I used to sell logos. Now I want to teach the thinking
behind them.
For a while, I was selling the logo as a key part of my design process. To justify my pricing and structure, I also included branding and brand guidelines, and the price depended on how deep the client wanted to go.
But I never wanted to just redesign someone’s logo and leave it at that. That only focuses on the visual side. It never answers why the logo needed to be refreshed, what it stands for, or whether it’s still relevant to the business.
The guideline that nobody sees
So I’d design a logo and a system for the client, with a brand guideline as an attachment. The guideline wasn’t an afterthought, but it wasn’t my selling point either. On social media, you don’t really get the chance to showcase a brand guideline. It doesn’t look as good as the logo, or the mockups on vehicles and storefronts. And as designers, we love that finished piece. We want to say, “Hey, look what I did.”
But underneath that is the brand, and branding is the real work we do as designers, at least as we mature in the field.
The dry cleaner problem
Nowadays, when I look at a logo, it’s trippy. If I focus only on the logo, it’s just a sellable item, no different from a hamburger or taking your clothes to the dry cleaners. You get your service, you get your product back, and that’s it. It doesn’t open up any opportunity for the client to do something with the process they went through.
Design that lives with the client
True design lives with the client for life. They buy it from you, but it also educates them. They can take the processes you introduced, and even the logo itself, and keep reinventing and refreshing their own work. Not just their business needs from a design standpoint, but through life. You start to question the why of everything. Why does this need to be done? Do I really need this? Is this actually helpful? That doesn’t just apply to the business anymore. It applies to every part of life, and that’s when design really takes off, because it becomes a life tool.
What I was leaving out
I got burned out on focusing only on the symbol. I wanted to show it on social media without giving my audience or potential clients any idea of how we got there. What were the steps? At the end of the day, the symbol itself isn’t as important as the education the client and I went through together: learning their story and where they really want the business to go.
So now I want to move into a new realm, and it’s been hard, because old habits die hard. I came up looking through design books and the finished pieces of the great designers from the 50s and 60s. I didn’t question how they got there or what they did, except for a few designers who worked on big brands, where I knew there were steps behind the result. With pure graphic design, I just liked the way it looked.
Why education
But I’m older now, and we’re in a new era where everything has to be reassessed, reinvented, and reinvigorated every couple of years. So I think it’s a natural evolution to move into education. It’s something I can keep growing in myself, and my clients are hiring me, or want to, so they can learn the mindset behind story, positioning, and the other pieces that make up branding. Not only for business, but for the choices they make in everything.
If you want to understand the why behind your brand before you refresh the logo, let’s talk.
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