When someone is introduced to your business, your logo is often the first thing they see. Whether it is on a business card, brochure or website, your logo needs to give a great first impression! It becomes the visual identifier for your company, like the Nike swoosh or the red and white swirl of Coca-Cola. Your logo will transmit a feeling about your company, and the right logo delivers the right message.

There are some general types of logos. An iconic logo uses an icon, or graphical element, often related to the business field. Even if it is an abstract image, the idea behind it probably started with something connected to the business (they say the Nike SWOOSH represents the wing of the famous Greek Goddess of victory of the same name.) 

LogoType is a logo based on letters. A unique font used to spell out the company name or rearranging letter patterns can easily make up a logo. Examples of this type of logo are those of General Mills and IBM.

Mascots can also be used as logos, such as the Pillsbury Doughboy. Mascots that seem to come to life add a personal touch to your business, giving it a friendly feel.

When first determining your logo, lots of aspects need to be taken into consideration. Do you have a slogan or motto that needs to be incorporated? Is there an icon to easily represent your industry, like a house for a Real Estate agent? Also consider the colors being used. Is your logo noticeable? Is it unique? Will it reprint well in shades of grey?

When you have a finished logo, you will need copies of it in different file formats for different purposes. Anytime you have your logo printed, you will need a high resolution vector graphic. This version of your logo can be resized without losing any visual integrity. For online use – in emails and on the web – you can use a lower resolution raster version of your logo. This is art made of tiny pixels that will load quickly online but might look grainy when printed.

The examples above are great logos, but what makes them so recognizable it that they are well advertised. Remember to keep your target audience in mind when thinking about your new logo because it will appear on all of your advertising and marketing efforts.

Because many of our readers are small business owners working out of their homes and vehicles, I’d like to share information about vehicle graphics and how this type of advertising can increase your business.

Purpose
Vehicle signage has two purposes. The first is branding. When you arrive at an appointment in a vehicle that has your business information on it, it reinforces your corporate identity. It should correlate with your business cards, brochures, website, etc. This helps legitimize your business in the eyes of your customer – it completes your professional image for them.

The second purpose for vehicle signage is advertising. Advertising is all about reaching as many people as possible as many times as possible. The book Guerilla Marketing helps explain this. It says,

“Research shows that the average American sees mare than 30,000 ads per year. On average, only one out of nine well-designed ads is ever seen by the targeted customer. We also know that an ad needs to be seen at least three times before it makes enough impact to spur action. Quick calculation: You need to put your ad in front of your target customer twenty-seven times before it makes a difference.”

Twenty-seven times!? How do you do that? You could send out 27 direct mail campaigns. You could advertise in the paper or on the radio 27 times. But at anywhere from $100-$1000 an impression, that ads up to thousands of dollars very quickly. So instead, consider the use of vehicle graphics.
Vehicle graphics cost around $75 for basic magnets to a few thousand dollars for a full color wrap. If you’re like me, and many days you feel like you spent the whole day in your car, your vehicle graphics have just paid for your advertising in impressions after only one month. But the graphics are there every day for years afterwards. This makes the value per dollar for vehicular advertising astounding! And that is why there are more and more vehicle graphics around you.

Options
There are several different options for vehicle graphics depending on your budget and goals. If you use your personal vehicle for work, magnetics may be a good choice for you. They are made to go on the doors and rear of your vehicle. You can put your logo on for branding purposes and add a slogan and your contact information for advertising. A nice thing about magnetics is that you can leave them on when you are driving for work, but when the car is your own on the weekends they slip right off. If you take care of them, they will last for years.

The next step up is vinyl lettering. This can be subtle door lettering or logos that wrap around the entire vehicle. This option is great if you want to advertise around the clock. Larger graphics allow you to grab more attention. The most dramatic option is the full color vehicle wrap. These are similar to what you see on buses or many work vans. The entire vehicle is covered with full color vinyl, including the windows. These are a big attention getter! Many people who choose this option like to park their vehicles at events with large crowds to use as a traveling billboard – without paying billboard pricing!

Whichever method you choose, you want the message to be simple and to the point. Use your logo, your contact information and as few words as possible to get your message across. Remember that people are reading your message at 30-miles-per-hour and faster.