Consider the template

When you create a new store on eBay, you will be presented with a choice of four simple templates to pick one. The color options of these templates are limited and for coherence, you need to choose the template which will best match the logo you want. It is possible for you to create your own template, but for the beginners, it is highly recommended you go alone with the standard templates availed by eBay. The templates are basic but flexible and they make it possible for you to create professional stores without having a lot of design skills. The take away here therefore, is that you should consider keenly your choice of template because you will have to match it with the logo.

Remember the elements of a great logo

When creating a logo for eBay store front, you want the name of your store to be an easy one for potential and current customers will remember fast. The competition in eBay is quite immense and if you present shoppers with tough or obscure names, then they won’t remember it and you will not be in a position to make a lot of money.

It also pays to remember to use colors appropriately on your logo. eBay has very conspicuous colors in their logo and for contrast, it is advisable not to use the predominant colors of the eBay logo on your store. This is likely to appear confusing to your potential customers and your will fail to stand out in order to attract the right audience.

Still related to the name, consider choosing an appropriate image that will tell the story of your store in a short and concise manner. Your choice of graphics should be dictated upon by the kind of products you offer and your potential clients should tell the moment they see your logo what it is all about. Ambiguous images might end up confusing shoppers and this may prevent from marketing your eBay store front effectively.

Uniqueness

Your store will not stand out from the crowd if your logo is just like the rest. Due to this, you must create a completely unique logo to set you apart from the masses. You can go through the various logos of some of the store in your niche to get an idea on what the top guys have done with their logos and also for some inspiration. After that, be sure to come up with your own original sketches and not copied work from other stores in eBay.

Make a scalable logo

The current trends suggest that the number of people accessing the internet with mobile device is almost overtaking the number of people accessing the internet with desktop devices. It implies that mobile users have increased and websites and ecommerce store owners must adjust appropriately to make it easy for the mobile users to access their websites. One way of doing so is by creating a mobile friendly store, but since eBay store fronts are already optimized for the mobile, it is upon you to create a logo that optimized for the mobile devices as well, and this comes down to scalability.

On scalability still, you have to ensure that the logo has the versatility to render properly in different sizes as well. This is because you may wish to use the logo in other branding materials such as newsletters, company letter heads, billboards, and marketing posters amongst others and the last thing you desire is for the logo to lose its quality when rendered on the various materials.

Simplicity

It is also important to ensure that the logo is clean and simple. Gone are the days when you could cram a plethora of elements in one logo and still hope that it will be great. For the leading brands on the world to most promising startups, you will easily recognize that they have simple logos, and mostly depict minimal designs. Since it has been proven that simple logos work best, you should also strive to make simple logos for your eBay store front.

Follow these tips for creating a print friendly logo!

The post Design a Logo for My eBay Store Front appeared first on LogoMaven | Easy Logo Design Software & Logo Maker.

For your brand to stand out amongst the millions in the site, it is imperative to provide real value to the followers and give them a reason to believe that you have a solution to their needs. Additionally, your branding must be spot on and this calls for the creation of a well suited logo to distinguish your brand from the rest. It should be noted, however, that when creating a logo for the social media such as Instagram, there are a few subtle aspects you need to have in mind to make the logo more effective. Presented here are cool tips one can use to create logos designed to be used in the social media, and especially in Instagram.

Consider the aspect ratio

Most of the marketing gurus will bring to your attention that your logos ought to be proportionate, in the sense that they should not be too wide or too short. If the logo is meant to be used in the social media such as Instagram, then there is another reason why the height and the width of the logo need to be in harmony.

Most of the social media websites, including Instagram, will display your logo or icons in a square or circular shape as is usually seen in profile displays in Facebook and Instagram respectively. In as much as your logo doesn’t have to be a perfect square or circle, it should have an aspect ratio that will enable it to display just perfectly well when should placed for display in the social media profiles.

Detach text from graphics

Since it is not possible to foresee all the applications of your logos in the future, it is highly encouraged you be versatile with the design, especially if you ever think that the logo will be used in the social media websites such as Instagram. You may be faced with a situation where you will be compelled to rearrange or use certain section of your logo if it doesn’t fit properly in certain shapes or sizes. If, perhaps, you needed to have very small icons, then it may be possible to include the entire logo. Due to this, most companies have adopted the use graphical elements or a single letter for their logos in the social media. It implies that if your graphics and texts are intertwined in the logo, then it may not be possible for you to separate the elements and use the logo in Instagram without confusing your followers. Therefore, consider detaching text from graphics when you are designing a logo for use in Instagram or any other social media platform.

Remember to keep it simple

Gone are the days when the quality of a logo would be determined by the total number of graphical elements and colors it had. Presently, minimalism and simplicity rules in the world of logo design. When designing your logo for use in Instagram or any other social media platform for that matter, avoid using too many words, thin lines, and very detailed graphical elements in the design. If the logo becomes too detailed, it will not just appear confusing to many people, but also resizing it may be difficult and this may work against your brand. Again, avoid using all the colors of the rainbow in the logo hoping that you will make it more beautiful and more conspicuous. This will create unnecessary noise and may not deliver you very good results in the social media, where there is already a lot of distractions from the followers.

Be consistent

In as much as you are creating the logo to be used in Instagram, it should be consistent with the logo being used in other social media sites. Through consistency, people will see the same image in the different platforms and this will work strongly for your social media branding needs. If you are keen, you will notice that most of the successful brands have a simplified variation of their designs being used across all their social media outlets. Without consistency, you will miss an opportunity to connect with your audiences throughout the social channels and in the process miss an incredible opportunity to achieve effective social media branding.

Learn how to build a social media strategy here!

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The competition in the technology industry is always a cutthroat one, and the companies realize that for them to stand out from the ground, branding is very important, and this begins with the design of the company logo. A beautiful logo won’t just make the company appear professional, but also will be memorable amongst the potential audiences and in so doing, the company has a chance to build a strong and a lasting brand in the minds of their customers. Whereas there are many tech companies with extremely gorgeous logos, some not already famous, below are the ones with the hottest logos currently.

Dropbox

Dropbox is a file storage company providing users with the ability to store and share files in the cloud. The company is relatively new, yet it has become immensely popular because it has negated the need for people to constantly walk with their memory sticks. Perhaps the other reason for the popularity of the company is its awesomely designed logo. It is simple, easily recognizable and a single glance at it will let you know immediately what the company deals in.

Storific

This is an app that allows its users to order food using their phones and they get notified with the food is ready for pickup. The logo features handwritten lettering on a bright blue background. It is beautiful, stylish and elegant, exuding a nice and warm personality.

Jelly

Jelly is a new tech company founded by Biz Stone, Twitter Co-founder. It is a platform where people can ask questions and get responses from other members and it is designed to be used by mobile devices, but allows for seamless integration with the social media websites. Just like Dropbox, Jelly’s logo is ultra clean, stylish and very simple. It depicts a shape of a white jelly fish against a light green background.

Snapchat

Snapchat is now one of the most popular social networks, and it uses a mascot as the logo. The logo is minimalist against a yellow background. The choice of the mascot is derived from the premises of the platform, in the sense that messages disappear immediately after they have been viewed. In this manner, it is like a ghost, since you won’t access the message again, and the choice of the logo has worked very well for the branding and overall success of the tech company.

Squarespace

Squarespace is a startup tech company which allows designers, artists, musicians and other professionals in the creative industry to have easy to build websites. Their logo features a beautifully elegant design, minimalist in nature and it can be easily recognized. The fact that the font is in white against a black background makes it conspicuous enough and it easily stands out from the rest.

Simple

Simple was created with a bold idea of replacing the high street bank. The design of the company logo is as simple as the company’s name – it is a beautiful design which will help you see as you spend your money. The logotype is all in uppercase, looking stern but professional.

Mailchimp

Mailchimp is a tech company that allows businesses and internet marketers to collect email addresses for purpose such as email marketing, and newsletter distribution. It is one of the top autoresponder companies you will ever come across in the present times. Their logo is a very simple logotype with the name with the name of the company written in a playful font against a white background. It is the perfect definition of minimalism in logo design.

Visual.ly

This is a startup tech company dedicated to creating different kinds of infographics to aid in presenting information in a more interesting way. Their logo features a sweetly designed logo mark which relates to its visual approach to data and it is well suited for the company.

GitHub

GitHub is a tech company that allows for code storage in the cloud and it’s a service that has grown immensely in terms of popularity. They have made it easier for programmers and developers in different parts of the world to share code with one another and also to work on projects together. GitHub’s logo is an interesting and a quirky one, perhaps to depict the personality of the company, which is now the most preferred for people working on open source projects. Their logo is half mascot and half cat and they have named it as “The Octocat”.

Hall

Hall is a communication app designed for businesses. It has various chat rooms that can only be accessed by the people who work for the respective companies. The Hall logo design is simple, clean and easy to recognize.

Check out why Uber’s head of design quit here!

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PNG: Portable Network Graphics

This is one of the most common graphic design formats you will ever come across. Files in this format will have the extension .png and it is majorly used when dealing with photos. Its use is also rampant when working on projects destined for websites and other online uses because of its low resolution. The files in PNG format are mostly bitmap images which use lossless data compression. It is also important to point out the fact that files in this format can have a transparent background.

TIF: Tagged Image File Format

Tagged Image Format is used for the storage of images, art or photography. Files in this format are predominantly used in commercial printing or professional environments. The TIFF graphics design format also happens to be the most widely supported format across most of the platforms. If you want high quality images, then this is the format you will have to work with. Though it is considered as large in size, it offers superior reliability when dealing with high quality images compared to the other formats you will ever come across.

GIF: Graphics Interchange Format

GIF is another common graphic design format you have probably come across multiple times. GIF formats are known to have low resolutions and are majorly used for website and email purposes. Almost all browsers support this format, and it employs the use of compression scheme to keep all the files small. Just like the PNG files, GIF files can also be created with transparent backgrounds.

JPEG: Joint Photographic Experts Group

You have probably heard of the JPEG graphics design format and maybe used it for a couple of times. JPEG refers to a compressed image file which offers no support for transparent backgrounds. The levels of compression in such files, however, vary with regards to resolution, and also depending on the quality of the printing. Repeated compression will compromise the final quality of JPEG files.

PSD: Photoshop Document

PSD graphics design format is probably known to every graphic designer, especially those who use Photoshop in their designs. This format is usually a raster format, and it is found in graphics and photos created using the Adobe Photoshop image editing software. It is commonly used by designers and printers and files in this format can only be opened using the software program. It is also worth noting that files in PSD file format can be created in separate and distinct layers thus making it one of the most robust graphic design formats available for the designers.

AI: Adobe Illustrator

Adobe Illustrator is a common graphics design tool used by millions of designers across the globe. The AI graphics design format comprises of vector files that designers and commercial printers can use to produce files in other different file formats as well as sizes. Just like the PSD files, AI files can only be opened using Adobe Illustrator, and they also allow for the creation of files in layers. It is the AI graphics file format that is most preferred by promotional product companies, printers, sign and banner companies as well as other third-party creatives.

PDF: Portable Document Format

PDF is considered a universal graphics design format that embeds and preserver the fonts, layout, graphics and images for all source documents irrespective of the application that was used in creating them. It is thus possible to share and view these files as well as print them with any free Adobe Reader software program. Some of the files in this format are also suitable for use in digital, commercial or desktop printing.

EPS: Encapsulated Post Script

The EPS graphics design format is mostly used in the transfer of artwork or images by designers, from vector files into other applications. EPS files can be scaled to any size and can also be opened with various applications such as Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop or Freehand. EPS graphic design format is another preferred format by printers, sign and banner companies, silk screeners and other third-party creatives due to its versatility when it comes to printing.

These are some of the common graphics design formats which will give you the flexibility when working with various files meant for various applications.

Learn about the basics of branding for designers here!

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While many people speak out against crowd sourcing logos there are even some major corporations that are now turning to crowd sourcing for their logo needs. Logo crowd sourcing can certainly save money as well as give business experts access to a greater amount of logo designs for their advertising budget. With many new crowd sourcing websites cropping up every day for logo design and more, even popular logos today are becoming crowdsourced. Over the last five years crowd sourcing has entered into almost every industry from writing, fundraising, stock photography and now logo design.

As well as being used by some of the world’s biggest corporations, governments, celebrities, artists and more are using crowd sourcing to get the support and creativity that they need to grow. Even back as far as 2012, 100 brands reported using some form of crowd sourcing to improve their marketing effort.

Here are some of the top 6 logos that you simply won’t believe were crowd sourced.

Truly from Coca cola:

The truly campaign started in the year 2012 and Coca-Cola outsource their entire marketing campaign across a mix of different freelance crowd source sites. Coke decided to crowdsource branding ideas for the entire campaign and received 3600 different submissions through crowd sourcing websites. As well as receiving lots of different logo ideas, marketing campaigns and videos Coke had to choose from thousands of submissions for a logo before they ended up selecting this one. The truly logo reflects the past Coke branding with its own classic attitude. This is the type of logo that you might expect a Madison Avenue ad agency to produce but it was simply crowd sourced from an amateur designer website. It just goes to show that there are some talented designers and submissions available on crowd sourcing sites. It also opens up the opportunity for designers to work with major corporations to get their name out there as well.

Obama:

Working on a design for the American public that’s built by the American public seems like a pretty good political move doesn’t it? That’s exactly what Obama did for the 2012 campaign where he crowd sourced a poster design for his campaign. The idea was to create a branded image promoting jobs in America. The and poster design was magnificent but Obama made a fatal flaw when it came to the crowd sourcing contest. Instead of outlining a budget he suggested that the prize would be just having the poster used. This is a mistake that commonly backfires and the Obama campaign didn’t have quite as many submissions as some other major corporations have received from their crowd funding effort. It’s important to offer some type of incentive if you are planning on crowd sourcing a design. Designers need to be paid and rewarded for their work.

Madrid 2020:

Following the London Olympics where the logo had an estimated value of around $600,000 to produce, Madrid decided that it might be a good time to start saving money on the cost of their logo design. Madrid set aside a budget that was just 1% of the 2012 budget for the London Olympics. Looking at the design they didn’t do too badly. The only controversy surrounding the winner is that the logo design kind of makes 2020 look closer to 20020. A lot of thought and process goes into designing any Olympic logo and this will actually be one of the very first crowd sourced designs to make its way onto an Olympic bid which is revolutionary for crowdsourcing as a whole.

Occupy 2012:

The occupy movement was all about putting power back into the hands of the 99% and that’s exactly why it was so poetic that they decided to crowd source their logo design. The occupy Wall Street movement website set a crowd sourcing campaign in the year 2012 and received almost 8000 designs eventually settling on a relatively simple design that was carried through for their entire website. The occupy movement logo still stands to this day and it was produced for an extremely modest fee as well. Crowdsourcing for social movements like this one just makes sense and will most likely be continued into the future.

Designer Awards:

The designer awards is a yearly awards presentation show that showcases graphic designers from around the world. Opening up their logo design process to professionals and amateurs was a controversial decision but it was a great idea because he didn’t showcase favoritism to any one of the particular award winners. There were thousands of entries for the designer awards logo and they eventually settled on a monochromatic, modern design.

Rolling beans:

Rolling beans is a national coffee shop chain that seeks competition with Starbucks and other major coffee shops across the US. When they chose to produce their logo via crowd sourced designs it was a controversial decision. The end product looks great and has made its way onto all of their branding and packaging.

While it can be hard to believe that these designs were crowd sourced rather than produced by professional design firms, this is a trend that will continue to grow for the future.

Check out the most unusual places to find inspiration here! 

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Several cases have been witnessed where a rebrand received a hostile reception from the fanatic followers. The most recent one is by Uber, the taxi hailing app, whose rebrand was likened to toilet tiles, thus making the company receive a lot of backlash from the customers. The rebrand by Uber was designed to give the users a different logo based on the various locations where the services were available. So serious was the redesign that the CEO and co-founder of the company as well as the Uber design director had to resign due to the excessive criticism that the new logo had.

Customers love their brands, and they are ready to protect it should there be a need to do so. This is usually a significant challenge for many corporate organizations looking to rebrand. There is always an apprehension on the kind of reception the rebrand will receive with the most dreaded one being a rejection of the rebrand by the loyal customers. As a matter of fact, most businesses will have several tests to gauge the effectiveness of a brand before they finally release it to masses.

About the Uber Redesign

The new Uber logo is centered around a theme of atoms and bits representing the company’s focus on humans and technology. Instead of hiring an external design team to take up on the rebranding of the company, Uber decided to use their own in-house design team led by the CEO and co-founder Travis Kalanick together with Uber design director, Shalin Amin. According to sources intimate to the redesign, the co-founder did not trust anyone else to make a good redesign, and this is why he decided to get on board with the rest of the design team.

The new redesign caused a storm worldwide, with the majority feeling disappointed by the sheer lack of creativity and the casual nature in which the new logo was made. Others have referred to it as “asshole” because it represents the type of tiles usually used in constructing toilets. The patterns on the back of the app icon when it is loading are the design of the company’s communications designer, and she admitted that the inspiration came from the small square tiles found in her bathroom.

One of the most disappointing things about the Uber logo is that it attempted to change the entire identity of the whole original logo. For instance, the conspicuous and well designed U in the initial design was taken away. Instead, it has been replaced by a circular motif and a hexagonal shape for rider’s and partner’s devices respectively. Both the patterns have a square “bit” right at the center, and this is what caused outrage on the design. Many people likened the bit to the anus.

The other glaring and potentially annoying difference about the new Uber logo is the conspicuous absence of the white and black theme present in the initial design. Instead, the company saw it fit to adopt a colorful palette which they claim that was inspired by the textiles, architecture, fashion and art present in the various countries where the company has operations.

For instance, in Mexico, the logo displays palettes of pink as well as the patterns present in the local tiles. In Ireland, the design was inspired the Georgian architecture and the lush green vegetation typical of the Irish countryside. The Nigerian version of the logo, on the other hand, was inspired by the Ankara due to its bright colors and the wonderful geometric patterns. The typeface used in the new logo design is also more condensed, thicker and simpler. The typeface was chosen to remove the curls that were present in the R and U on the previous logo.

With the new logo design, users in the various countries will see customized versions of the logo to match the identities and the colors of those countries. The company also has plans to roll out city specific logos which will depict the patterns and the colors of the cities. This is intended to enable the customers see Uber from a distance, and also to reflect on the fact the company has grown and is now more mature than it was a few years ago.

The resignation of the lead designers who spearheaded the Uber redesign is an indication of how sensitive a logo change is to the customers. It is the desire of every company to keep their customers as close as possible and would not admire for anything to make them unhappy. The storm is not yet settled on the perceived poor redesign of the Uber logo, and there are speculations that the company might as well revert to the old design as they think up of something new. Only time will tell.

Check out these color combination tips to avoid mistakes in your own designs!

The post Why Did Uber’s Head Of Design Quit? appeared first on LogoMaven | Easy Logo Design Software & Logo Maker.

Using professional software is an absolute requirement when it comes to logo creation. Many people get extremely tempted to use online tools as well as template designers in the creation of their logos and branding but it’s fairly easy to sniff out some of the template and easily created logos as soon as you see them. Logo designing software can be quite expensive for the license and it does take some time to learn but with the products that you can create the license will more than pay for itself in the future of your business. There are a number of good reasons why you should consider getting professional logo designing software especially if you’re going to be working as a graphic designer or doing a lot of your own in-house branding. Here are some of the top reasons why you should consider paying for a full license on logo design software:

Logo design software is compatible

Products like illustrator and Photoshop can be a little bit intimidating for beginners but they are compatible with many different programs for design and printing. People across the industry use these products because they are heavily regarded as the best for producing a high quality logo. As a result when you go to print your logo on signage or it’s time to actually print business cards, the outside services responsible for reproducing your logo may ask for several different copies of your logo design. Having the files available in the native design format, high quality image format and vectors can be made possible if you actually have the design software on hand. Out putting in the correct file format that’s compatible with printing and other design services is important for collaboration and for actually getting the services that you need for your business to thrive.

Easy edits

With access to full logo design software you can easily do rebranding or quick edits to your logo as they are required. Certain types of printing may require you to slightly change the color of your logo to reflect the original colors through the background and without the software on hand performing these edits could be extremely expensive because you will have to pay the fees of a graphic designer. Easy edits can be performed by almost anyone with a basic knowledge of illustrator or Photoshop and you can quickly output the file formats shortly after the edits have been made.

Scalable

With access to the vector images and the ability to scale them using a full licensed program you can blow up your logo to astronomical sizes. Having this scalability is one of the only ways that you can place your logo on billboards, signage and promotional materials without getting any type of distortion or sacrificing image quality. Seeing distortion or changes in your logo can really affect your brand image and the professionalism of your logo wherever it’s displayed.

Mockups

With the help of a professional tool like illustrator you can quickly mock-up a huge number of products for your business. This means you can quickly put your logo onto Tshirts, promotional materials, business cards and more. Being able to quickly perform mock-ups of promotional material with your logo design and all of the compatible files puts the power back into your hands.

You learn indispensable skills

Gaining even the basic knowledge of Photoshop or illustrator is an indispensable skill. For even just the basic license fee in your business you could have a qualified graphic designer capable of performing basic edits and for creating marketing tools. If you are interested in simply learning the program as well you could start offering up your services for web design, freelance logo design and image editing. Illustrator and Photoshop are two of the most widely used layout and photo editing programs in the world and they’re very much in demand for businesses. Purchasing one of these licenses could be your ticket to a future job.

You can work more efficiently

Having a Photoshop or illustrator license can help you work more efficiently in your business. Bottle-necking often occurs when you need to make small changes to your logo and a professional graphic design firm may take days or even weeks to make the small changes. If you have the license and the knowledge it’s possible that you could very quickly make the changes on your own and with minimal approval.

It’s not a cost, it’s potential to earn

While the license for a software is certainly no substitute for a professional graphic designer, many of the small edits to your logo as well as placing your logo and promotional materials can be done on your own time and with minimal experience. Having the ability to create more materials without any extra cost to you gives you the potential to earn money from a logo designing software. Learning logo designing software also gives you indispensable skills that could help you obtain a better job for the future.

Keep these top reasons in mind if you’re considering purchasing logo designing software.

Check out these top logo design trends to guide you through the design process.

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