Warning: This will blow your mind

Designing a good logo is no easy task. Often considered the ‘face’ of the company, a logo should convey a certain message to the customers.

To show how some companies ‘communicate’ with its customers through their logo, Business Insider has compiled a list of corporate logos that contain subliminal messages.

Fedex

The FedEx logo hides an arrow in its negative space. Even a glance subliminally inspires thoughts of efficiency and forward motion.

Amazon

The cleverness of this logo is twofold. The arrow points from a to z, referring to all that is available on Amazon.com, and it doubles as a satisfied smile (with dimple).

Check the rest out by following the link below

Corporate Logos That Contain Subliminal Messages – DesignTAXI.com.

Why is this such a big deal?  Well it’s just one more way to show everyone the great design work that T:12 does, and also give a little insight into the way we see the world from a design perspective.

So how can you follow, it’s dead easy really, just search for t12design within the app and the profile should pop right up.

What is Instagram?

It’s a fast, beautiful and fun way to share your photos with friends and family.

Snap a picture, choose a filter to transform its look and feel, then post to Instagram. Share to Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr too – it’s as easy as pie. It’s photo sharing, reinvented.

Oh yeah, did we mention it’s free?

What are you waiting for, get following and snapping!

Not got an Instagram account, head over to their website to find out how and I look forward to seeing you soon!

http://instagram.com/

Here are 5 great reasons to think about getting something new to represent you and your business.

1. To have a more professional image

All businesses know what it’s like when you’re first starting up, there are so many things that you need to fork out money for! Whether it be for equipment, premises or getting the correct legal items in place, it all adds up and the thing that most often gets put to the back of the queue is the logo and branded stationary. Fair enough, but if you’ve managed to establish yourself and make a little profit, start to consider professionalising that logo your cousin did 3 years ago (who reliably tells you they sometimes dabble in Photoshop).

2. Your current logo isn’t versatile enough

Your logo needs to go everywhere, whack that baby on all manner of things to promote your business. Business cards, websites, social media, promotional leaflets, brochures, the list is endless. The versatility element comes in two forms:

• The first is that the formats you have it in may not be suitable for print. An .eps or vector file of your logo is the standard for use in print, so just having a .jpg can cause problems when you look to get promotional print material done.  You could just ask whoever designed your logo to provide a vector (A professional graphic designer should do this as standard), but you could also use it as an opportunity to give your logo a bit of an update.
• Is your logo able to adapt to look great in the square box of a Facebook profile picture, or is it still recognisable in the tiny Twitter avatar picture? If the answer is no then why not consider bringing that logo into the 21st century.

3. To expand and gain more clients

You might have reached a point in your business where you would like to appeal to different or new target market, but the logo you have at the moment doesn’t say the right things to them. It’s vitally important to remember that whether intentionally or not, your logo will contain hidden messages that say different things to different people. Use this to your advantage to say the right things to the right people.

4. To differentiate yourself from competitors

It’s often the case that logos inside different business sectors have very similar styles. You can normally spot a solicitors or accountants logo a mile off, but there is no harm in trying to move away from the norm in your sector whilst still keeping the essence of what you do. It could make the difference between your business being remembered over another similar one.

5. You just fancy a change

Guess what, that’s a fantastic reason as well and there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. Things can get stale and boring, plus you have to remember that your logo is representing you essentially. If you are bored with it and don’t believe in it then get it changed to something you can be proud of. Bear in mind that changing your logo too often can result in your customers getting a confused message, but if it’s handled sensitively it can give a great shot in the arm for your business.

Do you relate to any of these reasons? If you answered yes then get in touch for a no obligation chat about your logo and how T:12 can improve your business.

Here is a brief overview of the values of some colours and work out what your logo or brand is saying to your customers

Red

The fiery power of red is a hard beast to tame, but used in the right way it can really help to set you apart from your competitors and show your desire to dominate. I think it’s no coincidence that companies like Virgin and (RED) use the colour in the brand.  Both want you to sit up and take notice of them and that they have a strong message that you just have to hear. Obviously red has to be used in the right way as it has the negative connotations of anger, cruelty and aggression but get the balance right and you could be onto a winner!

Yellow

Shiny happy yellow, the colour of sunshine and joy, but did you know that bright yellow is the most fatiguing colour as it irritates the eyes?  Like red, yellow is a very striking colour and can be used to almost shout your message across to people. The flip side of this is that yellow can come across as immature and overly loud.

Blue

Ever wonder why you see a lot of blue in branding and logos? Because of the calming effect the colour has, but not only that, it enforces ideas of trust and loyalty and is also said to make people more productive. The perfect colour it would seem, but also consider that it can represent coldness and depression and you start to see the best places for it to be applied.  A dentists waiting room perhaps, maybe not a psychiatrists office!

Green

I think we can all guess what green symbolises; growth, the environment, money and nature.  Green is considered one of the easiest colours on the eyes and is great for a calming and refreshing feel.  It’s worth considering that a bright green can come across as sickly and envious so getting the tone right is extremely important.

Purple

Do you want to give the impression of luxury and imagination?  Purple is the predominant colour that you need to use. It screams high quality and has an air of royalty about it, in ancient times purple dyes were expensive hence only worn by royalty and wealthy people.  If you’re planning on doing business in Latin America just be warned, purple is the colour of death!

Orange

A fun, creative and invigorating colour that has to be used very carefully as it is also extremely loud and brash.  It’s no surprise that youthful projects and brands use orange to great effect to appeal straight away to their target audience.

Black

Using black is not boring, most people think it is, that it maybe shows a lack of vision or ambition.  However, black is extremely elegant and powerful.  There is a seriousness about it, but if you are running a very upmarket, or professional business, you cannot go wrong with it.  It has other properties as like making other colours brighter around it and actually wearing black will make you look thinner.

Your brand colours

So what do the colours in your logo and brand say about your business?  Let me know in the comments below.

Graham Smith

Graham is a logo designer from the UK and his simple marks and icons are great for showing how much logos can be stripped back and still be very effective.  His designs always make you say “that’s so clever, that’s so smart, but I could’ve thought of that”.  Here’s the thing, you probably couldn’t have done, not without the level of research and time that goes into his work.

What I also find great about Graham is that he’s willing to really explain his work, especially if you follow him on Google+ and when he posts a project to his website.  It adds real context to the work and you can hear about the thought process and steps it has taken to get to the final mark.

Olly Moss

Now this guy does possibly the best and smartest film posters and all round clever geek artwork you will see.  Not only that, but the style is beautiful and always hits the mark with the tone of the subject.  There are so many small treats for if you’ve seen the film or show his art is based on which adds that extra layer of reward.

I’m just going to let his work do the talking, it’s mesmerising.

You can follow Graham Smith here – Google+ - Twitter – Website
And Olly Moss here – Twitter – Website

Think about it, you can meet so many people in a short space of time and you may only remember and recall someone overly charismatic (or not so!), or someone you want to do business with straight away.  So what do you do when you get back to the office, you sift through the business cards and it all comes flooding back to you.  They are something truly tangible that can initially connect businesses together.

It’s all about first impressions

Don’t underestimate how important business cards are to the brand identity of a business either.  They can deliver key messages and really give a feel for the business the moment that person sets their eyes on the card.  I would go as far to say they are the equivalent of a face to face first impression.  If I see a business card that says something to me about the business, that shows me a brand value or two, then I’m more inclined to remember it.  And yes, I will make an initial judgement from seeing a business card!  I’ve seen plenty I don’t like and it will bug me throughout the conversation, but that may just be because I’m a designer!

Don’t get me wrong though, I’m not saying for one minute saying that people choose to do business with companies purely on whether their business cards look good or not, but they can make a vast improvement to your business image so why not take care to get them right.

Hire a designer!

So what tips can I offer you?  Well, being a graphic designer I think you know the answer!  Hire a designer!  I’m serious though, get a professional to do them.  Don’t waste your own time trying to do them, it doesn’t make sense for anyone, and god forbid you go to Vistaprint and use one of their templates, you’re getting exactly what you pay for there!

What you want to do with your cards is be creative and be memorable.  Being memorable doesn’t have to mean that they’re the flashiest or the cleverest, memorable can be a really professional look utilising the best parts of your brand.  It could even be as simple as displaying the really important information clearly and making sure that it hits the right notes with the market you want to work with.

When it comes to having them printed make sure they’re done on a robust and sturdy weight of paper; 350gsm or 400gsm.  Take a look at what people do with your cards in their hands when they’re chatting to you, or when they get shoved into pockets or bags.  You want your card to look great when potential clients look at it for the second or third time.

Here are some of my favourite business cards.

And finally

Overnight prints are offering 10% off on business cards until 28/01/13.  I have used Overnight prints a few times and I would highly recommend them for their cost effective and robust cards.  They also do the wonderful spot UV treatment which, when used in the right way, can really add the perfect finishing touch to your cards.

I can trot out excuse after excuse for having a bland and confusing website for the past 18 months, one that didn’t quite present a graphic design company in the way it should or in the way I wanted, but let’s put all that behind us now.  I’ve even gone the whole hog and produced a brand spanking new logo and image.

The new site is responsive, which I think is more important than ever at this moment in time.  Personally I find more and more often I’m viewing sites on my mobile or iPad and we should be making the effort to improve the experience for all users.

I’ve also made sure that all the salient pieces of information are available for potential clients front and centre.  If you go to a graphic designers website you want to see what they offer and what they’ve done before so surely it makes sense to make these details easy to find.

I’m not ashamed to say that I haven’t designed this website myself.  One thing I’ve found is that you spend so much time doing your actual work that it makes it very difficult to plough hours and hours into your own, especially if you don’t quite know everything there is to know about creating a responsive website.  So, I swallowed my pride and looked carefully through Themeforest to find the perfect WordPress theme.  A lot of gratitude goes out to Matt Mao who created the theme, check out his work, it’s dynamite.

Hope you enjoy the new site and branding as much as I will, all that’s left for me to say is Happy New Year and look out for T:12 in 2013!