Your Logo Is Not Your Brand

Your brand is an expression of your personality. Branding is the strategy, planning and maintenance work that goes into helping to form and develop the communication tools that will best express and communicate the personality of a brand. We all have loyalty to certain products or services, an emotional connection that make us smile or reach into our pockets and pull out our wallets. For instance, I have an emotional connection with ING Direct. I notice the orange and blue color logo and the numerous placements this company has in the media, but I did not become a customer based on the logo or their placements. The user-friendly interface, their larger than normal interest rate for a savings account, as well as the accessibility of their other banking and investing products is what attracted me as a customer. In other words, a brand’s “personality” is multifaceted and a product or service cannot rely on any one element of its brand to make a sale.

As a branding agency that develops branding strategies and communications tools like logo design, website creation, collateral, social media strategy and implementation, etc. for professional services firms, it appears, all too often, that many firms still believe that their logo solely defines their brand.

We recently received an RFP for a “branding and marketing communications strategy”. As we read through the well-written RFP, it became clear that there was no branding involved at all, yet the firm and their RFP repeatedly kept referring to their logo as their brand. This got me wondering. Where is the communication gap? Maybe it is a lack of education regarding the fundamentals of branding. Perhaps they got the idea from the Coca Colas, Nikes and Budweisers of the world that push their logos in multiple commercial mediums. But again, these companies’ logos do not define their brands. Their logos alone do not sell their products. Think about it, why do you purchase a particular product? If I were to venture a guess, your answer would most likely involve an emotional connection or response to an aspect of that brand’s personality or service offering.

Defining Your Brand

It is important to understand what designing or redesigning a logo really means and how it affects the development of your brand. A logo is simply a mark that represents you, the firm to an audience. Like Budweiser and Nike, your logo is not solely responsible for selling your services, recruiting high-profile attorneys or empowering your employees to be brand ambassadors and communicate with the same voice. Prospects do not buy your logo—they buy the benefits and services you provide. Everyone loves a pretty face, but it is what is underneath that matters the most.

Certainly, a logo is an integral part of many rebrands. However, it is only one element, one of the tools we use in our marketing arsenal. How are you going to communicate your values and culture to your audience simply through a logo? A logo can express a lot about who you are, but it doesn’t speak for you or define your personality. Your brand should offer promises and ways to deliver on those promises—a proposal of sorts that engages your audience. Think about the communication channels that are being considering for an update. This might be a website, brochure system, collateral and letterhead or even a new logo. Each of these will incorporate multiple design elements to help communicate your brand as well as your personality, and that will encourage people to connect with your firm. A revamped logo alone won’t do the job.  

Beginning the Branding Process

More often than not, it is budget that dictates what is possible when upgrading or redefining a firm’s brand. Focusing on a logo redesign may not necessarily be the answer—perhaps money can be appropriated to different aspects of the rebrand. We suggest that you begin every branding assignment with a brand strategy exercise to help pinpoint key insights and aspirations from your firm leadership and your clients—including an analysis of your potential competitors. It is the nexus of these three segments, which dictates your brand and its needs. It is at this point that you and your branding agency can strategically determine what your firm’s brand is and what marketing communication vehicles make sense for your firm. Unfortunately, there is never a “one-size fits all” or an “off-the-rack” approach to branding and marketing communications.

Re-engineer Your Thought Process

Think about your firm and what it represents.

• Do you have a niche in a specific industry?
• Do you represent a great winning percentage?
• Are your employees and their knowledge valued?
• Is education an important aspect for new hires?
• Does your firm have experienced thought-leaders?
• Would your clients refer you to others?
• Do all your employees consider themselves brand ambassadors of the firm?

All of these questions impact your firm’s personality and help to define your brand. Your audience helps to build these types of distinctions, which will ultimately result in the shaping of your brand. Your logo, website, collateral and sponsorships are components that help communicate your brand and, hopefully, create a connection with your audience that leads to brand-loyalty.

For instance, Moiré Marketing Partners conducted a total rebrand for Freeborn & Peters. The new tagline “Your Future Is Our Purpose” and its redesigned website represents the dynamic culture of the firm and the client-focused nature of how they conduct business. Yes, they received a logo, but it is the firm’s personality and how it does business and works to solve their client’s issues that closes new business. These are the critical features that dictated this firm’s brand. The logo, website and other elements Moiré designed are all tools the firm uses to help promote and position the firm’s brand, but they do not define it. However, these tools could not have been developed without realizing first the personal components that needed to be elevated so that the firm could better realize its brand potential and the important role it played in the process of the development of these communications tools.

So, when you and your firm are considering a rebrand and immediately thinks “updated logo”, you should bear in mind the following: will that logo alone be able to communicate your firm’s fundamental ideals or values to clients and prospects? Or, will it be how you apply that logo that really matters? You cannot design a brand. A brand is thoughts, feelings, and emotional connections individuals have to you.

We hope that the next time you start thinking about your “brand”, that you take into account what goes into building and supporting that action, and what that word actually means. As we enter 2011, we need to all accept and understand that a logo is the face a brand wears but not the substance. The logo is the tool we use to create recognition and recall, but the feelings that accompany that recognition are dependent on the brand’s personality that has been strategically developed to best communicate your message to your multiple audiences.