The Alternative Broadcasting Online News Station

A corporate logo design should be highly instrumental in building your corporate identity and should successfully exude the company’s attitude. The viewers must have some idea about the disposition, character, or fundamental values of your company through your logo.

Following certain basic principles can ensure that your corporate logo design is professional easy to remember and creates a great impact on its viewers while successfully expressing the nature of your business.

Go for Professional Logo Designers
You might save a few dollars doing your own logo or getting it done from the next door boy who knows the basics of designing but if you are serious about your business you should always go for a professional logo design firm. Your corporate logo is your identity, your customers recognize you by your logo, so the more professional and sophisticated your logo is the better will be your customer’s impression about your company.

Though most of the logo design companies charge exorbitant rates to create a corporate logo design but the industry is changing. These days there are companies that offer excellent professional logos for nominal charges (e.g., http://www.mycorporatelogo.com)

Simplicity - Keep it Simple

An ideal corporate logo design should be simple and memorable. Corporate houses spend thousands of dollars to ensure that customers remember them at all point of time and a simple logo is the key to that. Think about the Nike logo, it’s simple and memorableonce you see the Swoosh, do you ever need to think twice about the company name?

Colors

Colors you use for your corporate logo are a very important factor in your brand establishment. If you already have your corporate colors ask your logo designer to use those colors for the logo. If you don’t, suggest the colors that you think might give your prospective clients some idea about the type of business you do. For example, a company working in the fields of forest conservation might like their logo to be in green. At the same time, you also need to consider which colors will go well with your corporate stationeries as well.

Black and White version

While emphasizing the colors we must also remember that it is important for a corporate logo to come out well in black and white. A corporate logo design is used in all corporate communications including fax and photocopied document where they will be in black and white and the logo design must be such that it holds the same impact even in black and white.

Minimize Colors

This is more important from an economic and usability point of view. Corporate logos are often required to be printed for stationary and corporate literature. Using a one or two spot color logo can save a lot of cost compared to printing a full color logo.

Logo Format

It is advisable to always use a vector format for your corporate logo design. A corporate logo may be required to be reproduced at any size for different purposes in the future. A logo design done in vector format can be expanded to any size without any loss of image quality, where as a corporate logo in raster format will loose image quality, if scaled up. Also it is easier to convert a vector logo design to bitmap than vice versa.

If you get a professional logo design firm to do your corporate logo and brief them about this basic tips (most of the knowledgeable firms are well aware of these principles) you are sure to get a satisfactory corporate logo design that would go a long way in helping you establishing your brand.

Use your Logo:

Once you are ready with your corporate logo start giving it maximum exposure possible. Not only on your business cards and letterheads but also on your packaging, uniforms, pens and all possible goods should contain your logo. This gives wider exposure to your logo and people gets familiar with the corporate logo much faster. With all these you are on your way to establish your brand.

Ray Smith is a marketing Expert with years of experience in different industries and specialized knowledge on branding and internet marketing.
Corporate Logo Design.

The marketing director for one of my longtime clients used to complain “does it have to be purple again?” What she and many others don’t realize is that the color you are seeing in your sleep, your prospects might just be beginning to recognize, and if done well, associate with you.

Consistency cannot be stressed enough in brand development: whether it is a color or a font, where you place your logo, the schedule for newsletters and promotions, or the way the receptionist answers the phone. One predictable encounter after another carves your brand in the customer’s consciousness.

Its Not All Repetition

One of my favorite advertisers is Target. Their commercials are fun, displaying the same flair and style that they market in their store. Interestingly, the logo and store name are not even mentioned until well into the spots, frequently displaying the signature bullseye in a pattern on a dress or as wallpaper in the background. Often it’s not even red, still overtime I know it for a Target ad instantly.

Consistency is about recognition and familiarity, not necessarily duplication. When building brand we are trying to create attachment. Target has room to be very flexible, developing consistency through a certain style. Their continuous advertising allows enough repetition that we see the pattern in their message.

The Flexibility Trap

While Target takes a lot of license with consistency, you’ll also notice that some things are always the same. The shape and scale of their logo, the pace of the message, the patterns created with their logo, the font for their name and it’s positioning at the end of their ad.

The secret to remaining interesting while maintaining consistency is planning ahead. Before you start a brochure or an ad campaign, make corporate-wide decisions on your brand. What can change, what must stay the same? What colors or color palette will you stick with? What is the underlying message of any marketing direction? In short, know your brand message, the key visual elements that support it and how they should be applied. As your business grows and more people handle distributing your message, your brand stays in your control.

About The Author

Beth Brodovsky is the president and principal of Iris Creative Group, LLC. Brodovsky earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Communication Design from Pratt Institute, New York. Before launching her own firm in 1996, she spent eight years as a corporate Art Director and Graphic Designer, providing a sound foundation in management and organizational standards and structure. Iris Creative specializes in providing marketing and strategic communication services to clients in service industries and small businesses. For more information contact Beth at bsb@iriscreative.com or 610-567-2799.

It is a hard-working life being a schoolgirl, sandwiched between schoolwork and going out, there’s little time to left searching for phone numbers and information. Nevertheless, with 118 118 directory enquiry, Britains leading assistance services, you are able to get stuff on individual phone numbers in a tick.

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Create your design brief in 4 simple steps.

Business logos and slogans are undoubtedly two of the most important elements in any company’s marketing mix. They define the visual style and “attitude” of an organisation and will be responsible for creating the all-important “first impression” for a large percentage of potential customers.

This article will explain the steps involved in creating an effective “brief” (or description) of your new business logo and slogan. By creating a brief at the beginning, you will find the process of finding the right designer, and communicating the project to your designer, much easier. You will be far more likely to end up with a business logo and slogan that works!

Step 1. Pricing

One of the most important jobs for your new logo is to let people know how much they should expect to pay for your service or product. There is no point in looking like a BMW dealership if you are selling Toyotas. (And vice versa). Your potential customers (or prospects) will usually have an idea of how much they want to pay for the product or service that you are offering them.

This step is simply a matter of choosing from one of the options below;

“Cheap and cheerful”

High quality, value for money.

Exclusive and expensive.

Step 2. Unique Selling Point

The next part of your brief should be a description of your USP, (Unique Selling Proposition). This is the feature that sets you apart from your competition. It might be a speedy turn around, or a pick up and delivery service that your competition does not offer. Whatever it is it will help your designer visualise the uniqueness of your company.

Here are a few examples.

“We are the cheapest”
“We deliver on time, every time”
“Our products have a 10 year guarantee”
“Our staff are always friendly”

Step 3. Establish a mood

This step is about creating a mood for your logo. Remember that you want your logo to communicate a message to your potential customers. That message might be that you are a “State of the art technology company on the cutting edge of the information era!” or it might be that you are “A traditional farmer, doing things the old-fashioned way.”

To help you with this step, we have again created a list for you to choose from. By selecting some of the words or phrases here, (or writing your own) you can help your designer get a feel for the style of logo you will need and the types of graphics that will be suitable. Try to choose two or three.

Young and funky

Mature and stable

New and innovative

Established and reliable

Latest technology

Traditional

Small Business

Big Business

Progressive

Bold

Corporate

Friendly

High-tech

Cheap!

Exclusive

Expensive

Fun

Sexy

Step 4. Describe your perfect customer

This step is probably the most difficult because it involves admitting that not everyone will want to become your customer.

Nine times out of ten, when I ask a client who their target market is, they say, “everyone!”. Even if it was possible that everyone in the world would like your product or service, there will still be people that will want more of it, or use it more often. These are the people that you need to focus on. It is important to give your designer an idea of the type of person that they are designing for so try to imagine the perfect customer. Not only the person most likely to want to do business with you, but the type of person that you want to do business with.

Below are some example questions that may or may not be relevant to your particular industry, but will give you an idea of the sort of information that your designer will find useful when they visualise the target.

How old are they?

Are they male or female?

Where do they work? (Office, outdoors, tradesperson etc.)

What type of car do you think they drive?

Do they have children?

Are they self-employed or on a salary?

Do they eat out or cook a lot?

What do they do in their spare time?

Step 5. Write the brief

Now that you have completed the 4 steps above, you are ready to discuss the project with your logo designer. Email or fax the written brief to him or her, and then organise a time to either meet in person or on the phone to discuss the project further.

With a well prepared brief, you have given yourself and your business the best chance of success.

Tristan Boyd - Owner of Boyd Design, a Sydney website design company focused on low cost, small business products and solutions.

Business logos and slogans.

I heard an advertisement on the radio the other day that surprised me, not because they were saying anything noteworthy, but because it was so banal. It was a national company’s ad. They pay an ad agency to write and produce their commercials. There are so many words at their disposal, so many descriptions, so many emotional statements to attract customers, why would they use the trite phrase, “ knowledgeable, friendly staff to serve you”? Even if they couldn’t think of anything exciting, they could have used, “if you’ve got questions, we’ve got answers”, “we specialize in providing answers”…”specializing in premium products and effective solutions”.”Try and stump the staff with your questions, they love a challenge”. “We don’t have all the answers but we’ll help find solutions”

Even if you don’t have anything new to say, you can still say it with style, create a connection to the consumer or create a buzz. Use customers’ experiences and what they have to say to create a unique message. There is a reason that a customer comes to you rather than the competition. You may have to ask a number of questions to get to the real reason. Even if the only reason is that you are closer than the competition..you can make a joke about it. You can brand your business with an attitude rather than a specific product line. If you present your business in a blasé manner, people will be blasé about dealing with you.

Ho Hum is not something you can take to the bank! Building a recognizable brand offers measurable results, measurable through increased response, increased traffic, and increased attention. Take a stand, chose a niche and give it different perspective.

Think about how long the t-shirt has been around. How many hundreds of times has it been reworked as a successful business? With the right words and vision it’s not just a t-shirt; it’s a billboard for social commentary, beliefs, attitude statements, advertising, fashion and/or art. Each of these businesses has successfully created a unique niche by creatively saying they sell t-shirts. T-Shirt Deli – Chicago www.tshirtdeli.com/, Turkish T-Box http://www.t-box.com.tr/v2/, Banka de Camisetas http://www.bancadecamisetas.com.br/, skwTeez www.squeezeteez.com

Yes, you do want friendly, knowledgeable staff working in your business, but if you want to convey that or any other message to prospective customers, present the information so that it’s believable. Forget the clichés and take some time to put together words that mean something to your prospective customers.

Nancy Fraser is the president of Nota Bene Consulting an advertising and marketing company that offers “out of the box” communication advice,design development and implimentation of branding and marketing campaigns that require clients to “First Ponder and then Dare”. http://www.notable-marketing.com

Here’s how to get a blank look from most business owners, managers and branding, marketing executives. Ask them, “What’s your marketing plan?”

You’ll likely get an answer like this: “Well, I don’t really have one of those exactly, but I am doing some corporate branding, direct mail, updating my web site and considering search engine optimization.”

Fact is, just the thought of a “marketing plan” overwhelms many. Mention of projections, studies, demographics and segmentation are returned with blank spacey stares.

Nevertheless, you shouldn’t let the idea of a marketing plan scare you. Think of it, rather, as a marketing recipe—a mix of ingredients you pull together to create a fabulously tasty result like increased sales, better profits or more market share.

But before you start-throwing ingredients together like a cook gone wild, brainstorm ideas of what you’d like to eventually make with the recipe and educate yourself on the characteristics of the ingredients you might use—what will each bring to the final product?

And you know what’s cool? After you find a marketing recipe that proves successful, you can use it again and again—just like any recipe.

I have numerous marketing recipes in my repertoire. I’ve got them for networking, getting speaking engagements, adding names to my e-newsletter list, creating a successful online sales letter and for following up with prospects and turning them into clients over the phone.

None of these recipes were especially brilliant. They were simply the results of brainstorming, research and testing. Many came from others, which is one of the best sources for winning marketing recipes. All I did was add my own twist to make it fit my business and market.

I continually tested and tweaked my recipes until I finally came up with something I liked…and that a few of my peers liked. Now, I have an arsenal of marketing techniques ready to tackle any marketing problem I may have. Here’s a look at how I put everything together:

Marketing Activity: What action will you take to accomplish an objective? Focus on one per recipe, such as networking, speaking or search engine optimization.

Purpose: What’s your goal for this marketing activity? What’s the perfect outcome?

Intended results: What do you want to happen as a result of accomplishing your goal?

Target market: Who is it and how can you best get their attention?

Plan: What tactics does your research show will work? What ingredients are needed and how will they best work in?

Message/Attention: What’s your key message? It must be attention-grabbing and memorable.

Marketing materials: Do you need a web page or a printed piece? Perhaps a combination…

Main activity: What is the main line of communication, and how can you best use it to reach your prospect?

Offer and Call to Action: How will you ask them to take action? What can you say or write that is compelling enough?

Follow-up: How will you get back in touch? Whatever you do, don’t forget to do this…it’s what separates marketing from selling.

Time: Give yourself deadlines, and carefully place them in your calendar so you can realistically accomplish them.

If getting results from your marketing is truly important to you, you need to have a recipe like this. Just start with one ingredient and take it slow. Before you know it, you’ll be cooking up a feast of new business wins.

Scott White is President of Brand Identity Guru a leading Corporate Branding and Branding Research firm in Boston, MA

Brand Identity Guru specializes in creating corporate and product brands that increase sales, market share, customer loyalty, and brand valuation.

This Article may be freely copied as long as it is not modified and this resource box accompanies the article, together with working hyperlinks.

Small business owners learn many lessons the hard way - through
the school of hard knocks. I recently experienced my own tough
lesson concerning the importance trademarking my business name.
Like many solo-entrepreneurs on a tight budget, the thought of
trademarking my business name was not high on my priority list.
Had I placed more importance on it, I might have saved myself
some anxious moments, not to mention a few hundred dollars in
attorney fees!

As a member of a couple different virtual assistant membership
organizations, I often look with interest at other VA’s business
names and website URL’s. One day I noticed a new member
announcement for one of the groups and saw a listing for VA
Office Solutions. Now this one hit a little too close to home for me - after all, my business name is VA Office Solution. I also noticed that she had a domain name to match.

Have you figured out my first mistake yet? I could have kicked
myself for not purchasing the domain name,
http://www.vaofficesolutions.com, which is so close to my own
domain name of www.vaofficesolution.com. After all, even some of
my own clients inadvertently add an “s” to the end of my business name in correspondence. I certainly didn’t want people to look for my business on the Internet, and mistakenly find this other website! This could potentially be very confusing for both of us, especially considering we both operate similar businesses and conduct our business virtually, working with people all over the country.

Well the first thing I did was a little research on this domain
name. I was able to find the owner and saw that the name had only recently been purchased, and had only been purchased for a one year period. This indicated to me that this was a new business, and she had only just started using this name.

Then next step was to get some legal advice. I had met an
attorney who specializes in trademark law at a networking event
so I gave her a call and asked to meet with her. I learned that I definitely had a good case, as I’d been using the trademark since 2001. Even though I had not formally registered the trademark with the USPTO (U.S. Patent and Trademark Office), I still had first use of the trademark, which gives me certain rights.

After meeting with the attorney, I decided that my first step
should be filing my trademark with the USPTO (http://www.uspto.gov). Now this is something that I could do
myself, without paying an attorney, but taking into consideration my own time constraints and her expertise, I decided to let her handle it for me. Also, since there would need to be a letter drafted to the trademark infringer after my trademark had been filed, I just felt more comfortable letting my attorney draft a letter that would be effective enough to get the infringer to stop using the trademark and take the website down.

So how did it all end? Well I got my trademark registered and we
sent the letter to the trademark infringer. She agreed to stop
using the trademark and took the website down. All in all, the
entire process took about three months. I feel very lucky though, as I was able to find this infringer very soon after she opened her doors for business. By getting it done quickly, it should not have been devastating to her business and did not have an apparent affect on my business.

So what should you consider when deciding if you should trademark your business name? First you should conduct some research to make sure you’re not infringing on someone else’s trademark. You may be forced to stop using it if that’s the case. If you decide to trademark your business name, then you must be prepared to enforce your mark. If you allow others to use the mark, then you can face abandonment and risk losing your own trademark. You should also consider the domain name issue. Do not make the mistake I did and let someone else snatch up a domain name that matches your trademark.

Be sure to visit the U.S. Patent and Trademark office at
http://www.uspto.gov, and then visit my attorney Heidi Pliam’s
trademark website, Trademark Edge, at http://www.trademarkedge.com. And if you’re looking for a good
trademark attorney, be sure to give Heidi a call! Her contact
information is on the website.

Jean Hanson is a Certified Professional Virtual Assistant.
Discover how partnering with a virtual assistant will give you
more time to do the things you love to do! Visit her at
http://www.vaofficesolution.com. Jean is also the author of the
eBook, Virtualize Your Business -
http://www.virtualizeyourbiz.com

The best brands always try to do the right thing, so that their reputations will remain unsullied. But beyond that they grow, evolve and get better with time, while maintaining their special qualities from the past.

We all have a personal brand with social, cultural, intellectual, and personal needs that may not necessarily be addressed in our daily work. Address these needs and you begin to improve your brand. Here is my agenda for building your brand.

• Join and participate in community and professional organizations
  
• Generate media coverage about your brand
  
• Stay in touch, or renew old ties with friends, family and business associates

Let’s examine how each one improves your brand.

Join and participate in professional and community organizations
The best brands grow, evolve and get better with time, while maintaining their special qualities from the past.

Professional and community organizations provide ample opportunity to learn and grow.

They provide professional development opportunities. They allow you to network with peers as well as with people you would not necessarily ever meet in the normal course of your workday.

For instance, I am a member and served on the board of our local International Association of Business Communicators chapter. This allowed me to broaden my contacts in the corporate communications world, as well as form a number of friendships I probably never would have developed. I’m also a member of the North Carolina Citizens For Business and Industry. Here I meet people from all walks of life and all work disciplines. Finally, I am involved with Charlotte Reads, a local non-profit that focuses on literacy issues. This allows me to use my communication experience in support of an issue I feel very strongly about.

But it’s not enough to just join groups: you must participate to benefit fully. As a participant you have the opportunity to stretch, to gain confidence in yourself. Learn to lead by involvement on the board or in a special project.

If you are a communicator by trade, try being treasurer for the group to exercise the other side of your brain, or take on a special project about which you feel strongly.

Generate media coverage about your brand
All that professional and community involvement will certainly lead to opportunities to leverage that involvement into news about the brand called you. And, of course, there will be promotions, new assignments, and awards at work, too. More opportunities to make headlines.

Your achievements are of interest to local print, broadcast, and online media, particularly the business pages. In Charlotte, the Observer has a weekly feature called On The Move spotlighting someone in a new position. The Charlotte Business Journal has a similar feature called Moving Up. If it is a big enough move and your company won’t do it, pay the estimated $150 to place it on BusinessWire or PR Newswire. Consider it an investment in your future. Don’t forget trade publications serving your industry and alumni publications.

Seek out speaking engagements and write guest articles, too. This is yet another way to publicize your brand. And don’t forget to do news releases when you make a speech or write an article. It’s all about merchandising.

To stay top of mind, you might even want to develop your own monthly e-newsletter like Think, the Hoover ink publication. Keep it mostly informational and limit the commercial material.

Stay in touch, or renew old ties with friends, family and business associates
Everyone you know can be a brand ambassador for you, so stay in touch or reach out to those you haven’t talked with for a while.

Yet another reason for having a monthly newsletter that shares your expertise.

The network of contacts you have built over your lifetime will be instrumental if you decide to start your own business, or change jobs.

So, heed this word of advice: always deal fairly with people. One bad experience with your brand can negate 10 positive ones.

Now, get out there and start branding.

 

Harry Hoover is managing principal of Hoover ink PR,

http://www.hoover-ink.com. He has 26 years of experience in crafting and delivering bottom line messages that ensure success for serious businesses like Brent Dees Financial Planning, Duke Energy,

Levolor, North Carolina Tourism, Ty Boyd Executive Learning Systems, VELUX and Verbatim.

Whether it’s your business card, tagline, article title, web site title and description or ad, just the difference of a few words can either pull in prospects and clients or push them away. Getting it right can determine whether your phone is ringing off the hook or you are twiddling your thumbs hoping someone will call.

Just by changing a word or two or combining a couple of phrases, you can increase your response rate dramatically. Book publishers know that a book’s title can make the difference between it becoming a best seller or a loser. Wouldn’t you like your service and products to be best sellers?

In the past if you wanted to be sure you’d found the best name for your business or the right phrases to use in your marketing materials, you needed to hire a marketing research firm to get a reliable answer. Using phone surveys and focus groups, a market research firm can tell you which names turn prospects off and which make people want to buy your services and products.

While marketing research firms may still be the best answer for mid to large businesses, most independent professionals and small business owners, don’t budget tens of thousands of dollars for this type of in-depth analysis. So how do you find out which key words and phrases will attract clients to you?

You can research and test words and phrases to dramatically increase the response to your marketing. Thanks to the development of the internet and a couple of free and almost free online tools you can easily research which words pull in prospects and which push them away. Use the steps outlined below, to refine the words you use in your marketing.

START WITH A FOCUS ON CLIENT’S PROBLEMS

Don’t make the mistake of marketing your services and products by focusing on your name, professional label, your credentials or processes. Your prospects are concerned about their own problems, issues and needs. For example, the phrase “back pain” is searched for on the internet one and a half times as often as “chiropractor”.

If you’re a chiropractor, your marketing materials should focus on the pain that your clients’ experience. Start with words that focus on prospects’ problems. If you can’t think of any, use words that describe the solution to their problems. What problems and solutions are your clients looking for?

USE ATTENTION GETTING WORDS

Everyone knows that certain words like “sex” attract attention. The problem is “sex” won’t attract clients for 99.9% of small businesses. It’s not going to help a lawyer, cleaning service, caterer, etc. Other words that get attention are how to, secrets, and free. The title of this article contains at least two attention-getting words. Can you identify them?

FISH WHERE THE FISH ARE

Certain category phrases exist to describe most types of businesses or tasks. If you are a web designer, the phrase “web design” is one. If you sell pyrotechnics, the more commonly used term is “fireworks”; by a factor of twenty-two. Improve the response to your marketing by using the common phrases people use to search online, the same ones used commonly in association with the services and products you sell.

Overture and Wordtracker provide free online tools to help you find the words and phrases your prospects are interested in. Make a list of all the words and phrases you think people associate with your services whether or not have a web site. Then test each phrase to find out which words attract the most attention.

The easiest tool to test word or phrase popularity is Overture’s at http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/ Type in possibilities from your list and look at the how many times it was used in a search in the last month. Write the number down next to the word or phrase on your list and continue testing until you have a clear winner. Make sure the keywords you use to describe yourself, and the ones you use on your web pages to help the search engines find your site are ones your prospects use, too.

ALMOST FREE MARKET RESEARCH

Once you know the category phrase that best describes your services and products, the next step is to develop your tagline, or the copy you use in your web site description or even yellow page advertising copy. If you are a lawyer you might have a listing in the yellow pages under attorneys, but what should you say to prompt people to call your office? Do you know which of the following phrases is most likely to pull in prospects?

• Free consultation for serious injuries
• Need legal help?
• Find the right attorney
• Maximum cash compensation

Without doing some market research you won’t know which phrase, if any of these, is the most effective. Thanks to www.Google.com/adwords it’s easy to test out your ideas. Depending on the popularity of your key words and how long you run your test, it will cost twenty to fifty dollars or more at Google. You can sign-up, put up as many variations of your ad as you want, and see which ones people respond to. You may be surprised that changing a word or two can increase your response by factors of five or more. Once you see which phrases are working, try combining them to improve your response even more.

Even if you never run an ad, researching which phrases pull in prospects can help your business grow. Use the results on your business card, in your tagline, as the title to your web site or as the title to an article and pull in many more clients and customers.

2003 © In Mind Communications, LLC. All rights reserved.

About The Author

The author, Marketing Coach, Charlie Cook, helps independent professionals and small business owners who are struggling to attract more clients. To get the free marketing guide, ‘7 Steps to Get More Clients and Grow Your Business’ visit www.charliecook.net or write ccook@charliecook.net

Look around today, labels are everywhere. With tighter regulatory rules, better labeling is becoming compulsory. Labels should provide the end user with useful information to them. A great label can also make your company or product stand out. Walk down any isle in a grocery store or pharmacy, and you can see many brands for every product. How does the consumer choose? One way is the packaging. A sharp, professionally designed label can increase the chances that your product will be the one selected. Study after study shows that the packaging can increase the likelihood of selection from 20 to 65% among undecided shoppers.

Do your labels save you time, effort, and money? Do they make your company look good and help you sell more? Do they adhere well, look beautiful, and last as long you need them? Or do they just stick? Discover everything your labels can do for you. You invest a lot in your labels–shouldn’t they do a lot for you?

Nearly every industry uses labels. They perform a broad range of functions, including identification, merchandising, marketing and transferring information. But not all labels are the same, nor will just any label meet your company’s unique needs. Find a label supplier with expert knowledge of label materials, adhesives, protective coatings, printers and more. By understanding your needs and wants, this will lead to a more successful label. Use employees who are specially trained in label design, including the finer elements of selecting the right face stock and adhesive for your stickiest label applications.

If you buy labels, you should know that many factors affect the success of these products. Next time you order labels, be prepared to answer questions about the surface the label will be adhered to (wood, glass, painted), the texture of the surface (rough, cylindrical, flat), the expected usage period (days, months, years), the temperature at application and the method of imprinting (ink jet, ion deposition, laser printer, handwritten). In addition, talk to others in your company to determine if the label will be exposed to any harsh conditions, such as direct sunlight or abrasives.

Why should I buy custom labels?

Stock labels may be adequate for internal usage, such as inventory tracking, but you’ll probably want to order a custom label for any applications that your customers will see. Consider a label, such as a shipping label, an extension of your company’s image and an important advertising vehicle. Incorporate your logo, corporate colors and your company’s Internet address. Labels in custom sizes or with custom die cuts will make vital information stand out. Ask for design ideas (such as custom perfs or bar codes) that will help your operation run more efficiently.

Distinguish Your Company with Unique Labels. If your company is using plain shipping labels, warning and instruction labels, information labels, and price labels, you’re missing out on viable marketing opportunities. Shouldn’t your company have more of a presence than just a name on a UPS label? The use of 4-color product labels, shipping labels and more, featuring your company’s name, logo, slogan and contact information. Personalized labels will improve your company’s image and reach. Once you put thought into the whole process of designing and usage of your labels, the returns spent on this label will certainly outweigh any of the costs. It’s not what you put in that’s important but rather what you get out.

Good luck with your next label!

About the author:

Steven Schneidman
Solutions Ink

www.solutionsink4u.com

Steven Schneidman has taught finance at a Canadian University, worked at the head office of a National Canadian Bank, and owns a successful printing and promotional product company.

Learn to question your label supplier and if they can’t help with your next label project, feel free to email me at steve@solutionsink4u.com or visit my web site for some fresh ideas for your next project at http://www.solutionsink4u.com