Susan asked Circle Marketing’s Louis Tanguay to be a part of that series, and he naturally accepted as it’s a great honor to be associated with the large number of companies and brand experts Susan interviews. You can read the entire article here on Susan’s Branding You Better website. We pulled out some snippets below to whet your appetite…

How did you know what typeface (font) would be right for your company wordmark or logo, and describe why your logo was the right object for your company.

We chose the Circle Marketing typefaces based on a combination of things. First, we wanted a sans serif font, because we felt that visual style conveyed a more modern and more legible feel. We enhanced the typeface and used two different fonts we had in stock to create a custom face. We chose to have a large, bold and red “CIRCLE” because that’s the basic concept of the company, appearing in many of our promotional materials, like the “Circle of Marketing” and such.

The “Marketing” font is thinner, but still all caps. So, while it is smaller and thinner, it’s not “wimpier.” Also, the “Marketing” word changes in our animated logo which helps the first-time viewer understand a little bit more of what we do.

The circle itself, is more like an eclipse than a perfect circle with a perfect border. This is to add some weight and balance to the entire logo. The sides of the circle are thinnest near the type, and heaviest where there is an absence of type. This varying thickness also helps create a more interesting visual and negative balance, than just a standard circle with a thick border would.

How did you decide on the right color palette to fit your company look and feel?

We wanted to be known for professional and clean marketing. That’s been a personal trait of mine ever since I was a graphic designer in the 90′s. I always felt that a clean look will always trump a busy look. It’s also better for small businesses to look more “professional” when they have a clean and balanced look, as opposed to collages and who-knows-what that the average bargain-basement designer will offer their competitors.

We chose red, because we wanted a POP color. My personal favorite color is green, and I love orange as well, but this company isn’t about me. It’s about our clients, customers and partners. We thought orange would be a great color, because it’s fresh, new, and is an “action” color, but so many companies out there are using orange because of that very reason, that we wanted to stand out from the crowd (like we tell our customers to do). We went with a deep red, because it still has the visual pop we’re looking for, is close to a “lighter burgundy” but not as stuffy and boring, and is striking but not alarming or forewarning like a brighter red would be. When you have a clean and white brand, that could look plain with a plain accent color. Therefore, the red helps add some punch and pop which also helps balance the brand’s essence and communicates our messaging through our visuals.

Other questions and answers included the transition to Social Media Marketing, Online Advertising for your business, and future directions for the brand and business. Check it out here, and leave comments below!

In 1994, a senior design director by the name of Lindon Leader, working at the Landor Associates in San Francisco came up with this stroke of brilliance. Leader had an amazing apprenticeship right out of college, by working for Saul Bass, who designed the AT&T logo among many other iconic images. Leader worked for Bass right after graduating from one of the best design school in the country, Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, CA (which is literally just mere minutes outside of Los Angeles).

Like most great designs, the first versions were not the best. Leader stripped  away some of the busy elements and broke it down to simple, yet elegant. It’s similar to the great chef Gordon Ramsay’s cooking. Simple great technique with the right combination of ingredients equal gourmet cuisine. If the FedEx logo were a restaurant, it would have three Michelin Stars.

The purplish blue in the “Fed” portion of the log represents business, reliable, regal stability. The orange in the “Ex” portion of the logo represents action, mobility, movement. For obvious reasons, they are the absolute perfect combinations to match their meanings and provide a subliminal definition behind the words.

Now for the icing on the cake, look at the negative space (aka white space) between the lower half of the E and the left side of the x. You will see a white arrow perfectly placed on the orange Express side of the logo, finally driving home that last punctuation at the end of the perfectly-crafted sentence. It’s like the final paragraph of a novel which finishes the story perfectly and wraps everything together in one nice, tight package.

The FedEx logo is the perfect combination of colors, readability, subliminal brand positioning, and one complete concept which fits the business and what they do, and how they do it, perfectly to a T. Just try to get THAT on Fiverr! Ha!

If you are interested in creating branding which helps you stand out from the crowd of competitors, then Contact Us to discuss the various Branding and Marketing Services we can provide and help you achieve the brand messaging you need to take your small business to the next level.

Recently, Circle Marketing’s founder and managing director, Louis Tanguay, was asked to appear on Lisa Steadman’s WooHoo Radio Show! Lisa’s a ball of energy and excitement, and she’s always full of such useful information about personal and professional branding. Check out her WooHoo Radio show, and also her business website as well.

In their segment together (embedded below), Lisa and Louis discussed the Top 3 Essentials for websites to be most effective, and some ways every company can up-level their brand and kick their business into a higher gear.

Don’t forget to check out Lisa’s website and radio show! She’s a blast to be around, and very fun as well as informative!

What is Brand Visibility and how can you get it?

Each business has its mission and goals, but in order to achieve these, the target market of who you are trying to reach, need to find you. How can they if you don’t brand and market your business effectively, both online and offline.

Many believe that if they create a website and social media profiles, poof, magically they will attract customers. It takes so much more to build BIG TIME visibility to the point of where your targeted audience is waiting for every piece of news on the edge of their seat, and you consistently are the answer to someone’s query.

As an example, a client of mine recently came back and we rebuilt everything. We re-branded his identity along with a new website and social media. We launched months ago, but as I check each week, I see ZERO activity. If the whole point is to attract new eyes and gain more sales, how will this happen without adding fresh content to keep the company in people’s minds.

Another way to think of visibility at it’s finest is to think of your favorite celebrity. You follow their moves, read about them in print and online, and you can do this because the media knows you’re waiting for every story. They also appear in so many different formats: magazines, newspapers, radio, TV, film, etc… The interesting part is that visibility can be generated from them, news writers, their agents, or in some cases might even be made-up, but always get us talking about them.

How Do We Get Maximum Visibility?

1. Make sure you and your brand are in synch.

1. Make sure your visual footprint both online and offline matches. A memorable brand is one someone can picture in their mind, trusts, and buys from consistently.

1. Be sure you’re doing all that you can to gain new visitors through a variety of ways. Explore new mediums. If you haven’t yet created audio or video, do it. New customers are found by tapping into new audiences.

1. Celebrate others genuinely.

1. Get out there and meet new people, Visibility in-person!

1. Use Social Media correctly. Don’t just sell your products and services. Do something to help others and consistently and it will attract more eyes. Join a group or two on Facebook or LinkedIn and participate. It’s about getting to really know the other members and sharing information.

1. Don’t do what others are doing. Be Unique!

1. Give back when you can so others can learn and benefit from your experience.

1. Even if a post is short, try to blog more! We know that the more often you blog, the better ROI. If you are a creative, just select a picture or product and describe how you made it, what makes it unique. Then you can share that same post on social media, with a link back to your blog.

1. Visit like-minded blogs, read their posts and leave a comment. You attract new eyes and it entices them to your blog.

Don’t forget to visit Susan’s Design Business Website and Broadcast Louder.

BRANDING Explained (Briefly)
When you create BRANDING, you’re creating an identity and messaging style. You’re also creating a sub-conscious feeling when people look at your materials. What colors will you use? Are they appropriate to your business model, business style, and products/services? What fonts do you use? Are they appropriate to communicate your business to potential customers?

If you saw a Lawyer who used an orange Comic Sans font for all their type then you wouldn’t care much about their logo being the Scales of Justice. Your logo, and brand start with the first question, “What am I selling, to whom, and in what way will this identity be best communicated visually and in the written word?”

LOGOS Explained (Very Briefly)
Now that you have established your brand identity, now developing your “logo” is much easier and the end result will be much better and much more effective. Your logo now knows what it wants to be, and what it’s supposed to communicate.

Now, the lawyer client in our example will most likely use a serif font, with strong grounding colors and maybe the scales are incorporated into the words somehow or there are visual keys to communicate the particular brand of law, whether they are prosecutors or defendants, and what kind of sub-section of law they practice. The “logo” may now include a more targeted and aspirational tag line, too. Like, “Smith, Rosenbloom & Gold” … “We Are On Your Side” or “We Win After YOU Win”…

But now we’re entering into the next stage of branding….messaging…more on that in another post…

Your tag line shouldn’t be passive or weak, like “A Good Place to Sit and Eat.” Yes, a large restaurant diner chain actually used that one. Another doozy comes from a major airline: “We’ll Get You There.” Well, I would sure hope so!

Avoid these problems by making your tag line emotionally impactful. Experiment with having it make a big promise. For example, take FedEx’s tag line, “When It Absolutely, Positively Has to Be There Overnight.” This is a great slogan and pretty much says it all. This tag line indicates that FedEx will ship anything you have, to anywhere you want, without failing you. This speaks to their core customer (businesses who ship products, and who need dependability in their vendors). A business requires reliability in their business partners, because their vendors’ service reflects on their service. This is why businesses have trusted FedEx over most other overnight shippers. FedEx promise big, and they deliver big. Great branding helps you gain trust quicker with potential clients.

Some other great ones are “Lose the Carbs. Not the Taste.” from Michelob Ultra, “Expect More. Pay Less.” from Target, and “Finger-Lickin’ Good!” from KFC. These all speak to the value you will get from their products and services, and what you can expect from being a patron of their business.

Get Started Now: What slogan can your business come up with which will touch the core needs of your customers, put them at ease, and help them feel comfortable using your product or service?