14 Ideas for Better Logo Placement
Your brand’s logo is the hallmark of your business. It is the one thing people see over and over again no matter where they first see your brand. Traditionally, the logo goes in the upper left corner of a website, but what about when you want to mix things up, or you’re placing the logo on a product?
Around 89 percent of business-to-business (B2B) marketers feel brand awareness is one of the most important goals for a company. Using the company logo consistently leads to better brand awareness and drives new leads while keeping current customers connected with the brand.
One of the best ways to learn about strong logo placement is by studying the rules other successful companies follow, no matter where they use their logos.
1. On the Back of the Product
If you sell a physical good, you may not want to put your logo on the front of say an electronic device, but you still need to brand your item and show users who you are. Place your logo on the back of the product, so it is easy to find, and you have more space to enlarge the logo to a noticeable size.
Apple places its simple apple with a bite out of it on the back of their iPhone products. The logo doesn’t interfere with the viewing space on the front of the device but still labels the product as part of the Apple brand of tech items.
2. Add-On to Products
What if you want to drive home your branding through your logo and show the world the product is your company’s unique creation? Purse designers often add on a bauble or some type of attachment that shows the product is from them, but they also brand the product itself in a variety of ways. The add-on is a consistent way of sharing the logo for the company with consumers and turning them into walking billboards for you.
Coach adds a tag to all of their bags — sometimes a leather tag and sometimes a metal tag — which bears the name of the brand in their signature type. In the image above, they also added a little gold “C” in addition to the leather tag with the brand name. These embellishments catch the eye and make each bag a bit unique.
3. Website Logos
Traditionally, the logo goes in the upper left corner of the page on a website or is occasionally centered. Users expect the logo to appear near the top of a landing page so that they can find it easily. They also expect a functional logo — when the user clicks on the logo, it takes them back to the homepage.
Note how the logo for W.N. SHAW appears in the top left corner of the navigation bar at the top of each page on their website. It meets consumer expectations and makes the user experience (UX) seamless. The user knows that no matter where they navigate on the website, they can quickly return to the home page with a click on the logo.
4. Favicons for Browser Tabs
Your site’s favicon appears in the tab portion of the user’s browser. The favicon is the monogram only portion of your logo. It should be 16×16 pixels or 32×32 pixels. Think about using the first letter in your name or company initials, for example.
Quora takes the first letter from their site name and uses just that small portion as their favicon. Note how the font and color palette exactly matches the logo. The goal of a favicon is simply as a reference to the logo rather than trying to represent the full logo in such a small space.
5. Email Placement
For brand consistency, you’ll want your logo in emails as well. Two locations work well for email placement. The top of the email is an obvious choice and an area where subscribers expect to see the logo. You could also use the logo in your signature line to drive home branding.
Carnival places their logo right at the top of each promotional email they send out to subscribers. Anyone who opens an email communication knows who it is from instantly because the name of the brand appears, and the Carnival logo sits across the top line.
6. On Social Media
The placement of your logo on social media channels may vary, depending upon which channel. For Facebook, a more personalized profile photo and using the header area for the logo may be a better choice. It’s less generic than using a letter or logo image. On the other hand, on sites such as LinkedIn, a logo may be a better choice to indicate you’re a company and not an individual.
Study your competitors on the social media channels of your choice and see what types of images they use for their cover photos and profile images. Which pages have the most interaction from customers?
Kong Company’s Facebook page features an image of a woman with her dog and a Kong toy in the circular profile image. The cover photo is the brand name logo with a picture of their traditional, fillable dog toy.
7. Logos on Business Cards
Your business cards introduce people you network with to your brand and gives them a point of reference. You’ll need your logo on a business card, but figuring out the best placement isn’t easy. Business cards are one of the best places to experiment a bit with logo placement because they are consumable, and you’ll eventually need new ones. Test the waters with unique placement and change what doesn’t work at the next printing.
Some options include placing the logo on the back of the card, in the traditional upper right or even near the bottom of the card. Try different combinations until you find the design you love.
Take a look at this business card layout by 99designs for Cloud.Ninja. The logo appears in the traditional upper left corner, but then they repeat the logo to the right of the card in the negative space. The double use of the logo gives the card an extra opportunity to brand the company with the logo image.
8. Placement on Shirts
Whether you give out free shirts as part of a promotion for your customers or you have employees wear a shirt as a uniform or as your walking billboard, logo placement needs careful consideration. Similar to business cards, you do have options on where you can put your logo. Most companies place the logo above the left front pocket. However, you can mix things up and put it on the back of a tee shirt or near the bottom of a casual shirt.
Think about where the logo will appear when the item is worn. Will it stretch out too much or sit in an awkward spot? It’s a good idea to order a couple of sample shirts before investing in a large print run.
Planet Hollywood sells shirts and various branded merchandise in its restaurants around the world. Each of their products features the name of the restaurant and then the locations, such as Orlando, Las Vegas or Louisville. The placement varies, depending on the product and the length of the name. Designers should take away that it’s okay to vary logo placement on branded products to suit the product and occasion.
9. As a Sticker
How do you utilize your logo on something smaller, such as a sticker or a small shopping bag? Think about the use of positive and negative space even in a small area. For a sticker, you may want to use only a portion of the logo as you would with a favicon, so you leave room for text, such as adding a website address or telephone number. On a shopping bag, think about the fact that there will be a product in the bag, so you’ll want to leave plenty of room around the edges.
Sticker Giant created the beautiful sticker above for the Baltimore Old Time Music Festival. Note the logo is in the center with negative space surrounding it. The negative space allows for the text, which describes the event.
10. Unobtrusive Placement in Presentations
Whether you’re uploading a slideshow online or plan to give a presentation at a local event, branding your slides is a smart business move. You don’t want your logo to disrupt the flow of the text, so the bottom right corner is a good location as it is typically the last thing on the page the eye tracks.
Track Maven is a research firm, and they promote their findings via Slideshare with branded slide presentations, such as the one pictured above about the best times to post on social media. Note the logo in the bottom right corner of the screen. Placing the logo in that spot doesn’t disrupt the flow of reading, but it still brands the slides as theirs. The logo appears on most pages of the slideshow.
11. Outside Packaging Placement
If your business provides physical goods, then you use some type of box to send orders to your customers. Utilize this space to show off your brand logo. You’ll need to keep a big area on the top of the box free for the address label, but the sides are fair game for logo placement, and they also allow you to add text. It’s a marketing opportunity for every person who sees the box in transit.
Every Plate uses their delivery boxes to showcase their logo on the sides and top of the box. They use the same orange logo as they use on their website, on social media and in other marketing efforts. The orange doesn’t pop quite as boldly against the tan boxes as some different colors might, but the branding remains consistent by using the same color palette.
12. Online Advertising
When it comes to online advertising, branding is an absolute must. A rule of thumb in advertising is that a person must see your brand about seven times before they remember you and consider doing business with you. If this is true, then the more consistent your messages across different platforms, the better your chances of attracting a customer.
Bannersnack did a case study on Fanta and their banner ads on various social media platforms and websites. Note how the look is similar across all four banners, always including the logo in some form, even if just on the product itself. However, they also add the logo on the Amazon add and repeat it in the product labeling. The background reflects the colors in the logo.
13. Logo Placement for Billboards
Billboards call for larger elements than other types of advertising. It’s important to think about the most strategic use of the ample space to highlight your brand image but still get your message to those driving past in as few words as possible. Since the human mind often takes in the image before turning to the text, the placement of the logo is less important than the size of the logo.
You can also get creative with the placement and use it as an indicator of where the viewer should go to get to your store.
McDonald’s logo of the golden arches is well known all over the world. When you see the specific yellow arches, you know it stands for the brand. Look at the use of the iconic logo in the billboard above. They point the user to the direction of the restaurant and use half of the arches to show the rest are to the right. It’s a brilliant use of a partial logo to indicate direction.
14. Vehicle Wraps and Your Logo
Out-of-home (OOH) advertising is still a favorite way of marketing to the local community. Vehicle wraps are one way of reaching out to local consumers. However, you need to think through the placement of your logos and images carefully. Think about how a logo’s look or even meaning might change if a door opens or a sliding door on a van covers part of the image. Ideally, the logo is readily apparent no matter if the door is open or closed.
Big Country Raw wraps its delivery vehicles. Note how the logo is in a spot where it will still appear even when the van door is open. Think through the placement of logos and how sliding doors or hatches impact the overall look. People see your vehicle both when it’s moving and when it’s sitting still.
Experiment With New Placement Ideas
Don’t be afraid to try something new with your logo placement. Just make sure you test any major changes and see how well the placement performs with your target audience. You can always revamp the design and move the logo to a more traditional spot, but you’ll never know if a unique idea works for branding unless you try it.
Lexie Lu is a UX content strategist and web designer. Feel free to subscribe to her design blog, Design Roast, or follow her on Twitter.
