Designing a Logo - Part 4

Whew! We've come to the final part of this series! In this post, I will talk about why Logo design can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. I am going to make it as short as possible so enjoy!

1. Lets start with acknowledging that Graphic Design is a profession like any other. A graphic designers main job is to solve problems, to go beyond pretty pictures and to enable you to directly speak & engage with your target audience. It is by no means an easy task. It often requires a ton of preparation, intuition and years of practice and experience.
   
   
2. It is not the time taken to design a perfect piece of graphic that you are paying for. It is the understanding, the strategy and the skill. When you go to a professional, lets say, a dentist, you're not going to pay more to have them twist your tooth around for 5 hours. You're going to pay more for a quick, effective, painless solution to your problem.
   
   
3. More is NOT more. I am going to give you an obvious example of the Nike 'swish' logo here. For Carolyn Davidson to come to that conclusion probably took a thorough understanding of what the brand is about, the idea/values it stands for, thought, foresight, and many many hours of scribbling. Today the brand stands at 13 billion in value.
   
   
4. It can be tempting to go to cheaper platform thinking that you just need a graphic to slap on. There are a couple of problems with this approach. Firstly, you often get what you pay for - a generic, easy to forget design. Secondly, the deeper problem with the existence of these platforms. They exist to encourage mediocrity and exploit professionals in the industry under the pretext of helping them find work. Play fair, please. 
   
   It is perfectly understandable that not all businesses will have a big budget for design work. In that case, find a graphic design student to help you out. You will likely be hiring someone who knows what they are doing and helping them by giving them real time experience and paying them fairly for their efforts.
   
   
5. Pro-Tip: Don't hire an eager-to-please-designer who wants to give you 5 million options. It shows they aren't very focused in their research and their ability to provide an effective solution to your needs. You should look at a maximum of 3-5 variations before picking out a winner.
   
   

You can read Parts 1, 2 & 3 again. I hope this series helps you. I certainly had fun writing it!

Talk soon!