Beyond branding and marketing materials, one of the most crucial aspects a brand should have is a good logo. A logo is more than just an image. It represents your brand, its image and even your values. Oftentimes, a good logo design might even help your brand attract the right audience. When consumers resonate with a brand’s logo, they tend to sort of gravitate towards it more than others. Therefore, it effectively increases brand differentiation by ensuring that consumers are favouring your brand over others.
However, what confuses brands sometimes is whether they should save their budget and opt for a logo created from free logo design tools or invest in getting a branding agency to create their logo design [some are also confused between the concept of branding and logo design]. The not-so-helpful answer is that they both have pros and cons. Nonetheless, knowing these pros and cons may help you decide which is the better option for your brand going forward. Before we get into that, allow us to explain, in detail, why logos are important for a brand.
Importance of Logos in Branding
As we’ve mentioned, a logo is more than just an image or icon. While being the main key visual of your visual identity, it’s the face of your brand and often what consumers spot first when they see your brand. Therefore, it’s crucial for your logo to be memorable while representing what your brand does along with its values. This sounds so complex but it’s quite simple.
Source: Logowik
Let’s take the iconic Nike’s swoosh logo as an example. It’s one of the most famous logos out there. Their logo depicts motion, speed and success. Plus, since it looks like a checkmark, it also gives a positive outlook. This logo resonates with their brand, what they do as well as their target audience. You can find out more about Nike’s and other brand’s logos in our blog about how a logo is not a brand. Without any further ado, let’s get into the pros and cons of free logo design tools and hiring a branding agency.
Pros and Cons of Free Logo Design Tools
Pros:
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Cost-Efficient
Most logo design tools come free or at a minimal cost. That being said, it’s optimal and highly accessible for businesses that want a quick, easy and cost-efficient option.
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Ready Templates
Apps like Canva usually have pre-designed templates that you can readily add on to. Therefore, this simplifies the design process.
Source: Canva
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Quick Design Process
Since there are apps that have templates or will generate random logos for your business, this quickens the design process, giving you a logo within a short period of time.
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Creativity & Control
Some of the free logo design tools or apps give you the ability to edit or add-on to the logo before finalising the design. This gives you some control over the design to let it fit your brand and your target audience.
Cons:
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Limited Customization
Although there are some apps that allow you to customise your desired logo, the customization is restricted. Which basically means there’s limited aspects of the logo design you can change, which may or may not result in a generic-looking logo.
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Lack of Originality
Logo design tools and apps have a lot of similarities in their templates or randomly generated designs. Overall, this could affect the originality of your logo, which leads to the next con:
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Lack of Copyright Ownership
When your logo is generic or very common, it can be difficult in obtaining full copyright ownership over it. Thus, this would also limit your rights to use it as freely as you wanted.
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Weak Branding Impact
As mentioned, a logo should be unique to your brand while standing out among others. Logos created with free design tools can result in a logo that diminishes your branding impact since it wouldn’t necessarily represent your business well.
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Lack of Professional Branding Knowledge
While creating a logo with free design tools can be quick and simple, the outcome may not have all the essentials of an effective and memorable logo due to the absence of professional branding input.
Pros and Cons of Hiring a Branding Agency
Pros:
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Detailed Design Process
A branding agency often takes the brand’s identity and values into account, ensuring a detailed design ideation and execution to perfectly suit the brand.
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Professional Expertise & Advice
Branding agencies are equipped with branding and design experts that incorporate invaluable insights throughout the design process, resulting in a logo that strengthens the brand.
Take this brand we worked on, Maha Berjaya for example. We executed a full rebranding for them and designed a logo that resonated with their brand while reflecting their values to their target audience. This logo provides a fresh new look for their brand to stay relevant and stand out in the market.
Source: CR8 Consultancy
To better understand what goes into the design process, you could visit these blogs about Shape Psychology and Colour Psychology in branding and logo design.
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Extensive Customization & Creativity
Logos designed within a branding agency are often designed with software that allows you to make even the slightest change to your logo. The alterations you can make are almost limitless, within reason of course.
For instance, this new and improved logo for CK Bidan portrays the brand image as a compassionate and loving brand that provides holistic women healthcare services.
Source: CR8 Consultancy
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Strong and Long-Lasting Brand Identity
Since professional branding insights and design expertise are incorporated into the logo, it stands a better chance at representing a brand well while resonating with a certain target audience. This contributes to the integrity of your brand identity, making it timeless.
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Ownership of Copyright
Logos designed by a branding agency are often designed from scratch to fit your brand. Therefore, you would have full ownership over its use and distribution.
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More Deliverable Formats
Branding agencies also often include various formats or applications in order to enhance versatility across multiple marketing materials and platforms.
Cons:
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Higher Cost
As mentioned earlier, the design process may be more intricate, making it less accessible. This could pose a challenge for smaller businesses with a limited budget.
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Time-Consuming Process
Due to the intricacy of it all, the process includes consultations, revisions, and an overall longer timeline compared to using logo design tools or apps.
Which One Should You Choose?
The answer is simple and it depends on your brand and its needs and resources. If you’re a brand who is seeking a quick and cost-effective solution without deeper branding needs, then a free logo design tool would be optimal. However, if you’re looking for a longer-lasting impact on your audience while moving towards a bigger future, then hiring a branding agency would be the way to go. Hiring a branding agency could ensure a stronger brand for a stronger future.
You can check out our guide to choosing a branding agency for more tips!
Conclusion
Everything boils down to a few factors you have to consider in making this decision. That includes the business’s budget, time and priorities. There are no good or bad options. Both hiring a branding agency and utilising logo design tools have their own pros and cons that only the business themselves can weigh out and decide on. Nonetheless, you can always reach out to us and schedule a 1-hour free consultation for your needs! Our experts at CR8 Consultancy are always ready to assist in your branding needs and more.
Want to design a good memorable logo? Schedule a FREE 1-hour consultation with us today!
