The psychology of logos:

The psychology of logo design.

A logo is usually the very first thing that people see regarding your business. People can form an initial impression of a logo in a very short amount of time, with some studies suggesting it takes around as little as 50 to 250 milliseconds to form an initial opinion. During this time, people decide almost instinctively whether it’s something they might be interested in looking at for a longer period of time or not.

The initial few hundred milleconds are critical, as this quick glance is when the first impression is made and when people decide whether to engage further or move on. If their brain likes what they see, a logo might capture their attention for perhaps 3 seconds, during which time people determine whether it is personally relevant to them or not, whether to put it into short term memory — for example in order to then visit your website or contact you for further information when it is more convenient for them. A truly great logo is more likely to enter someone’s long term memory and stay there for later recall.

These subtle, subconscious decisions that clients make are often what distinguishes or decides who gets someone’s business. Either the competition, or you. First impressions count for everything, that why large corporations hire design agencies who devote sufficient time to create memorable logos that customers can personally identify with.

Successful brands have brand guidelines.

Lufthansa online brand style guidelines

Here are the Lufthansa logo guidelines for example. Guidelines for the use of icons. Illustration guidelines. More technical illustration guidelines. Infographics guidelines. Then they have a colour style manual. A typeface and typography guidelines. Interior, product and industrial design brand guidelines. Motion design guidelines.

All of this creates a unified brand so that Lufthansa Group’s 110,065 employees have an identical vision.

But it’s not just Lufthansa. It’s Qantas. British Airways. Starbucks. Uber. NASA. Twitter. Switzerland has a style guide. Al Jazeera has a style guide. The London underground has a style guide. Sony has a style guide. Ericsson has a style guide. 3M has brand guidelines. Microsoft has a style guide.