Top 21 Tips For Designing A Personal Logo

Whether you’re a creative professional or entrepreneur, you need a personal logo to give an identity to your work. It projects a good perception amongst the target audience. We can say that a logo helps in creating your personal brand. But such a logo should have the right design using colors, and other elements to make it look unique and simple. Here, we’ve shared the most-recommended tips for designing a personal logo.

An effective logo design is not only important for businesses but individuals. Like businesses, individuals working from home also want to draw people’s attention, and they understand that visuals like these are crucial to make people turn their heads.

Remember that the attention span of the modern audience is minimal. The success of a logo is in catching the eye instantly at first glance. For both businesses and individuals, a logo works similarly to draw people’s attention and build a brand.

An individual professional can benefit from a nicely designed logo in many ways. It helps build recognition in a niche market or amid clients. With an outstanding logo, you can hope that people can recall what you do and build up a relationship with your profession. You can expect the logo will engage your potential clients with your freelance works by making a good impression on them.

For a freelance professional, visual identity matters a lot. A logo is the most seen visual as it appears everywhere on websites, social platforms, advertisements, etc. However, in creating such a design, you should be extra careful not to have a clichéd logo.

Therefore, first, visit many design ideas that work like personal logos inspiration for you. They can provide you some food for thought so that they can come out with something new and unique.

A personal logo defines and reinforces your personal brand, especially how you interact with your audience in speech and the written word.

Your personal brand logo should make a memorable impression so your followers, viewers, readers or students easily recognize it.

A personal logo might involve using your name, your business name, the name of your website, newsletter or product. It should bring together all of these elements to create a brand identity.

So, make sure that you have all the basic knowledge in place when thinking about how to design a personal logo.

Here Are Some Basics To Follow When Designing A Personal Logo

01. Consider Your Profession And Personality

Your logo should be a reflection of what you are and what you do. Therefore, first, when you design a logo, decide what strong reputation you want to project amongst your target audience.

Ask questions regarding your main characteristics and strengths. What aspirations drive you in life? What products or services do you offer to people? How people should perceive your brand.

Overall, evaluate your personality before you set out to create your personal logo. While you may be aware of some of your aspects of personality, still make a shortlist of them, which will help you pick the right elements to create a logo.

02. Decide About Your Name In The Logo

Do not think that if it is your personal logo, then it must include your name. First, you should consider your field of activity or expertise. If you can create something that can express your identity, then there is no need to have your name in the logo.

Still, if your name sounds good and looks unique, then think of having the name as your logo. In case your full name is not significant, opt for its acronym when you design a logo. Many great logos, such as the NASA logo, are shortened names of their companies.

03. Search For Inspirational Logos

Before setting out to design your logo using an online logo maker, have some inspirational ideas. But inspiration does not come by just doing anything. And instead, you have to actively look for new logo ideas in many places.

Some Of The Places To Visit For Logo Design Inspiration

• Designhill – Designhill is the world’s leading creative marketplace with many thousands of graphic designers as its members. They post their creative logo ideas daily either on their profile or as part of working on a design contest. When you visit this marketplace, you access hundreds of new logo inspirational ideas from talented graphic designers. That will ignite your creative mind to come up with your own unique personal logo.
• Other Resources – You can visit sites like Behance, Instagram, Pinterest, Google Images, and even social media to get inspiration.
• Move Around – Wonder around your place to observe your world. Sometimes an idea can strike out of nowhere in that way. Or, visit your local stores and see the products. You can also talk to your friends and relatives to get ideas from them.
• Go To Art Museums – If you have an art museum or exhibition nearby, visit it. Since it has art all around the place, it will surely energize your creativity.
• Read Design Magazines And Blogs – Design magazines and blogs are a great source of inspiration, and they can give a different angle to creating a personal logo.

04. Know Your Competitors And Customers

One of the critical tips to create a logo is to know your competitors well. Even if you are working as a freelancer, there is a lot of competition in the market. You may be selling your services as an individual, but thousands of others offer the same services.

Therefore, know who your immediate competitors are. They may be right in the colony you live in or at the other corner of the city. Research their work and have a look at their logos.

Make sure that your personal logo does not look similar to your competitors’ logos. Such a design will help you stand out, and it will give signals that you are offering something unique and valuable to the customers.

In addition to knowing the competitors, it is essential to have some crucial details of your target customer to create personal logos. Who exactly will be buying your services or products?

Once you know who the customer you want to target, do some research in this regard. Study the cultural, educational, financial, and social backgrounds of the audience.

05. Do Sketches

One of the surefire ways to know what logo ideas you have in mind is to do sketches. Draw as many sketches on a piece of paper one after the other without thinking twice about their quality. The purpose here is to get all those thoughts into paper.

You will be surprised to see so many unique logo ideas on the paper. Just pick a pen or pencil and start sketching. But keep in mind the research you made regarding personal logos, and you have some direction in those random drawings.

Some Points To Remember While Sketching Your Personal Logo

• There Is No One Correct Way – Note that there is no one best way to make sketches. It is a random process, meaning that you just follow your ways and do not be intimidated by others’ processes.
• Do Not Worry About Details – You should pay close attention to the details while sketching. After you have finalized a sketch for your logo, you can then add details when using a logo maker.
• Sketch As Fast As You Can – Make many sketches as fast as possible to have several logo ideas. Your mind will jump from one idea to another when you do sketching quickly, and you can leave a sketch unfinished if another idea strikes your mind.
• Do Not Involve Colors – At the sketching stage, do not think of colors, which hinders sketching another idea quickly. You can later think of coloring those sketches to understand how they will appear in their colored versions.
• Be Messy – Do not be afraid of drawing messy sketches. Draw randomly and add as many sketches as you can. You can later remove those unwanted elements to make the sketch simple.

06. Avoid Clichés

If you want to ensure that your personal logo design builds up a good perception of what you do, make it look unique. This means that it should appear different in its shape, colors, typefaces, etc., to the viewers.

If that happens, they will perceive that you are a creative individual, and that is where you score over your competitors.

When you design a logo, avoid all those clichéd design elements. For example, if you are a doctor and need a creative personal logo for your services, stay away from some conventional designs.

Create something without a stethoscope, white cote, the Red Cross sign, etc. People do not emotionally respond to clichéd designs as they have seen them everywhere.

Check out the other logos from your niche. Do not use any of the elements that others have used in their logos. You should give the impression that your work is original. So, avoid all those clichés used by others in their logos.

07. Pick The Right Type Of Logo

Even if yours is a personal logo and not for a business client, it should be the right type of logo. Note that there are many types of logos, and they should be selected as per a client’s brief.

You want to create a logo as a visual identity of your blog, website, or any other activity. But make sure that you pick the right type of logo even when using a logo maker.

Here Are The Major Types Of Logos

• Lettermark or Monogram Logos – These logos are in the shape of a monogram with many details, and they may also be acronyms of a company name. Generally, personal logos are not monograms.
• Wordmarks or Logotypes – Wordmarks have the full company name. Your personal logo design may pick this type if you wish to give your name.
• Logo Symbols – Any image can be a logo symbol if people can derive some meaning. But you should avoid symbols only as people would like to know your blog or any activity’s name.
• Abstract Logo – You cannot give a fixed meaning to an abstract figure. So, avoid abstract things for your personal logo design.
• Mascot Logo – This type of logo usually has a mascot of the business owners or anyone else. You can opt to create your face mascot and make that your personal logo and identity.
• Combination Logo – A combination logo combines an image with text. This could be an ideal choice to create your personal logo as you can pick a relevant image and give your name underneath it.
• Fonts Inside A Shape – You can put your full name inside a rectangular crown or any other shape. So, this can be an ideal logo choice.

08. Choose Your Design Style

Which style would you like to have for your personal logo? Think over a style that can give your logo a distinctive look. There are many styles prevailing today. So, compare different logos for their styles to know which style will suit your brand.

Here Are Some Design Styles

• Classic – Choose classic lettering if you write a blog or run a website about things related to the bygone era. Coca Cola logo is an example of the classic style of lettering.
• Retro – A retro-style logo design has some elements that remind of a distant time in history. Choose this style if you provide information about the bygone era on your blog, website, and other platforms.
• Modern and Minimalistic – Minimalist style involves only a few design elements to keep it straightforward.
• Handcraft – Show your personal brand’s unique personality using a handcrafted style of logo design, and it gives a somewhat rustic and earthy look to your logo.
• Fun and Quirky – Pick this style if you are in the entertainment industry or something related to fun.

Choose a style based on your activity such as blogging, website, graphic designer, or any profession you are pursuing. A perfect style will also convey your message to your target audience.

09. Create A Unique Design

If you intend to make your personal logo a tool to build trust, then it must be a unique design. Your website visitors, blog readers, and others should be able to identify your logo as a unique visual.

When we call a logo a unique design, it implies that there is no other such visual. So, it should be a design that specifically speaks for your personal activities and experts.

This means that every element of the design should be unique. So, your color scheme, use of fonts, symbols, images, and style should be your own, and it should not look like a design that viewers have seen elsewhere.

10. Make It Memorable

A personal logo may be unique and straightforward, but is it memorable as well? That is the question you should answer precisely. There are many simple and unique designs out there, and yours will be just one of them. With such a logo, you cannot build an identity for your activities.

Most global logos are memorable. For example, people have the logos of FedEx, Nike, Twitter, Coca-Cola, and Pepsi in their minds, and they can recall the company behind these logos.

So, can you come up with a memorable personal logo that your target audience can easily recall? All you need to do is to create a logo that speaks for your expertise and activity.

11. Use Negative Space

When designing your personal logo, be smart. One of the most used tricks by designers is to create some illusion to attract viewers. They employ a tactic known as negative space, which is the space between two design elements.

Take the FedEx logo for an example. It has an arrow hidden in white space or negative space between the letters E and x. Can you create something like this? There are, in fact, many iconic logos known for their clever use of the space, and you can learn from them to come out with your ideas.

If you can design a logo that surprises the viewers using this element, your logo will help establish your brand identity. But make sure that the use of the space looks natural and not orchestrated. So, try to use the negative space element even while creating a logo on an online logo maker.

12. Keep It Simple

Whichever may be the idea behind your logo, it should be a simple design. People do not like to be told what the symbol of your company means, and if they do not get its message right away, they will simply ignore it. That is the disadvantage of having a complicated graphic design like a logo.

In case you failed to establish a one-to-one connection with the viewers, they may not recall your personal brand. Simplicity is undoubtedly one of the chief characteristics of a logo.

So, when you create personal logos, consider the minimalist principles. This implies that you should keep only those elements that are just enough to convey your brand message.

The rest of the elements for personal logos designs are undesirable as they will clutter the space, creating confusion for viewers. For this reason, global companies have simple logos, and they have a diversified audience that can understand the message of a simple logo.

13. Evoke The Right Emotion Using Colors

Another critical thing when pondering how to create a logo is the use of colors. When a logo successfully stirs up the right emotions of viewers, it helps connect its company’s business with the audience.

It is true also for a personal logo. Every color and each of its shades are capable of stimulating our emotions. But which set of them do you want to invoke? That will depend on the type of freelance work you do.

Choosing the right colors is, therefore, a key to creating successful logos. You should have some inkling of color psychology and then use it in your design process.

Start by using the primary colors and their meanings. Remember that you have more than 33 shades of red, 29 shades of blue, and 20 shades of yellow to choose from.

Remember that some colors have a universal meaning. For example, red is generally taken as the color of passion, aggression, and love; while, Blue is now widely considered as the color of socialization and intelligence.

Most social media logos have blue in them. Similarly, black is the color of power, luxury, high quality, and authority. So, pick a color that can evoke the right emotions associated with your profession.

14. Use Custom Typography

Custom typography is the one that you create, especially for your logo or other design work. One of its advantages is that it helps the design stand out. There are already hundreds of competitors vying for customers’ attention.

With custom typography, you can ascertain their attention quickly. When thinking about how to design a logo, think about having a specially designed typeface.

Another advantage is that fonts give a personality to a logo. For example, the classic style of lettering in the Coca-Cola logo gives it a distinctive identity.

Many rock band logos have big and bold letters, giving them a strong personality. Similarly, a company in the toy manufacturing business will have handwritten letters in its logo.

Also, pick from serif and sans serif categories of fonts carefully. Sans serif is usually known for creating a more friendly and informal environment in design. These are contemporary fonts. Serif fonts should be used for formal professions. Get some personal logos inspiration by visiting some iconic logos to get new ideas.

If you cannot have a custom typeface, you still have dozens of lesser-used typefaces from the web. When you use a free logo maker, it gives access to many of them. But choose the one that looks unique to viewers.

15. Think Of A Timeless Logo

Would you like to redesign your personal logo every two years? Well, you will do that if the design follows some trendy styles. But when the trends gradually fade away in a few years, people will take your logo as old-fashioned. In that case, you will need a new design. In order to avoid this, make sure that your logo design is not strictly following the design trends of the day.

Therefore, keep the design straightforward. It should be based on some design basics, which help you create something that people can admire even after decades.

Note that most global majors have had their logos unchanged for many decades. This is the reason that generations after generations of consumers can relate to those brands easily. So, try to come out with a timeless logo to build a better personal brand.

16. Create A Balanced Design

A personal logo design will look more appealing if it is asymmetrical. A balanced image in the form of your logo will have a desirable impact on your potential customers. It makes a logo aesthetically pleasing.

But you can create one such logo even with asymmetrical elements while using logo creator software. For example, the LG logo has a winking face. This design has asymmetrical elements upon which there is an asymmetrical motif, and both these elements are well balanced in the logo.

17. Make It Versatile And Scalable

Another critical characteristic of an impressive personal logo is that it is a versatile and scalable design. This aspect is worth considering when thinking about how to design a logo. Remember that like all other logos, your logo for personal works also will be used across all platforms.

You will use it on your website, blog site, different social media channels, etc. So, the logo should look equally great everywhere. If it looks good on your website, but makes no impact when appearing on your Twitter or Facebook account, then redesign it.

Similarly, make sure that the logo looks as good as it appears in colors. You may use the logo in newspaper advertisements, stationery, fax documents, etc. There, it will mostly be in its colorless version.

When we talk about scalability, it means that it must keep its sense of balance when blown up to the size of a billboard. But when printed in a small size of a postcard, it should be able to retain its details precisely. When you hire a freelance graphic designer, tell clearly that the logo must scale up or down nicely without being disproportionate or blurry.

18. Should Look Good In Black And White

A test of a great logo design is that it looks equally good in black and white as it looks in colors. Many global logos, such as the WWF logo, are in black and white. So, you can choose to have your personal logo without colors.

But if you wish to have a colored logo, it is advisable to make sure that it looks good in its colorless version. While sketching in black and white, the logo must look impressive, and then you should think of coloring it.

Your personal logo may appear on faxed documents about any content that someone wants to send to others. A photocopied content of your website or blog also will display your logo in black and white.

19. Avoid Being Literal

There is no need for your personal logo to be showing an icon or image of your field of work. Your logo does not have to tell you about what you do.

For example, a bitten apple has nothing to do with computers. But while the Apple company is in computer technology, its logo is a bitten apple and not a computer image. Similarly, the McDonald’s logo has no image of a fast-food item, and still, the customers identify this logo with fast food.

So, do not be afraid to use an abstract figure as your logo. Later, your audience will associate that figure with what you do.

20. Think Of Animating Your Logo

Though it is not an essential tip, try to bring your logo to life through animation. A static logo has the same look and feel. Think of the ways you can breathe your logo with some life, which will impress your audience.

One of the effective tricks to breathe life into your logo is to animate it. This is important particularly if your interest is in digital applications. Many modern logos are in animation form. A famous example of an animated logo is the University of Arts Helsinki logo, and it constantly changes its shape due to animation.

21. Get Suggestions For Improvement

After you have finally created your personal logo, do not take it as a final verdict. Instead, you should test its impact on real people who may be your audience as well. So, you should put your logo on social media and ask for their feedback.

But make sure that you are specific when asking for feedback. Graphic design comes with many aspects, and not all of your audience has technical knowledge of the design.

So, ask for feedback on the aspect where you doubt and want to know how people will respond. So, frame your feedback question precisely.

So, these are the essential basics you should never ignore while designing your personal logo. Pay utmost attention to each point and check that you have taken care of them.

If you need a logo for your freelancing career, then you can outsource the work to Designhill. At this leading platform, you have access to thousands of designers from across the world. Many of them will work on your design brief to come out with unique logo ideas. You can then pick one winning design for your profession.