Logo and brand identity: where to start with your brand

Many businesses come to us saying “we need a nice logo”. But customers don’t recognise you by your logo alone: they see your colours, how your Instagram posts look, your business card, your website and your shop sign. When all of that fits together, a brand sticks in the mind. That is what a brand identity is.

What does a brand identity include?

• Logo — the main version and simplified ones: a mark for small sizes, versions for light and dark backgrounds.
• Colours — one or two primary colours and a few supporting ones, with exact codes.
• Typefaces — for headings and body text, fully supporting Uzbek, Russian and English characters.
• Graphic elements — patterns, icons, photo style.
• Brand book — a guide to how all of this should be used.

What to prepare for your designer

A good result starts with a good brief. Write down answers to these questions in advance:

1. What does your company do, and how is it different from competitors?
2. Who are your customers: age, income, what do they value?
3. What impression should the brand give: reliable, modern, premium, affordable?
4. Which brands’ styles do you like, and which don’t you — and why?
5. Where will the logo be used: signage, packaging, clothing, app icon, Instagram avatar?

Signs of a good logo

• Simple — memorable at a glance, and you could sketch it by hand.
• Readable at small sizes — even as a Telegram avatar or a browser icon.
• Works in one colour — on stamps, engraving, black-and-white print.
• Not tied to trends — it won’t look dated in a couple of years.

Common mistakes

• Using a template from the internet. It’s cheap, but another company may have the same logo, and you can’t register it as a trademark.
• Trying to please everyone. The test isn’t what family and friends think — it’s whether it fits your customers.
• “Logo now, the rest later.” Every designer then styles posts and banners their own way, and the brand looks scattered.
• Not getting the source files. At the end, make sure you receive vector files (SVG, AI, PDF) and the brand book.

When is it time to refresh your brand?

If your company has grown and works with new kinds of customers, or the logo looks dated or is used inconsistently, it’s time to think about a rebrand. That doesn’t always mean starting from scratch: often it’s enough to simplify the existing mark and put the rules in order.

Planning to create or refresh your brand? See our design and branding service or message us.

Gulmurod TolipovFounder, Tolipov studio

Building websites and apps for 5 years. 75+ projects, 40+ clients.