Are you one of those people who feel that without a proper logo, you don’t have a real nonprofit? In a sense, this attitude is true, but it is not the logo that makes a nonprofit or a business. Rather, it is the unique brand of who you are and what you and your nonprofit offer. 

You are not a real nonprofit unless you know what makes you different than every other competing brand out there. It is your internal brand that defines you; only once you have determined that can you create your logo as the graphical presentation of that brand… but not before. Therefore, in order to create a proper logo, we recommend the following four-step process:

1. Know Who You Are
Determine what your nonprofit is about and what makes it different from the competition.

2. Choose a “Look”
Go and search for images of logos that you like, that are relevant to your industry. Pick out not only full imagery, but aspects of various logos that you like such as colors, vector images and font styles that you would potentially integrate. Google Images is a great tool to use for this step. 

3. Get Started!
Keep in mind that you are aiming to be “one-of-and-a-little-different.” You want to stand out from the crowd, but you still want to look like you are part of the crowd. If you are an insurance agency or a new Jewish institution, you don’t want to look like a day care center and vice versa. You want your logo to look like it is part of your industry, but also to be unique within that industry. 

4. Be Consistent
Now take a good look at your logo and make sure that it reflects your internal brand. It may help to get an outsider’s opinion here as once you are “in it,” you will have a hard time seeing your logo as an outsider yourself. 

The above process is necessary whether you are just getting started or you are doing a re-branding for your nonprofit. Overall, it is crucial that you keep in mind that it’s insides first, then outsides, for that lasting brand impression. 

Good luck!

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Estie Rand is an internationally acclaimed lecturer and business consultant specializing in helping small business owners and nonprofits bring in more money with less headache. She can be reached at estie@strandconsulting.net for all your business and nonprofit related questions in areas of marketing, profitability, growth strategies and more.

 

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