Is A Logo Really THAT Important?

Your logo isn’t as important as you think. In fact, most businesses spend far too much time and money on creating a logo. In this post we will examine why you might want to spend your time and money elsewhere in your company.

I’m pretty sure you can find many people out there who disagree with my premise that a logo just isn’t that important. Fine. Most of these people are the people that make their living designing logos. I can’t blame them.

Over the years my experience has taught me that small businesses that try to emulate large companies end up creating a disaster. It never works. As a small business owner you are in a different world compared to a Fortune 500 company or a much larger company. One of the things these large companies can do really well is waste money and resources. 

Some of the best examples of wasting money on a logo:

• Pepsi paid over a million dollars for their logo.
• Citibank paid about a million and a half dollars for their logo.
• Accenture paid A HUNDRED MILLION DOLLARS for their logo.
• BP paid over two hundred million dollars for their logo.

As a side-note —- The world famous Nike logo cost $35 and the well-known Twitter logo set them back a whopping $15. 

These two logos are two of the most recognizable in the World – a combined cost of $50 for both.

The list of stupidity goes on and on and on and on. This is a complete waste of time, energy, and money. We think of the $100k hammer in the Air Force when we see stuff like this. These companies don’t live in the real world – like you do as a small business owner.

The company makes the logo. The logo does not make the company.

I just did a search and you can get a logo done in two days for $20.00 all over the place. We have done that before and it worked out perfectly. You can get ultra-fancy and spend $40.00 if you want.

It’s just not that big of a deal. It’s not. It won’t bring you one penny of business. Ever.

So how do companies get conned into spending $500 – $1000 or more for their logo? I just found this little snippet from a logo-design company:

“A logo design can be so expensive because the process of arriving at a top-quality logo takes time and talent, and a great logo can help a business succeed.”

What? Are you kidding me? I could rip this sentence apart from every direction. I would love to know about “…this process”. As for the talent – those guys and gals charging $30 are very capable and have the same or better talent than some cubicle designer on the 5th floor making $80k a year. “…a great logo can help a business succeed.” I don’t think I even have to challenge that statement – it speaks for itself. I hope nobody buys it.

Look – I’m not knocking designers, design companies, artists, etc…if they can get it…go for it. I don’t have a problem with that. The point of this post is that our companies or our customers won’t fall for it. We would rather spend that money on lead generation, client retention, or securing our processes internally. Those things actually DO make your company succeed.

I want this blog post to reveal to small business owners that a logo just isn’t all that important – as compared to other aspects of the business. 

Here are THE 6 areas that REALLY make a difference:

• Sales. Generating revenue. I would include marketing here also. Sales and marketing funnels are critical today.
• Workflows – processes – systems. The more you have – the more detailed they are – the better your company runs. Another vital aspect of your business.
• Customer Retention. We all know how less expensive it is to keep existing customers versus generating new business – we need strategies and a system in place to do this. If you fail to do so you are leaving a lot of money on the table for no reason.
• Human resources. There has to be systems in place to build and train staff members. Do you have an onboarding system? This is as important as sales. Hiring funnels can make your life so much easier…and…help grow your business.
• Employee Training. Another area where systems are critical. Your company is only as good as its people.
• Employee Retention. Even more important than customer retention. Don’t let those good employees get away!

Tucked away inside of marketing would be logo design. This is a blip on the radar as far as really helping your business to succeed. Get your priorities in order and don’t spend a lot of time, energy, or money with a logo design.

Tell me about your experience with logo design. Did you spend a lot of money? How has it helped your business? What would you recommend? Am I missing something?

Thanks for taking the time to read this – please comment below or shoot me a message if you have questions, concerns, or suggestions.

Dennis Lynn
Inbound Solutions Group