe a bit more) I can design something that looks good, but even then I feel like I have nothing to work with. And, there’s a high risk of obvious solutions – like using a wrench for a plumber’s logo.
Give me some depth, some details, some characteristics. Give me a deep understanding of whom the client is and where they want to go, what’s important to them and their audience. Give me some characteristics, some key words and a reason to believe they’re all that. Then I have some inspiration, something to chew on.
To get a meaningful icon like that coveted green chair, you have to start with the story.
faith@rapportinc.ca
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NEW EMAIL ADDRESS: andris@coinbranding.com
NEW WEBSITE: www.coinbranding.com
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COMING SOON: A fully updated and revised edition of the Globe and Mail-bestselling Brand: It Ain’t the Logo* (*It’s what people think of you) – with a new chapter on naming