Real Estate Marketing & Beyond
Few industries require as much curbside appeal as real estate: it is a buyer’s market and competition is undeniably fierce. However, when it comes to establishing a memorable and appealing brand for your business, too many realtors fall back on cliched logos using sloping roofs and square windows, suspended in abstract space or agglomerated onto one another in physically baffling clusters. Or worse, they skip the logo altogether and go with tried-and-true photo on a business card approach.
Instead of taking the generic route, just follow some of these tips to create a unique and effective real estate logo.
Tip 1: Don’t just go with your favorite - or the most common - colors
Just because you personally love the color pink, you shouldn’t necessarily gravitate there when designing a real estate logo. Nor should the fact that blue or green are fairly safe and common hues among realtor logos drive your choice. Instead, the most important element of choosing the colors for a real estate logo is ensuring they communicate the values and attributes that are most important to your brand. According to a recent analysis of real estate logos created on 99designs, realtors broadly identify their desired brand personalities as being luxurious, mature, modern and serious. This largely explains the prevalence of blue, black, and generally quite subdued branding in the industry.
Warm colors like yellow and orange rank relatively low in terms of popularity in the real estate industry, but they are a strong option for accenting given their associations with friendliness, comfort and happiness. After all, every prospective tenant or buyer is looking for a happy home, so it makes sense to capitalize on the emotional connection created by these colors.
Tip 2: Focus on a sense of place
It’s not just about what property you’re selling, but where you’re selling. Consider what’s unique about the area you cover, whether it’s a neighborhood, a city skyline, or iconic architecture. Now imagine someone moving here from the other side of the country, or even the world. Don’t you want a logo that highlights what makes your properties special?
Tip 3: Consider creating a wordmark.
One way to help clients remember you(or your company’s) name is to turn the name into the logo itself. This is called a “wordmark.”
What’s great about a striking wordmark is that it helps people remember the name even when they’re not holding your business card. If a former client has a friend or family member who’s looking to buy a new property, they’re that much more likely to recommend you over someone else if they can remember your name. In terms of style, a wordmark keeps things simple and classic, but also personal.
Tip 4: Don’t be afraid of the abstract.
Sometimes the nature of your agency is ineffable. Or perhaps it’s always changing; that’s not too unusual in real estate. An abstract realtor logo allows you to be different and keep your brand identity consistent in an ever evolving market. But it doesn’t have to be totally abstract. It only takes a few lines to imply the shape of a skyscraper or a house, while still retaining the dynamism of an abstract business card.
Pamela Webber is Chief Operating Officer at 99designs, the global creative platform that makes it easy for designers and clients to work together to create designs they love. Earlier in her career, she served in various corporate strategy and marketing positions with eBay and its subsidiary, PayPal, Inc., True&Co, and other fast growing companies in the consumer Internet space. A resident of San Francisco, Pam received her BA from the University of Pennsylvania and MBA from Harvard Business School.
