How To Create A Great Massage Logo

Most new massage therapists are eager to print up their new massage therapy business cards. As they begin to put the design together one of the first things they are faced with is constructing a massage logo for their business card.



Do they really need a massage logo?



Logos are used in advertising to create and reinforce a certain level of comfort with a product or service. Logos are also used to anchor and reproduce a certain emotion that the logo is associated with. Because of this logos (and branding in general) are a whole lot more applicable for commodity products, that is goods where there is almost no perceived difference in the customer's mind.



Encountering a rack of candy bars at a supermarket checkout for example, an advertiser wants a customer to feel an instant feeling of familiarity and comfort with choosing their product. They do this mostly by means of logo design (there's not room to print anything more than a logo on a chocolate bar wrapper) that has been connected with a particular message or certain feeling through substantial brand advertising on TV and in print. If that chocolate bar doesn't get selected right away from the sea of comparable sweets, then that producer is out of luck.

Most business, massage practices included, don't have the same need to brand as the candy bar producer. Massage is not a "commodity" product. It's what businesspeople call a "high involvement" product. The ordinary buyer doesn't see ten businesses lined up down a road and on a whim select one. They research, get advice about, ask for referrals to, talk about, and take time deciding before they pick up the phone to schedule an appointment. The need for instant visual recognition is in reality not that strong.



So for therapists, massage logos serve more as artistic components in the design of their massage business cards than any type of branding device.



Guidelines in developing your massage logo development...



Here are some important rules and guidelines for designing your own personal massage therapy logo.



1. Keep it simple



Avoid a lot of details. Customers are only going to look at it for a moment and step away with a feeling. Making the design simple makes your logo easier to remember and a snap to reproduce.



2. Don't get overly literal



Your logo doesn't have to convey what you do. Consider some of the greatest logos: Golden arches (nothing to do with hamburgers), a swoosh (nothing to do with running shoes) or an apple (nothing to do with computers). So you can breathe a sigh of relief understanding that you honestly don't have to have hands in your logo... seriously, you don't.



3. Make it memorable



To be unforgettable your logo should be bold, graphic and interesting. Avoid cliches. There are so many massage therapy logos that contain graphic images of hands and the low back curves that they are now indistinguishable from one another.



4. It should reproduce well without color



You never know how your logo will be printed, so it should look good in black and white.



5. Looks good big or small



Your logo will need to look good whether large or small. You must be able to shrink your massage logo down to an fraction of its size and have it still be readable. It should look good blown as well.



6. Aim for rectangular



Our eyes scan easier across pictures that are wider than they are tall. Design a wide image in place of a tall one.



7. Incorporate your practice name



If it makes sense, use your name as part of your logo. This is known as a logotype or wordmark. It does double duty making your company name as part of the design rather than an addendum. You'll see how I've done this for my logo at BodyworkBiz.



In a nutshell, don't worry about your logo too much. A logo is not going to determine the success of your massage clinic.



If you are just starting out, you can generate appealing sales materials without a logo by using basic typefaces and decent quality images.



If your logo is not anything special then consider getting rid of it. It's better to have a clean layout in your web site and collateral materials rather than have an unattractive and forgettable massage logo just for the sake of having a logo.