Corporate Identity - Things to Consider
Things to think about before a new design is created:
- Employees, customers and investors all seem to prefer names and marks or symbols with one obvious meaning.
- Logomarks with too many parts or that are too intricate will be less memorable and harder to reproduce than strong, simple marks.
- Logomarks that follow the latest design trend are usually doomed to an early death.
- Identity design strategy should be to constantly simplify and clarify.
The best logomarks do not float in space, but have some grounding reference point that hints at their placement.
- Watch out for logomarks that are derived from a certain product, service or industry; they, too, are doomed if the company should decide to diversify.
About Symbol Design...
In developing symbols, avoid overworked images such as single capital letters, stars, the globe, etc., unless you can bring to bear an entirely fresh interpretation. Here are some points to keep in mind while developing a symbol identifier.
Symbol designs should be:
- Highly memorable
- Unique within the client's industry
- Flexible for present and future applications
- Effective in black and white as well as colour
- Reproducible in all sizes from a few millimetres to huge billboards, by any output service provider
- Reproducible in a variety of materials, on different surfaces, for a range of applications (letterhead, fax, silkscreen, cut vinyl, etc.)
- Adaptable to laser and dot matrix printing
- Translatable to other languages and cultures, if necessary
- Conducive to animation, for use on TV or web
Adapted from The Designer's Guide to Creating Corporate ID Systems For companies of all types and sizes Rose DeNeve ©1992
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