I have spent a lot of time reading about churches and how they brand or identify themselves in the public arena – and although for many pastors ‘marketing’ is a dirty word, there is no doubt that your church (or organisations) identity is very important to how the public percieve/see/remember you and in many ways how your members can connect with you too.
But although I do offer my help with logos and identity projects, I am no expert or scholar on this subject – but the people at Church Marketing Sucks (great name!! makes you sit up and listen doesn’t it) have a wealth of experience and their members/friends offer a huge bank of information and resources about logos, branding, identity and marketing for churches and christian organisations. It’s one of my regular and favourite reads – often reminding me with painful clarity that in this little ministry of mine the over-riding goal is to honour God in everything and every way. Anyway… I am therefore going to republish some advice first posted by Mike Buckingham on the Church Marketing Sucks website back in 2006 – this is a great, simple and straightforward outline for beginning to develop your logo / identity.
How to Design a Church Logo
June 15, 2006 by Michael Buckingham
Too often we jump to designing a logo when in fact we should be developing an identity. It may sound like symantecs, but it really isn’t. A logo by itself is simply an appealing image connected to a church name. An identity is a strategy that tells your story through imagery and color. This certainly involves a logo, but must first begin with strategy.
God First
Don’t begin this process without first seeking God. This is a big task and if you don’t have some divine guidance, good luck.
Computer Off
Every identity and logo needs to begin with a pencil in your hand and your computer turned off. Don’t jump into Illustrator until you’ve done your homework and have pages of sketches. If you skip this step, you’re letting the computer design your logo and you’ll end up with a logo without heart.
Describe Your Church
Before we even sketch, take out that paper and pencil and begin to write down words that describes your church, your culture, the people in your community, what you’re great at, why people would want to know you, what people will find when they arrive, etc. This helps to find a foundation to build your identity on. Just because your church’s name is Hills Valley Christian Church does not mean you must have a logo with a hill, a valley and the sun shining over a cross. Instead your logo should be about what you are, it should tell your story.
Sketching Time
Once you’ve written out this list of words that make up your story, now you can begin to isolate the main threads that run through who you are. Now, you can being to sketch with the goal of putting into visual terms these key concepts. Sketch and sketch and sketch. Put the paper down, go take a walk downtown, play catch with your kids, pull yourself away and refresh. Now, go back and sketch some more.
Now Use the Computer
Now take a look at your sketches, highlight those that jump out at you… now you can turn the computer on. As you begin to put your sketches into Illustrator keep a few things in mind…
- Design in black and white. Color is the final piece of the puzzle. Don’t let it confuse your decisions too early in the process.
- This isn’t time for the tagline, that can come later. The logo must stand on its own. If it needs to be explained, it doesn’t work.
- As you progress, look at different size scales of the logo. This will be important in having a universal logo. It will need to work on the side of your building or as a tiny web icon.
Please visit the original article here.
There is also a very detailed article about the complete branding process, which I found really useful and may well help someone to see how ‘big’ the job of designing branding and logos can be. Read it here.
Next Steps
Now you can take your ideas and sketches and mock-ups to a graphic designer or artist and ask them to to start developing that in electronic/digital form that can be manipulated and edited until you come up with an image (or images) that will not only suit you, but suit the various media and situations that your logo will be used in. If you don’t have a graphics designer to work on your logo – or your budget is too tight to go to a professional – please [button link="http://small-beginnings.net/contact/" color="black"] contact me today![/button]
