Why Your Logo Should Be Square

Square saves a lot of aggravation

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During its 30 year existence my firm had quite a few logos. Many were BCE (Back in Caveman Era) and I had to photograph my business card collection to show you those. As you can see many of the versions were driven by a change in the name of the firm. These changes were mostly perfunctory. BCE a logo didn't have the visibility that it does now. Most people didn't see it until you handed them a business card, or sent them something in the mail. Email was ACE (After Caveman Era) so you didn't send out much promotional mail after a while because you eventually realized the time and cost that you were expending was delivering zero results. It turns out that people don't hire an architect because they get a piece of mail.

So when BCE ended on April Fool's Day in 1996, we got busy. Architects like the golden section, so we didn't have to think about shape. My favorite color is green so that was simple. All those names fit better on a vertical rectangle - WOW, that was easy!

Once ACE got rolling, websites added a new wrinkle or two. Nothing that was unmanageable. Social Media on the other hand ...

It became obvious pretty quick that Social Media did not like vertical - at all. Tumblr, nope. LinkedIn, nope. Twitter, nope. Facebook, nope. Google+, nope. Even non-Social Media sites like Basecamp  are not very permissive about shape when you personalize. In fact square is the clear winner / preference. Social Media definitely is fond of anything square or round - or square. Maybe that is because the majority of the big boys use a square or something very square-like. This graphic demonstrates that point; and, as a bonus, gives you a lesson in color selection for your new logo project. 

Graphic credit: Thelogocompany

Even a favicon, that little doohickey to the left of the URL is a square. 16 pixels by 16 pixels is the specification. We never did catch on. There was always a new place cropping up to add our logo. We should have stopped experimenting when we got to the first one in the second row up above.

Another point worth making is that nobody cares about your logo so your time can safely be spent elsewhere. You won’t win more work (or lose work) because of your logo. Just look at the logos of the clients you aspire to work for; then create a logo that ‘fits in’ with those, but does not imitate them. Only change your logo when forced, and then only the minimum. You have better things to do with your time and resources.

You might have an ironclad reason for going off-formula; but, barring that, go with a square logo and save yourself a lot of aggravation.