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The contacts in the Android and many other operating systems were for a long time referred to as a business card. Business cards are thought to be going extinct as the world goes increasingly digital but that is far from true. The business card is something whose value is not appreciated fully, and those who do know its importance are not going to give up on it anytime soon.

The business card holds a lot of sway in the corporate world. And it is not just the formal corporate world where the business card matters. It matters almost everywhere and we shall talk about reasons why should be always carrying well-made business cards:

Swapping phone numbers and email is unprofessional

Networking is about making connections; connections are only credible if they are genuine. Sending contact information via email or text on the spot is convenient but it is an impersonal way of doing things. A business card first of all is tangible. Tangible things are more easily remembered. There is a good chance of a person coming across a business card in their wallet after a meeting than they are of coming across the email you sent them. Also exchanging business cards is something you do after a conversation and sometimes the business cards lead to even more conversations and this is how real relationships begin. Simply typing into your phone does not create a “memory” for this act has become routine and insignificant.

Business cards are very effective marketing tools

If you are giving them to your employees these tend to be distributed a lot. Having a formal business card in today’s world has become quite rare, and thus more appreciated. A business card is now considered something that only important people carry. So these do make people feel important and they are more inclined to distribute them to people they want to impress. How does this benefit you? Well if your employees want to impress someone, chances are they do matter and it is good for you that such people learn of your presence. This is the cheapest way of advertising and yet effective.

However many would argue that all forms of advertising pale in front of search engine optimization. Paid forms of advertising are no doubt great at attracting leads but seasoned business will argue and prove and when such advertising methods are like a candle in front of the sun when compared to the effectiveness of an in-person meeting which is concluded with a handshake and exchange of business cards. Business cards may not help you sell a shoe to one lone customer over the internet but they will help you a lot when you go to your supplier to negotiate better rates.

Plus what many people forget is that networking is a continuous process. You can meet a potential lead or contact any time, be it at the airport lounge, industry conferences or happy hour. Arming yourself with a business card ensures that you never miss an opportunity to make an impression and create a valuable business connection in one go.

A business card shows that you are prepared

Smartphone batteries are notorious for dying. And once that happens even the savviest of business people can be seen scrambling, writing contact information on cocktail napkins on scraps of paper. That never looks professional.

A business card gives the impression of being prepared and impressions count for a lot. Who would you do business with, someone hunting for scrap of paper or someone who has a business card ready with them?

So for many years to come it is a surety that conversations will be ending with an exchange of business cards.

We humans are psychologically hardwired to be attracted to colors. Visual stimuli is one of the most powerful messaging techniques that allow the viewer to give meaning to what it is in front of is eyes. Each color has its own connotations and this makes each color convey a different meaning altogether. But what purpose does it serve in logo design? The answer to that question is very simple yet quite intriguing. A simple thing such as a certain color can make the viewer get an altogether different message from your logo altogether. The color tends to represent what your business is all about and above all it signifies your mission, vision and what values you are trying to portray. Most companies opt for a two to three color based theme for their logos, single color logos are quite rare and even if they exist, the single color has different shades in the same logo.

We have learned to associate meanings with each color due to millions of years of evolving as creatures that instinctively live through data gathered through our senses out which we are the mostly inclined to rely on visual information. An in depth understanding of color psychology can put you into a better position to design a logo. As a creative professional you have the liberty to choose from a wide array of colors and play with their shades and give different nuances to each one. Lets delve into the world of colors and see for ourselves what each one has in store for us as its identity:

White: A symbol of purity and sophistication since time immemorial, it portrays surrealism, calmness and cleanliness. But if your logo happens to be white it needs to be portrayed against a colored background, this can be quite tricky as you have to make sure that your symbolic appeal of sophistication is put against a background that also makes it meaning remain the same even if now it is accentuated a bit. The focus should be on the white.

Red: Red symbolizes aggression, power, danger and above all passion. Red is known to be an appetite stimulant and that’s probably the reason it is part of the logos of a wide variety of food related business. Using red can make your business look to have a go getter approach and a dynamic outlook.

Orange: Well, this one has limited usage as it symbolizes the word “innovate” and is most often used by tech companies to identify their logo with their free minded and forward thinking approach.

Green: This one has been clichéd into being a color which is associated nature and organic materials. It signifies a company’s connection to the environment and Mother Nature. Green in recent times has also been associated with monetary and financial connotations.

Blue: Blue makes it easier to convey professionalism and serious mindedness. If a company wants to portray itself as a organization that values integrity and authority, then blue is the color it should go with.Black: We have been fascinated by this color since forever. It is one of the most mysterious of colors as it can signify loneliness and gloominess on one hand and Power on the other hand. This color is one of the first preferences of artists when designing something and as the primary base color for outlines and demarcations; it carries a lot of significance. Use it sparingly.

Purple: This one is reserved for the show of royalty and wealth. In older times, it was the prime color of the church in Europe and that has made it signify dignity and more importantly wisdom.

One of the most important things to keep in mind when thinking of colors for logos are their cultural implications which should be carefully taken care of in this globally connected world where white is color of mourning in South Asian countries and red is considered to be rewarding and a harbinger of luck in China. In the end it boils down to the designer who has to make the choice on the color with which the logo would be created. We hope this will help in understanding how to define colors for your logo and assist you in designing great logos for your business.

Since man began understanding things, he has been mired in his endless endeavor to make them simpler. Easy enough to be comprehended by anyone. The school of minimalism in logo design inspiration is not new, with its dignified proponents being found in every professional field of the world. Every artist, painter, sculptor or designer thrives on the concept of expressive conservatism. When things which are unfathomable, retreat onto a shortened version of their previous self, obtaining a new entity altogether, the results are always spectacular to see.

Edvard Munch expressing the depressive mood of the dusky evening, an embodiment of the seamless transition of day into night in his painting “The Scream”, was an example of minimalism, of how whole scenes can acquire a voice, by leaving out distractions. Galileo peering out into the abyss of the universe, simplifying the notion of how heavenly bodies move, putting to rest the confusion man faced while comprehending the vastness of space. It was an act in simplicity, a perfection of focusing on only what is important, reducing the visual noise, the blackness of space posed. Minimalism isn’t just about keeping it simple, Its not that easy. It has its own complexity, leaving things out is even more difficult than adding things up, with the emphasis being on what the reduction would help highlight. Its not different when it comes to logos. The best ones are intricately minimal, toned down to make them reflect what the business does. Logo, simply speaking, is a design that should suffice for all the things that a company is made up of, Visions, structure, ideology, core values, USP, focus and the impression it wants to build are the components of a logo. Accomplishing that is an art of its own. Here are some of the reasons why minimalism in logo design inspiration, should the effective policy behind every corporate logo design process in 2016.

Logos as a portal into the company:

Spilling everything at the first meeting, invariably translates into lost interest. Something has to be held back, a trigger has to be implanted subliminally which would inspire the viewer into the action of learning more. A logo should be a small window, a sneak peek into your mode of operations as a business unit. It should serve as a transparent facade, just about hiding what goes on beneath, but showing enough to generate interest. A logo should be more akin to the modern day “Selfie” concept, where no pose or artificial element is required, just a simple focus on whats there at that very moment.

A process of owning it:

It shows in your logo how much interest went into its design. Kleenex, the quintessential leader in paper based cleaning product had their logo match their ideology and products ingeniously, the ongoing connective words signifying the “Swipe”, a function of nearly all of its products. Its ideology was so dear when it came to representation that an altogether new font was created just to accommodate the artist’s idea of a continued swipe. The most identical font available that comes close to matching the font used is Montauk Pro Bold Font.

Mind it when splashing it:

Our mind is wired to react to selective attention. Too much and its too burdensome on the brain, it loses its focus and redirects itself to something more visually less demanding. In a poll by Playtime booth, blue came out on top, as the most favorite color of people, daylight second and then followed purple. Just remember, logos are used almost everywhere by brands, their color, whatever you are meaning it to signify should be a consistent one, keeping in mind all the places that logo could have an impact on. One prominent example is of the Logistics brand UPS, a brown predominates their logo meant to symbolize soil and logistical prowess.

Adequate trends shouldn’t serve as a palette where you choose a color for your logo, think of every aspect, in every context before zeroing in a color.

Resolves dormancy

The worst impression a logo can give is of being “Stopped”, it symbolizes that your company doesn’t have anything else left to tell or sell and it gives off a vibe that the effort gone into finding logo design inspiration wasn’t up to the mark.. Evolution is an inbuilt mechanism of nature, without it, nothing survives. Adaptability must be one of the core competencies of a logo.

When adding a new acquisition into your business, instead of adding a circle, a circle must be reduced onto your logo. In the reduction of boundaries are new territories included.

“When the Prototype of Ipod was shown to Steve Jobs, He viewed it and told them to reduce its size even more. The Engineers told him that it was the most compact size possible and no further space was left where the size could be toned down. Steve threw the Ipod into an aquarium that was nearby, then pointed to the bubbles that were coming out of the Ipod as it lay at the bottom of the Aquarium, saying that there is space in there to make it even smaller. “

There’s always space to tone things down, all you need is imagination mixed with cleverness to figure out where the bubbles in your logo might be hiding and your logo design inspiration will truly be embodied.