Freelance From Jason

Why is gifting subscriptions so hard?

2023-11-22T00:00:00Z

Why is gifting subscriptions so hard?

As a freelancer, some years are better than others. The last two years have been difficult for me financially, so I'm always thinking of ways to better weather the storm.

I had this idea to ask my family to gift me subscriptions this Christmas for the online tools I use most. A month of Webflow, a year of micro.blog, or Notion would be a cherished gift because it's one less expense to worry about. Even a few months of Apple Music would ease some of my anxieties. Music is good for the soul or, as Dead Prez would say, “One thing about music, when it hit you feel no pain.” Gifting subscriptions, at least for me right now, are the type of rare gifts worth more than their retail values. And, yeah, asking for specific gifts can feel a bit awkward, but I don't need socks this year. Throw me a month of Raindrop.io, dear sibling.

But to my surprise, the act of gifting subscriptions doesn't really exist for most software as a service (SaaS). You can buy an Apple Music gift card, but that's mostly where it ends. Why?

I'm old and cynical enough to know that new ideas are rare. If none of these outfits are offering gifted subscriptions, there's probably a reason for it— some obscure financial metric that shareholders don't like. Or maybe it's the result of shortsighted executives. Who knows.

Subscriptions are out of control, I know. #

I'll be the first to gripe about the current state of software, and how everything is a damned subscription. As a result, customers get shafted and left with dark pattern practices that keep us locked in. To justify the monthly expense, the software then becomes bloated and unfocused over time. I get why some services use a subscription model (i.e., micro.blog), but mostly it's bullshit. This is the world we live in, nonetheless, and subscriptions add up fast, especially for digital freelancers.

Gift URLs #

Wouldn't it be great if these companies had a "gift link" users could share or publish to their personal websites?

For example, gift.micro.blog/fromjason sends you to a gift page with 1, 3, 6, or 12-month subscription options to gift your favorite micro-blogger.

Note: that link, of course, does not work. Here's my actual microblog account URL: micro.blog/fromjason.

In such a world, I would create a dedicated page on From Jason with just a list of gift links for all the software I use. Users like me get longer-term stability; SaaS companies get free advertising and increased revenue (I think?). These companies are always begging us to pay for annual subscriptions, so why not offer the ability to gift it to someone?

Take it a step further, SaaS gift links could show how far in advance a particular user is paid up. Gift givers could then choose which subscription to gift based on a person's needs.

Why doesn't this exist? Or does it and I wasted 500 words? Or is this a horrible idea for reasons not obvious to me? Let me know your thoughts. Reply to this post on my Mastodon post or via electronic mail.

On iA Presenter and my mission to preserve my digital assets

2023-11-15T00:00:00Z

On iA Presenter and my mission to preserve my digital assets

So certain that the world didn't need another presentation app, I ignored iA's new offering for months. Not even through a week of daily visits to ia.net did I so much as peek at its product page. I thought that, at best, my corporate slideshow days were over, and Presenter was for some other poor schmuck in a cubical.

What a terrible mistake. It turns out, Presenter has helped me in my mission to standardize my digital assets (more on that in a bit).

Indeed, I'm not about that corporate life anymore. For almost ten years now, I've been a freelance designer, copywriter, and web developer. I don't see the inside of many conference rooms these days, and I won't wear a single collar shirt all week if I can help it.

But just because I'm a freelancer in stretch chinos doesn't mean I've lost the need to convey ideas. In fact, I've been questioning, and subsequently retooling, how I communicate with clients for all aspects of my work.

For a branding project, I once wrote a slide deck titled What makes a good logo. I included some Saul Bass designs, a few Vignelli quotes, and my client loved it (or, at the very least, seemed engaged). The presentation set the project's tone, and we landed on a great logo. The experience taught me that gentle client education at the top of a project can go a long way. Now, when I close a branding deal, I whip out my logo slides for the kick-off meeting.

I've toyed with boilerplates for all my onboarding and project discovery processes. I envision a collection of bite-sized messaging I can mix & match and reuse for client presentations, emails, PDFs, and even landing pages. This idea plays into my asset standardization project, but progress could be faster.

I couldn't figure out how to organize everything. Do I make a bunch of PowerPoints like my logo deck, effectively trapping my copy into a single format? Do I write it out and store the collection in a Notion database? I'd then have to copy/paste into presentations as needed. None of these options appealed to me.

And then this morning, an hour before a client meeting, I decided I needed a slideshow.

While waiting for PowerPoint to fire up, I remembered Presenter. All that time spent on iA's website reading documentation for Writer (their flagship app I adore), I ignored Presenter. But, I knew it was there. And I knew (somehow) that it made slides dynamically. I may have peeked at the product page after all.

I filled out a form for the free trial, and a few minutes later, I was writing my presentation— one I didn't need ten minutes ago and had 50 minutes to write, source images for, style, and proofread. Did I mention I was sitting on the sidewalk outside a hospital, desperately searching for an internet signal? I booked my meeting the same morning I was to drive my mom to the doctor. Traffic diminished any hope of arriving back home in time.

Under pressure.

Here's the thing. I was done in thirty minutes. The remaining time I spent driving to a stronger WiFi signal. I even had time to grab a cold brew. Thanks, Corporate Coffee Shop™.

Like iA Writer, Presenter lets you focus on the writing. Its design discourages fiddling with formatting for half an hour before you jot down a sentence. I spent ninety-eight percent of my time organizing my thoughts and shaping my message and two percent clumsily navigating a foreign UI. I spent zero percent on presentation layout and formatting. That part was done automatically and looked great.

My meeting via video conference went well, and I suspect it benefited from a visually structured presentation. And because I was able to spend all my time on my message, my clients were able to grasp some technical concepts that I struggled to communicate previously.

I did have one hiccup, though. While on my Teams meeting, I couldn't figure out how to share the full-screen slideshow and then switch to my notes without my client's screen blacking out. (Presenter smartly separates the slideshow from your notes into different windows.)

After the call, when I wasn't frantically writing and had time to poke around, I read the documentation and watched some product videos. I learned that my screen-sharing scenario is a significant selling point for Presenter. I suspect my issue was either user error or a salty Microsoft, making things harder than it needed to be.

What I loved, and couldn't believe I didn't realize before, was that Presenter builds presentations from Markdown text. And, of course it does! Presenter's sibling is the original “distraction-free” writing app I just so happen to use daily- iA Writer.

Remember my logo presentation? What I didn't mention earlier was that I lost my accompanying notes after presenting the first time. I had worded my speech just as I wanted and could never get it back in my rewrites.

This experience is just one of many times I felt my writing was trapped and unorganized. Over the last six months, I've made it my mission to better preserve and catalog my digital assets. I've focused on methods to improve reusability and portability for the things I write.

The answer, of course, starts with non-proprietary archival formats like .txt and .md.

My mission (hyper-fixation?) has led me to a renewed appreciation for iA Writer (I switched to Ulysses for a few years and recently came back). My mission resulted in my designing this very blog, which preserves my writing in .md files in a single folder. And now, my mission has led me to Presenter. Not just for what the app can do but what it represents.

The tools we use to create should bend to our creations, not the other way around. Our creations (writing, photos, graphics, code, etc.) should exist independently, free to move around, reshape, and repurpose. If an app can't respect that, I don't want it.

Now, my collection of evergreen messages seems possible to create.

It's all so simple— write it in Markdown, present it in Presenter, email it in Rich Text, and then store it in text files. I can render it in HTML for my portfolio site (that I'll never finish building) to boot!

Now, if I can only get well-meaning clients to stop sending website copy in Word docs. One mission at a time.

From Jason 2.0 is an 11ty-powered digital garden with multiple plots

2023-11-06T00:00:00Z

From Jason 2.0 is an 11ty-powered digital garden with multiple plots

From Jason 2.0 builds on the concept of 1.0 where I created sub-sections ("subs") that behave like independent blogs. These subs now have a new name— plots.

I made From Jason as a digital garden. It's a space where I can grow a diverse range of ideas and subjects with my writing, outside the limitations of traditional blogging. (That's the goal, anyway.) What better way to cultivate away from garden variety blogs, than to introduce my digital garden to a few plots?

Before I get into the weeds (I can go all day with the garden metaphors), I should warn you— I'm still learning 11ty, and to a greater extent, JavaScript. Version 2 is structured a bit neater than version 1, but posting is mostly still a manual process, and my code isn't near as DRY as I know it could be.

In short, syntax is my achilles heel, but I'm improving. Feel free to ask me technical questions about this project, but know I'm still learning and am in no way an expert in 11ty. "Me still baby," as my friend Rob would say.

That out the way, lets talk "plots."

About Plots #

Each plot behaves as a distinct blog and lives in the "p" directory. (Think Reddit and subreddits.) For example, my notebook plot (p/notebook) has its own homepage with a filtered view of posts and a filtered archive page named "all" (p/notebook/all).

Posts in my notebook are identified in the front matter with a "sub" key and a value that matches the plot's name (i.e "sub: notebook") Posts that belong to a plot are unofficially called "sub plots", hardy-har-har.

In addition to posts, plots can contain "series" sections, which are a group of serialized posts with a special table of contents page. For example, my freelance plot (p/freelance) has a series called "How to commission a logo design," which lives at p/freelance/s/how-to.... My hope was to implement a maintenance-free series feature, like described in this wonderful post by Shiv J.M. but, alas, my eleventy skills still need sharpening. For now, setting up a series is a relatively painless process, but still very much manual and requires multiple steps.

Finally, you can also subscribe to a plot's RSS feed without subscribing to other plots. Or, you can subscribe to From Jason and get everything! What you subscribe to depends on the url you input into your reeder.

Everything is then tied together on the homepage, where I list posts from all plots.

Technical note: all posts, regardless of plot, live in the /posts input directory. I use directory data files (i.e. posts.11ty.js) with the permalinks key to redirect where the post lives in my output folder. This structure was important to me as I wanted to maintain one folder for all my writings in a markdown format. 11ty for the win.

Other sections in From Jason #

Separate from plots, From Jason has a "me" and a "resources" section.

The me index page (/me/) contains my h-card and rel=me markup. Additional pages in me include my bio page, colophon, and a "now" page that I 100% stole from Maggie Appleton's blog.

The resources section is experimental (hell, all of this shit is experimental) and contains things like my Lorem Ipsum tool.

Why structure my blog this way? #

On my search for a better blogging experience, I came across Write Freely. Sick of being boxed into algorithm-driven niches and platform silos, I was drawn to its "distraction-free" consumer offering Write.as.

There, I experimented with writing in separate blogs that all lived on the same domain. I immediately love it, even if I wasn't completely sure what "it" was. I knew I disliked niche-based blogging, corporate platforms owned by petulant billionaires, and SEO-crazed keyword optimization. I knew I liked writing about various topics and publishing to something that felt like mine.

My previous blogs were always based on a specific niche, usually the subject I was most interested in at the time. After a year, or even as little as a few months, I got tired of the forced-narrowed writing and started posting articles outside of my niche. This behavior, I assume, was jarring to my readers. Posting about contentious political topics in a travel blog isn't going to do well. So, I eventually would pivot the blog to the new subject of interest, or abandon the blog altogether and start over.

After a month or so on Write.as, I found this wonder blog post titled Communal Bonfires on the Read.as feed. In it, was the first time I heard the term "digital garden." From there, I went down a rabbit hole that I have yet to crawl out of. I learned about the world of digital gardens, the indie web, static site generators and a hundred other concepts I now have bookmarked and reference often. This desire I had, fuzzy and undefined, suddenly had a blueprint. I wanted From Jason to be a fully custom digital garden that participated in the indie web. From Jason 1.0 got me there, and 2.0 pushes the boundaries just a bit.

From Jason gives me the freedom to hop around my topics of interest without "cross contaminating," for a lack of better phrase. The plots concept isn't an attempt to replace tag categorization, but rather an expression of my multiple online personalities. Plots represent the different sides of me that aren't always omnipresent, but exist nonetheless. I don't foresee creating dozens of plots, but there are a couple more I have in mind. I see myself creating a political plot and possibly a design plot in the future.

And then there's my notebook.

My notebook is my catch-all. It's where I can write about anything, including my "micro obsessions"— little things I'm passionate about that don't warrant a full plot. My notebook is where my typos and oddly structured sentences live. It's where I can published a still-evolving opinion or a seed of an idea. My notebook relieves me of perfection. I can't remember exactly which blog I borrowed the notebook idea from, but it was almost certainly one listed on my colophon.

Conclusion #

I'm excited about the possibilities From Jason 2.0 introduces to my personal writing. Again, the code isn't exactly perfect, but I think I moved a step forward. I'm happy to have shared it with you, and will gladly answer any questions to the best of my ability. I'll likely write up something more technical in my colophon in the coming weeks.

I made a Lorem Ipsum page

2023-11-02T00:00:00Z

I made a Lorem Ipsum page

Go to: Lorem Ipsum with copy button

I made a Lorem Ipsum (Lipsum if you're nasty) because the site I use for my website dummy text has gone mad with advertisements. I suspect it's the same site we all use.

I'm cool with ads. Get paid for your work! But when the ads have user-hostile behavior, I'm out. The website I'm speaking of now jumps the page down when you try to copy the text. It does this to show an ad. Booooo.

Anyway, the new Lorem Ipsum page has a copy button next to each passage. I also designed the passage for specific typesetting: small paragraphs, a few titles, and longer paragraphs. It's a version 1 attempt for sure, but I find it better than the alternative. It's what I'll be using for all my Lorem Ipsum needs.

I used generative AI to populate the text #

I gave Chat GPT 4 a prompt to generate the dummy text. I felt better using AI than copying directly from another website.

Chat GPT spat out the Lorem Ipsum and also included a translation. Is it real Latin? Who knows. Chat GPT likes to talk out its ass sometimes. My understanding is that standard Lorum Ipsum is not real Latin. It just looks like it.

Results from Chat GPT 4 #

Link to full chat: Lorem Ipsum 2.0 Renewed

Here's an excerpt with the accompanying translation:

"In perenni questu formae perfectae, ‘Mysterium Artis’ se expandit ultra marginem, fontes et spatia inter verba subtiliter moderans. Hic, in labyrintho pulchritudinis typographicae, designatores quaerunt harmoniam absconditam, elementa visiva inter se nectentes in chorea silentii. Ars typographica est tamquam flumen, cuius undae sunt ligaturae et capita, motus et pausas textuales creantes. ‘Lorem Ipsum 2.0’ ambulat per hanc viam mediam, inter lucem et umbram, ubi forma tantum non est figura, sed nuntius internus, sermo sine sonitu, qui mentes movet et oculos delectat. Ad hunc finem, structurae novae, simul cum antiqua arte manu scriptorum, sinunt legentes etiam inanis verbi profundum gustare, ut verum artis essentiam capiant."

(Translation: In the eternal quest for the perfect form, 'The Mystery of Art' extends beyond the margin, subtly moderating fonts and the spaces between words. Here, in the labyrinth of typographical beauty, designers seek the hidden harmony, connecting visual elements among themselves in a dance of silence. The art of typography is like a river, whose waves are ligatures and headings, creating movements and textual pauses. 'Lorem Ipsum 2.0' walks this middle path, between light and shadow, where form is not just a figure, but an internal message, a speech without sound, which moves minds and delights eyes. To this end, new structures, together with the ancient art of handwriting, allow even the depth of an empty word to be savored, capturing the true essence of art.)

...okay.

Anyway, feel free to use my Lorem Ipsum page.

Patreon's new logo design is good actually

2023-10-09T00:00:00Z

Patreon's new logo design is good actually

From my post in r/logodesign

Patreon is the latest brand to get dragged by the internet for its new logo design. At the risk of catching a few strays, I'm here to defend it, just a bit, especially in the context of this sub.

Is the logo marking basically just a blob? Yes. Is the accompanying philosophy maybe a little pretentious and wacky? For sure. It reminds me of Pepsi's logo rebrand doc

But the Patreon logo is fundamentally a good design, in my opinion (which I try my best to form using guidance from great logo designers). Here's why:

It's identifiable, scalable, and highly adaptable.

Identifiable: The marking is as simple and solid as possible without feeling ambiguous. We might see a kidney bean now, but that will pass. Over the years, the marking will be unmistakably "Patreon." Same with the custom(?) lettermark. It complements the marking but is distinct enough to stand on its own.

I see so many designs here that first aim to be clever, adding unnecessary ornamentation at the expense of recall ability.

Scaleable: When I think of scaleability, I think of the Twitter logo. You can tell that the designers worked hardon keeping its shape when small. Patreon's marking, lettermark, and combination mark are identifiable at any size. The marking will even look good as a favicon (32x32). How many logos can claim that?

Adaptable: Patreon's brand guide covers multiple use cases for its logo. All work well. Adaptability is primarily dependent on the first two points above. For example, the ability to use the logo as a marking, icon, lettermark, and combo mark without losing its identity means it'll adapt to any medium, from an app icon to a billboard.

The logo also looks good monochromatic. I don't know what they're doing with the animated blob thing, but it doesn't lose any detail as a solid color. That's important for formats that restrict the use of color, or when the logo isn't the focal point of the marketing message.

Conclusion #

Patreon's logo is just very different from the geometric outline shapes we're used to. It's solid and organic. It's anti-brutalist and anti-Scandinavian (design style, not the people.) Maybe it's the start of a whole new design era. Who knows. Organic shapes and ornamentation are already popping up on website designs.

None of this is to say that personal taste doesn't account for anything. A logo can be fundamentally "correct" and still look ugly. Maybe that's the case with Patreon. But personally, if I'm aiming for anything in a design, it's the three things mentioned above. These are targets too important to miss.

Some thoughts on naming your business

2023-10-04T00:00:00Z

Some thoughts on naming your business

A common theme I've noticed when freelancers name their business is the name is too long--way, way, way too long.

People want a name that describes what business they're in. I get it. I make websites and logos. My business's name is Pixel Riot.

People also want an available website domain for their business name. Also, reasonable.

The problem is when the business name gets so long, it hurts the logo's composition and makes it difficult to fit anywhere. The same goes for a long website address.

Shorter is better.

Your business name doesn't have to be so short that it falls into abstract territory, like a computer company named after a fruit. But it also shouldn't work so hard at describing your business that the name reads like a whole sentence.

Entity name vs. DBA #

Perhaps you're worried that your chosen name might be unavailable and the federal government will hunt you down in the middle of the night if you try registering it. And honestly, maybe they will. I'm not a lawyer, and this is not legal advice. Check your state laws.

But you should know there's a difference between the name on your logo and your checks.

Your entity name is how the state recognizes your business. You'll use your entity name to open a bank account, and it's what you'll see on your first check from a client.

Your Doing Business As or DBA goes on your marketing materials like your website, business card, and logo.

As far as I'm aware (again, check your state's laws), your entity name and DBA can be different.

For example, my company's legal name is Pixel Riot Marketing Agency Augusta, LLC*. My company's DBA is simply Pixel Riot. I submitted a super long entity name to the state to reduce my chance of choosing an unavailable name, and the state subsequently rejecting my LLC application.

There are websites where you can check if your name is already in use. Here's one.

Conclusion #

In short— descriptive name good, long name not so good. Do your best to find a happy medium. Or, go bold with it and name your business Pomegranate.

In a future post, we'll explore the various logo types. I'll try to remember to include a section with special design considerations for a long-ass business name. All of which you can avoid if you choose a short DBA.

Helpful resources: #

*I changed up my legal name for this post because it felt weird to post that information publicly.

Write the worst brand identity anyone has ever written

2023-10-03T00:00:00Z

Write the worst brand identity anyone has ever written

Take it from the king of shitty first drafts— no one ever has to know.

Our previous series post identified three objectives for your logo design project. You can read that post first for more context if you're just joining us.

Today, we'll discuss how to identify some key aspects of your business's "brand identity" so you can offer some guidance to your logo designer.

Your brand's identity before the logo design

Listen, you really should write up some thoughts on your brand's identity and purpose. It'll save you time, stress, and maybe even some cash. At a minimum, you'll need to share what your business does, what it sells, and a couple matters of tone and vibe to your logo designer (and everyone else for the rest of your life).

I know, I know. Sitting down to a blank computer screen, expecting to make a wholly remarkable brand out of thin air, is not what dreams are made of. I'll let you off the hook a bit and tell you that you won't get it right the first time. Hell, you probably won't get it right the fifth time. I sure didn't. But you have to start somewhere, sometime. How about right here and now with something small?

Let's take 30 minutes and get that first drivel out of the way. You'll likely learn something about your business you didn't know before. And when your designer asks you their discovery questions, you won't have to start with a blank screen.

I took the liberty of writing out some fun prompts that'll help you gain insight into your business without dying of boredom.

Answer the following questions as sloppily and long-winded as you can make it:

The most annoying family member just cornered you at a holiday dinner and asked, "So, what does your company do?" How do you respond truthfully without encouraging follow-up questions?

The New York Transit Authority called. You just won a free advertisement on the E train. How serious is your ad's tone on a scale from Vitamin Water to the CDC?

Follow up: Which typeface do you use? Times New Roman, Helvetica, or something fun like Lobster?

Side note: don't use lobster font for your logo. This is just an exercise, you weirdo.

You're setting your business up on a blind date (stay with me). What companies do you think your business would be into?

Now you need to buy your business an outfit for its date. Would you shop in the men's or women's department? Or something more androgynous?

Oprah called. She will buy one of every service or product you offer on grand opening day. Write out a list for her.

Write some thoughts down. Set it aside. Come back with fresh eyes and start a new draft.

Conclusion #

This article was initially going to outline a few core concepts that will meet the three objectives from the previous post. A thousand words in, I realized that the entire series is about meeting those three objectives. Isolating a few concepts into a single article became increasingly difficult. I kept adding sections until I was dipping into future posts I've outlined. So, I backed up a bit and limited this post to a single concept— communication.

Conceptually, communicating clearly to your stakeholders is the best way to meet any objective. In the matter of logo design, that would be to your designer. Most experienced graphic designers will ask a client some discovery questions. These questions are designed to help them understand your needs, wants, and sensibilities toward design.

The longer you have to mull over the answers, the better you will be at communicating your vision.

Later in the series, we'll discuss the various logo "types" and why you can choose any one so long as it's the one I recommend.

Three objectives for your logo design

2023-10-02T00:00:00Z

Three objectives for your logo design

You're starting a new freelance business. You're excited. You're motivated. You're — oh no. You need a logo! Where do you start?

Start here.

This article will be part of a series called How to Commission a Logo Design: a Guide for Non-Designers (working title).

Unless you're starting a graphic design business, you probably have little experience with project managing a new logo. This series aims to show you how to do that using straightforward logo design principles, so you end up with a logo that meets your needs.

Today, we're identifying your objectives, or goals, for your new freelance logo. There are only three of them.

“Fight against the ugliness” — Lella & Mossimo Vignelli

Your three logo design objectives: #

Your logo fits neatly in a social media profile photo.
Your logo's design holds up on a black and white invoice.
Your logo can fit on a horizontal business card above a tagline.

That's it? That's it.

Should your logo look cool? Sure. Should it pop? Fine. But those metrics are hard to measure. This is “Three Objectives…” not “Three Subjectives…”

Also, don't get too caught up in whether or not you'll have a social media account or black-and-white invoices. These objectives are simply measures that are indicative of good design.

Let's take a closer look at the objectives: #

If your logo fits neatly on a social media profile photo, that means it looks good and is identifiable on a small scale. If it looks good small, that means your logo can adapt to different mediums.

This is important because your logo will appear in many places with varying sizes, from mobile websites to billboards (if we're lucky).

“Logos survive because they can adapt to countless formats.” — Sagi Haviv

If your logo retains its design on a black-and-white invoice, that means it can be used monochromatically. If your logo can be presented in just black or just white, it can identify your business in different mediums and contexts.

This is important because full color may not always be preferable or even an option. You need a design you can present in one color when necessary.

“Simplicity, carried to an extreme, becomes elegance.” — Jon Franklin

If your logo can fit on a traditional business card above a tagline, that means a couple of things:

First, it means your logo is also horizontal, or you have a horizontal version of your logo (more on this tomorrow). If you have a horizontal logo (as opposed to stacked), that means your logo is easy to incorporate in various design grids.

This is important because often, marketing materials designate a space for your logo in a row, not a column. Think website navigation, flyer footers, and business cards.

Second, it means your logo doesn't have frivolous information baked into the design, like the year established or a catchphrase. If it doesn't have those things, it means your logo is symbolizing, not selling; punctuating, not speaking.

This is important because logos that attempt to inform or sell will lose all sorts of adaptability and scaling. Your logo won't be legible when small, and you'll find you have less control over your marketing messages.

On one side of your business card, you should have your logo front and center, with a one sentence description of your business. With a "tall" logo, you lose the ability to increase its size without the business card feeling crowded. With a logo that already includes a tagline, you lose control over the placement and sizing of the tagline.

You also may not need a tagline with your logo in some instances. You can always add one, but its hard to remove elements permenently set in your logo.

“A logo does not sell, it identifies.” — Paul Rand

The exception proves the rule #

I present this information and will continue offering future related tips in this series, as a matter of fact. Not because it's the only way to do things, but because I'm making two big assumptions.

One, your business doesn't require you to be famed logo designer Saul Bass; therefore, you have little experience with logo design. Two, you don't have a quarter million dollars in the budget for your brand identity. (If you do, please email me.)

And thats totally cool. You probably won't need logo design experience past your own project.

New freelancers sometimes get too caught up in their logo's design. They place too much or too little importance on its role, spend too much or too little money on a design that doesn't work for them, overlook filetypes they need, or one of countless other common pitfalls I've seen in my years of logo design project management.

This guide is a clear path to a successful logo project that will result in a versatile logo and get you through your first few years, at least.