Your logo was almost certainly drawn to be read from thirty feet away on the side of a van. Google will show it as a circle about a centimetre across, a browser tab will show it at sixteen pixels, and an embroidery machine will render it in solid blocks of thread. One artwork file cannot survive all of that. The fix is a set of versions, not a redesign.
Every placement crops you differently
The profile picture on your Google Business Profile is cropped to a circle. So is the avatar on a Facebook page, and so is the thumbnail beside a review. A horizontal lockup with the company name, a tagline and a swoosh loses both ends and becomes a grey smudge. Vinyl cut for a van is one flat colour with no gradient. Thread cannot do a fade. A permit form or a supplier fax flattens everything to grey, and two colours that looked distinct on screen turn into the same shade.
None of that is a reason to change your logo. It is a reason to own more than one version of it.
The set of files you should be holding
- A vector master. An SVG, EPS or AI file that scales to a billboard without going soft. This is the file the wrap shop and the sign maker will ask for.
- The full lockup. Name, mark and tagline arranged horizontally, for the website header and the letterhead.
- A stacked version. The same elements in a squarer arrangement, for narrow spaces, the back of a shirt and a yard sign.
- A monogram. Two or three letters, or the mark on its own, drawn to be legible inside a circle. This is what goes on your Google and Facebook profiles and in the browser tab.
- A one-colour version. Solid black and solid white, no gradients, for vinyl, thread, stamps and anything printed in a single ink.
- Transparent PNGs at a few sizes, so nobody in the office ends up screenshotting the logo off your own website when a supplier asks for it.
Find out whether you actually own the artwork
This catches more contractors than the cropping does. The logo was drawn in 2016 by a designer who has since moved on, or by somebody’s nephew, or by the wrap shop who redrew it by eye and keeps the file on their own machine. If all you hold is a JPEG pulled off your own website, the next van costs you a redraw, and the redraw will not quite match the vans you already have.
Ask whoever holds the artwork for the source files, in writing, and store them somewhere the office can find them. If a designer will not hand over the vector, that is worth knowing before you order six wraps. The same question applies to every account with your name on it, which is the subject of what you should still have on Monday if an agency leaves on Friday.
Photographs do not travel between placements either
A wide shot of a crew on a roof works as a website banner and is unusable as a square social post, where the sides are cut away and the people disappear. When your technicians take job photos, ask for one wide frame and one square frame of the same thing. It costs nothing at the time and saves the crop later. What the photograph is actually of matters more than how it is cropped, and that is covered in why stock photos work against your map rankings.
Frequently asked questions
What should I upload as my Google Business Profile picture?
A square image of at least 720 by 720 pixels, designed for the circle inside it, because the circle is what most people see. Put the monogram or the mark in the middle with clear space around it rather than the full horizontal lockup.
Why does my logo look blurry on my website?
Usually because a small raster image is being stretched. Ask for an SVG and use that in the header. It will be sharper on every screen and smaller to download than the JPEG it replaces.
Do I need a different logo for social media?
Not a different logo, a different version of the same one. The monogram in the circle and the full lockup on the site should read as obviously the same company.
Can the sign shop just copy the logo from my website?
They can trace it, and the result will be close but not identical, which is how a fleet ends up carrying three slightly different logos. Give them the vector.
Where to start
Open your Google Business Profile on a phone and look at your own profile picture at the size a customer sees it. If you cannot tell what it says, you need a monogram, and that is an hour of a designer’s time rather than a rebrand.
Real Time Marketing has worked with home service contractors since 2016: plumbing, HVAC, roofing, electrical and other trades, nationwide, from our office in Bradenton, Florida. Agreements are month-to-month. See our website design or book a strategy call.
