The Briefing

A briefing is a meeting of the logo designer and the client. First of all, a prepared list of questions is discussed. These questions are dealt with in the below paragraphs.

When these questions are answered and noted down by the designer, they can start talking about the desired logo itself.

• The Basic position must be defined.

  What should be the most important statement of the logo?

  What must be implemented unconditionally?

These things should be precisely defined, so you won't work in the wrong direction later on. Naturally you can also present your own ideas, but these things should by all means be fully discussed first.

Questions that should definitely be asked in a briefing:

• Company name

  Services, Focus of these services

  Advantages over competing companies

  Size and structure of the company

  Current image of the company / desired image of the company

  Price range of the products / services

  Market share, in comparison to the competitors

  Naming of the competitors (to analyze their logos and strageties)

  Future market developments

  Future company developments (fusion, expansion of services, ...)

  Current and planned advertising materials

  Definition of the target group

  Branch colours

  Company colours, corporate font (if available)

  What terms or brands may not be used (because they're already used or trademarked)

This listing is arbitrarily expandable. The more information the designer gets, the closer the logo will be to the clients option.

Naturally, the above questions will not always be precisely answerable, but a short overview of the market situation is better than no information on the market situation at all.