Don’t Sweat Your Logo…

Posted by Laura

January 29, 2006

Here’s another marketing secret that ad agencies don’t want you to know: if you’re starting a small business, the last thing you should be worried about is developing your logo or creating a brochure.

Those marketing activities can wait. Pretty marketing pieces…like fancy brochures and logos…don’t help a new business sell its products or services.

Truth is, you can run a very profitable small business without a logo. And I know tons of successful small businesses that would never dream of investing in a brochure.

That’s because successful businesses are interested in SELLING what they do to their highly niched prospects, not TELLING what they do to a more general audience.

Logos tell. Brochures tell.

They don’t really help you sell.

There’s only one basic reason that many small businesses start their marketing efforts by developing logos and brochures — and it’s a sad reason.

It’s so that they can feel better about themselves.

A pretty logo, a fantastic looking brochure — they can feed a small business person’s ego. Hiring a pricey ad firm with a tempermental designer and a college-educated copywriter — why, the very process of hiring smart, savvy creative and marketing types can just plain make newly minted entrepreneurs feel better about themselves. And make no mistake, ad agency employees will deal with your ego first, and put your business results second.

If you’re starting a new company, you’ve got to decide right off the bat whether you’re more interested in a feel-good process for you…or if you’re more interested in getting solid results.

If you are more interested in feeding your family that feeding your ego, the choice is obvious.

For your first few years in business, invest in direct marketing strategies and tactics that help you SELL. Use a street smart approach to getting fast results….only then can you use your profits to develop the fluffy marketing stuff that feeds your ego. You can always hire a pricy design firm after your company is outrageously successful — but by then, you won’t be feeling so insecure, and your ego probably won’t require it.

Now, the biggest objection I get to the advice I give new businesses on logo development is this:

“But Laura, I need a logo for my business card!”

No. You don’t.

Need proof? Think about it:

What does your lawyer’s logo look like?
Does your accountant bowl you over with an amazing logo?
In fact, how memorable is your ad agency’s logo?

Many successful businesses - including your law firm, accounting firm, and ad agency — don’t even have a logo. And it’s because they don’t really need one.

And neither do you.

When you are just staring out, it’s more important to tell your prospects a story about how you will help them than to give them an abstract image about your corporate values and your vision for the future. It’s more important to develop a catchy phrase — a tagline, if you will — that tells your prospects exactly how your business will help them.

Put that benefit-driven phrase on your business card. Put your contact information on your card. Put your picture on your business card. Put a call to action on your business card. You can safely let the logo slide.