A logo is simply a recognition device, which has been used throughout history to assure people that the product is associated with the company that provides the product. A common misconception is that the logo is the be all and end all of the visual communication of a brand. It is true that the logo is important, as it should reflect the core idea behind a brand with immediacy. However it isn’t simply the logo which displays a brand’s core idea.

If you look at any industry, you’ll notice that mostly there is very little difference between competitors. It is becoming increasingly harder to stand out. The days of being able to judge a brand on rational terms such as price, quality of product and quality of service are gone. Companies must embrace that a brand essentially, is a product, service or organisation with a personality. A personality which overtly differentiates the company, making people become enamoured with the products or service that the brand offers, “become loyal beyond reason”.

The wingspan of a brand has grown considerably in recent times, with the advent of new technology allowing for a myriad of mediums for a brand to communicate with it’s audience. You need to make sure that your brand has a set of effective visual elements. Not simply a standout logo. Think of brand colours, typefaces, imagery and graphical devices. All of the aforementioned (if deemed necessary to promote the brand’s core idea) should adhere to a coherent system across various media (printed matter, web presence, enviroments etc) that gives your brand idea a unique and memorable appearance.

The times are a changing, and it’s not just clients that need to adapt, as a brand communications consultancy we need to move with the times too. Creating brands that come to life in a physical environment is something that we’ve done very well for years – but the world of social media is changing the goalposts for all. Take recruitment – one of our core service areas which has traditionally needed to differentiate itself, work hard and communicate through the printed media first and foremost is now seeing the vast majority of if it’s work being conducted on LinkedIn and Twitter – the challenge of building a personality through social media is a welcome one (so long as the person doing this recognises the fact they still need to be ‘on brand’) but trying to get across the top-end of sector feel of a recruitment consultancy (which a beautiful printed piece with high end production techniques would do easily) through social media avenues is really when the brand messaging needs to be very joined up.

Over the coming weeks we will be exploring a number of areas which will hopefully inform and inspire you to think more in-depth about how you can make your brand stand apart from the competition! Part two coming soon…

References:
Wally Olins: The Brand Handbook Thames and Hudson
Kevin Roberts, Saatchi & Saatchi: Lovemarks – The Future Beyond Brands

Projector are currently: Ticking those to-do lists off, preparing diaries for next week and allowing a small droplet of weekend fever to creep in.

We’d just like to let you know that Jamie of Bespoke Radio, has been accepted into the final 10 of gigantic tall man business supremo Peter Jones’s Enterprise Challenge. This is a thoroughly great piece of news, as Jamie has the chance to win a £10,000 cash injection into his business, and in addition to this, 10 hours worth of Legal, Accountancy aid, International Trading top tips, PR Guru support and HR recommendations from leading companies.

Congratulations Jamie! 

You can find out more tit bits of information on the competition here.

Projector are currently: 1 hour away from the weekend. Our weekend activities vary. The Open at St. Andrews, Wallpapering a Guest Room, “not a lot” and going to see Inception. Have a good one!

Today sees the launch of the London 2012 Olympic Mascots. Named Wenlock and Mandeville, these two interesting characters have been unveiled as joint mascots, rather than sticking to the norm of having one main character. 

The character’s description/guidelines have been set out in great detail on Creative Review’s blog. There has obviously been a lot of care and consideration taken into the development of the characters, going into a lot of detail on specific elements.  You do have to question the extent to which our country is represented in the character itself. Granted, there is an element of reference to London in the use of the “Taxi Hire” sign which adorns the Black Cabs of London.

It’s easy to knock something (we’ve all been on the receiving end), and we’re not here to do that, however the overall look and feel of the character I feel, is actually quite Eastern and more akin to the likes of anime, rather than something you would assume was quintessentially British. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want a lion wearing a Union Jack Cape with a Bulldog sidekick, or perhaps an large bipedal stiff upper lip, but there should be more of an inclusion of something that separates us as a nation. It doesn’t have to be cliché.

I’m looking forward to seeing how their personality will exude in static media, as they seem to lack the warmth that Javier Mariscal’s Catalan sheepdog Cobi had. The jury is still out until more examples of their use are evident. Cobi proved to be a very lucrative source of income for the olympics, a definite commercial success. I hope Wenlock and Mandeville have similar success.

What are your thoughts? Like or dislike? We’ll have to lump them whatever the choice! I’m still undecided.

Projector are currently: In the studio in somewhat tropical temperatures and humidity.

1. Demoralised employees, confused customers? – it may be time for a re-brand.

We here at Projector take pride in the fact that we are well known for combining creative skills with an underpinning of business knowledge which we’ve built up over a number of years, working within a wide range of sectors. We’d never tell you that simply a new logo design is the one magic answer that will turn around your fortunes and solve any problems you’re having. However, a good (and thorough) rebrand process will work to unearth the issues that you may be having that could be solved through a number of key changes, including a new look and feel. This can lift spirits, re-focus aims and offer a new beginning.

2. Name or Design Weakness

The company may be doing extremely well with no issues, record profits, loyal workers and happy customers. So why would they want a re-brand? It could be something as simple as the logo growing old fashioned or creating technical problems, i.e. failing to reproduce well in print. This could be the result of a logo simply being designed badly in the first place or being designed to fit in with the style of the moment. For example in the early 90′s a lot of logo’s were designed to look ‘grungy’ with distressed edges and textures. A few years down the line and these logo’s show their age, they have no ‘timeless’ qualities. This approach to branding can pay off in the short term but will require a refresh several years later. 

3. Legal Requirement

Occasionally, but very rarely there may arise legal issues that require a company to make changes to their branding. Reasons for this might be down to similarities between naming or designs resulting in the need for change or perhaps the break up of a company which leads to a loss of the right to use it’s logo mark. One of the most famous examples of this was in 1984 when the US government forced the telecoms company AT&T to break up, resulting in several smaller regional companies. The AT&T bell logo had to go after over 100 years representing the company. 

4. Publicity Stunt

There are many examples of well known companies changing their brand (or the branding of one of their products) in order to drum up publicity resulting in, sometimes positive, sometimes negative public response. Pizza Hut/Pasta Hut, Marathon/Snickers, Pollack/Collin (Sainsbury changed the name of a fish), Opal Fruit/Starburst. The saying goes that ‘all publicity is good publicity’, in the case of the examples I have mentioned and similar cases I would have to agree or at least say that I can’t see that any permanent damage would have occurred as a result. Although initial public response may have been negative in many of these cases, they have all been propelled to the forefront of media attention and are all the better known because of this. Bad publicity usually results from individual human error and not from structured, planned marketing – i.e. Gerald Ratner of Ratners jewellery stores stating their products were cheap rubbish at a press conference.

5. Merger or Acquisition

When two companies merge or if a company is acquired by another the question is usually raised as to how the merger will affect the brand values of either business. There can be a lot at stake, especially when one or both companies already have strong brand personality within the public eye. It’s essential to know the market and assess the pros and cons of making any changes if at all.

One example of where the wrong decision was made was the Royal Mail re-brand to Consignia; in 2001 the company ceased to be run by the government and became semi-independently owned. A re-brand was commissioned and the new name Consignia unveiled. It was a total flop with widespread derision (even the new chairman disliked the name!). The decision was made to revert back to the Royal Mail.

The ship’s captain (Managing Director) of Projector and all together nice guy Mr Phil Lowery was recently asked for his opinions on North East design and upcoming graduates by a:design association. Phil was only too happy to lend a moment of his time to the organisation and if you’d like to see what he has to say then follow the link.

Projector are currently: Wondering where on earth the day has gone.

With Christmas behind us and the turkey and all the trimmings that come with it, we’d like to wish all of you a very Happy New Year.

The studio is as busy as ever. Following on from the recent success of the National Apprenticeship Business, we are currently involved in creating yet another brand identity. We’re working with ‘Proform’ a business which offers coaching to companies and their employees, to improve individual performance, productivity and most importantly, the bottom line. 

The word is an amalgamation of ‘professional and performance’ resembling the company and the target audience. The extention of the letter ‘r’ around the ‘o’ gives suggestion that this is a supporting arm of guidance towards the individual wanting to improve their skill levels and further progress within the company. We’re looking forward to working alongside the client in the new year and produce some strong pieces of literature for the brand.

Projector are currently: Getting used to getting up early again.

As the creative sector grows ever more in demand, it’s skill, ideas and a client’s satisfaction which have become further challenging as new boundaries are being set. This has lead to creative studios working together in an intersection of common goals, by sharing knowledge, learning from one another and building relationships. In particular, creative studios that work together have greater resources at their disposal. This means collaborating between studios is undoubtedly a bonus.

Having a network of creatives, which you can call upon at any given time depending on the project’s demands, saves your client time, cost and effort. Engaging the correct creative at the right time will not only create a stronger message across a piece of media you are designing for but it will also give the project it’s cutting edge and success. Having and using other reliable creative studios with complementary skills is a valuable source for any company to have. These relationships will bring their own rewards in return. You can then build good and fruitful relationships, which can bring new business opportunities. Furthermore, you will learn from the experience of working with designers who have a different skill set from your own.

A prime example of this ethic is Matt Pyke (aka Universal Everything) The Guardian newspaper listed the studio as one of the Top 50 designers in the UK. Matt operates out of his garden shed in Sheffield yet manages to snare clients such as Nokia, Adidas and London’s 2012 Olympics. This is due to his ever expanding network of modular team of designers, programmers, animators and musicians. This allows Matt to offer a large array of solutions for his clients. This allows him to think freely as a designer, allowing him a limited amount of boundaries. Limited boundaries in terms of creativity certainly and also in attracting clients, allowing him to morph to fit their needs, whatever sector they operate in. In addition the client is amazed a startling amount of possibility and scope for their brand. 

Projector Brand Communications also has first hand experience of this, working alongside many notable creatives and the creative support network. We have have grown from learning. Not only do we share the same studio space as Union Room Web Design, many of the projects we work together on are for the same client, making the seamless transition between both online and offline media. We also work with a range of Marketeers, Planners, Researchers, Photographers, Illustrators, Printers and Motion specialists to assure that you get the utmost quality for your business.

The Creative Industry will always thrive on one important rule, communication. It is essential the information you are giving must be inline with your brand image. So having a consultancy with a structured network of creatives at hand will only encourage and increase the success of the your businesses’ visual communications.

If you’d like to hear more from us about the solutions we can offer your business then simply give us a call. We’d be more than happy to listen to your requests.

One of my favourite reads on the Brand Republic Blogs.

http://community.brandrepublic.com/blogs/dtb

Not only does Dave talk a lot of sense when it comes to advertising, (which nowadays I believe ads should start doing, it’s about selling after all) but his blog is a thoroughly entertaining read.

The question is what is Dave possibly doing.

1. His best impression of a chicken.

2. Showing off “the guns”

3. Holding two invisible eagles

Answers on a postcard.

Projector are currently: Working on a new blog article and illustration.

It’s been busy times at Projector recently but I thought it about time I’d step back into the shoes of the man-in-the-press-box. Last week three of the crew of the good ship Projector took out a few moments from being consummate professionals and trundled down to Dance City. Despite the enormously alluring contemporary dance class, we opted to attend a Parkinson-esque interview of Michael C Place by renowned design lothario, Adrian Shaugnesssy.

For those of you who don’t know Michael is an outstanding contemporary designer (“I heard he’s the best in the world’ – overheard whilst getting a glass of wine, not exactly sure how that’s voted for?!) who treads on the cusp of art in his graphic design work. He is a definite favourite of mine and it was fantastic to see how he’d developed over the years, from placement work, to TDR moving onto his work under the name Build.

One question raised from the interview was what inspired Michael to start designing, which he replied with the albums covers of seminal designers, such as Vaughn Oliver’s sleeve designs for the Pixies. This led to me to think of what had started me on the path to becoming a graphic designer. Michael Johnson has recently written an excellent article on the same topic, which goes into a lot more detail.

The main point I derived however, from the display of his work and the seemingly relentless, but undeniably good, questioning from Adrian, was that hard work gets you where you want to be. Also obviously being given the gift of immense talent helps too. It’s definitely made me think that despite being diligent I can and will be working a lot harder starting right…………….now. Maybe then that incredible talent might slowly cultivate and begin to manifest itself.

Projector were inspired to become Graphic Designers by: Many things, but for me it was to not be an artist and have a stable income. Very Radical. 

The organisation which has been charged with selecting the design consultancies for the design and print framework for the games, has divulged that a number of the design groups were chosen anonymously, at random. I find it hard to believe that such a prestigious opportunity to do some great creative work is put completely to chance and not by the quality of work. 

You can’t help but wonder if they’ll dish out the medals in the same way? Or maybe they’ll base it on which design agency, on average is tallest.

Despite being amused by the foppish Boris Johnson’s flag bearing antics in Beijing, the outlook does look distinctly bleak. How could we compete with the Chinese opening ceremony when it seems the design agencies being used are picked randomly?

I can only grimace at the all too possible prospect of the welcoming the competing nations will receive. It is destined by fate that we’ll wheel out the poodle permed relic that is Brian May, Lulu dueting with X factor winner Leona Lewis amidst a troupe of breakdancing beefeaters, who will collectively proceed to catastrophically butcher “We are the Champions” whilst hurtling around the Olympic Village atop a London Bus.

Well we can live in hope.

Info from: Design Week