A logo is an essential piece of the process behind creating a brand that potential customers will connect with. In this article, we’ll talk about why a good logo is important, as well as some ways to make sure your ecommerce logo is doing everything that it can for your brand with logo design tips.If you’re looking for more specific strategy help for your online store or other ecommerce business company, consider a free strategy call with Ampry, a platform dedicated to driving customers to purchase.But first, let’s talk about why logos are so important!
Why your logo matters
A great logo is a really important part of brand identity. Of all the things that customers see and identify with your company, a logo is one of the most common and the most important to get right-especially for a small business. It’s something that should be able to stand for your company and your brand whenever a potential customer sees it. The perfect logo will be one that represents you well, and is instantly recognizable and representative of your brand. So, with all those reasons in mind, let’s talk about the practical side of things: what does a good ecommerce logo actually need in order to be effective?
What does my ecommerce logo need?
1. Keep it simple and timeless
Simplicity is obviously key for a good logo for several reasons. First, a simple logo design is going to be quicker to produce and remember, and easier to adapt to different situations. Suppose you have a logo that’s too complex (for example, it has a lot of small text or words on it). In that case, it’s sometimes hard to make that logo work in places it wasn’t designed to be. In that case, a logo with lots of detailed, small images or text would not work very well if it had to be condensed to a small box in the letterhead of a document, or a business card. Simplicity in a logo design also helps ensure that the logo will be relevant and timeless. If your logo is only focused on following the latest trends in logo or graphic design, those trends will likely go out of style eventually. Many small business owners find themselves in need of a logo redesign after the company has been active for a decade or two simply because their original logo was very influenced by the trends and “modern” look of other logos when the company was founded. If you focus more on representing your company in a simple way, and less on trying to get your logo to look like the logos of other successful corporations of the day, you’ll end up with a much more versatile and timeless logo that might not ever need a redesign of this nature! Keeping web design simple, avoiding the frills and trends, can help with this goal as well.
2. Keep it memorable
Why does an ecommerce logo design, or any logo for that matter, need to be memorable? Simply put, none of the other points we discuss here will matter very much if people don’t recognize and remember your logo.It won’t matter how cool or fancy your logo looks if potential users and customers aren’t able to recognize it when they see it, or if they aren’t able to connect it with your brand name and services or products. This is another point in favor of simplicity: some of the best logos are memorable because of how simple they are in their design, making them easy to recognize. However, your logo creation should not be so simple that it’s difficult to distinguish from other logos of a similar style. We’re looking for brand recognition here! For instance, a logo with a circle around the first name of your ecommerce website is simple, and fairly timeless as well, but will not do too much to help a potential customer who sees the logo connect it with your brand.A good ecommerce logo creation will try to keep things simple, but also include details that help represent your particular company, values, services, products, etc. A company which helps customers grow vegetables in their gardens might use a simple, stylized leaf image as part of their logo, for example. This adds a bit more character and individuality to the logo which helps connect its memorability with your specific company.
3. See style and color through the lens of the customer
Whenever you’re doing anything that is going to be customer-facing, you need to be thinking about your audience. This applies to advertising, external communications, product design, user interface...and making a great ecommerce logo. We’ll talk about a couple of things that relate to this: first, how customers are important for defining key aspects of your brand, and secondly, how a knowledge of your customer base can help you make design decisions for your logo.Your loyal customers help define how your brand is seen-in fact, they are probably the most important part of that definition! You have some control over what values and ideas you emphasize in customer-facing communication, but when it comes down to it, you can’t forcibly create a brand to be exactly what you want without taking customer opinions and sentiment into consideration. (This is one reason why specific SEO is so important.) A store which has become well known for selling children’s hats, for example, might face considerable pushback and reduced sales if they were to pivot suddenly to emphasize the fact that they also sell socks. This isn’t to say that they shouldn’t also sell socks, but this hypothetical company would probably not want to make a sock-centered logo. Logos and your representation of your brand name should focus on the things that your customers will care about. Thus, you want to know not only what you would like people to remember about your brand, but also what things about your brand will be most important to customers.You may have other points of focus, but if there’s one that is the most important to your users or potential customer base, that point should likely be the one that guides your decisions in customer-facing communication. When it comes to the style and color of your custom logo, this is an important design tip to keep in mind. Different audiences have different styles and approaches to communication that they will appreciate; advertisers selling toys to children will often, for example, opt for a very informal style, with lots of bright colors to emphasize the excitement that they want their products to convey to potential users.On the other hand, a financial institution, or a company involved in that field of business, is likely to focus on using a more formal approach to their wording and design, with more muted, “serious” colors. This is all meant to show potential users that they are taking things very seriously, and can be trusted (among other goals they might have with their branding).Therefore, when it comes to the style and color of your logo, you should consider who it is that you want to appeal to. Who is your target audience or your expected user base? What are their ages, personalities, likes, interests, and so on? Once you have your audience fairly well defined, you’ll want to decide what kind of communication will appeal to them.This might require some educated guesses at first, but it will be even more effective if you look at what other companies have done to appeal to similar audiences, talk to members of your audience, or conduct other kinds of market research.
Emphasize your business’s unique value
You’ve probably heard many businesses talk about Unique Value Propositions (UVPs). These statements describe your products and services and how their benefits will address specific needs or pain points of customers. Having a UVP in mind helps design your ecommerce logo. This relates to other things we’ve talked about in this article: having your UVP in mind will help you keep your logo simple and focused on the things that really identify your company, and the reasons why customers are likely to come to you. With these things in mind, you’ll be able to choose a design and focus for your logo that will be effective at not only helping people remember you, but also showing them a little of who you are, what you do, and what you value. If you’re looking for more advice to help you with your corporate strategy, consider scheduling a call with Ampry today.