25 Overused Logo Designs That Can Harm Your Brand Name

Logo designs are often overused. A number of companies tend to use the same concept repeatedly without bothering to change the subject or the modifying the design to look different. They mostly make a few changes to the logo colour or letters that other brands or companies may have used several times.

There are situations in which getting an overused logo is the only way to run the company because the budget laid out for selecting and making a logo is too small to appoint a professional logo designer or agency to create new designs. It is often seen that small-scale companies end up conducting logo design contests where a number of people submit their work that contain overused or monotonous logo designs.

The nature of a business is also a deciding factor in how unique its logo would be. For a photographer, a dentist, an attorney, a real estate agency or for a provider of financial services, logo designing can be a tricky thing to do because of the similarity in the nature of the work field. Conducting a logo design contest and expecting unique logos for these jobs can lead to disappointment and despair.

Why is this so?

This is primarily because most dentists, photographers and attorneys from a particular town use the same method to get their logo designed by designers. They would put up similar advertisements that have the same old titles. This will naturally not be as interesting to skilled logo designers who consider designing as their passion instead of doing it all for money.

Every other day I find new logo design contests that are titled like, “Family Dentistry Looking For A New Logo” or “Design An Award-Winning Logo For *put name here* Capital”. These kinds of contests would eventually lead to the production of overused logos because there is nothing new to add to it.

Unfortunately, being in some industries, will invariably lead to the use of stereotyped logos. Here are a few examples of logos that have been overused time and again:

1. Company’s acronym forming a 3D cube

2. Curved abstract road

3. Company’s acronym forming a square

4. Company’s acronym merged together

5. Excessive use of the Harabara font

6. Company’s name divided by circle

7. Stylized droplet

Especially overused for Oil&Energy, plumbing, etc.

8. Excessive use of the Eurostile font

9. Excessive use of the Eurostile font

This popular variation includes a company’s acronym in Eurostile font & one letter in a negative space

10. Gears, gears, gears…

11. Company’s name divided by a “horizon line”

12. Company’s acronym wrapped around each other

13. Excessive use of mountain illustration

14. Speech & Comment bubbles

Especially overused for Web 2.0s and online services.

15. Company’s name in a circle

16. Excessive use of a pin icon

17. Excessive use of the font “satisfaction”

18. Swoosh

19. Abstract car shape

20. Abstract people in a circle

21. Company’s acronym in “Ethnocentric” font

22. V shaped people

23. Leaves and trees

24. Ascending graph

25. Roofs

It is true that some businesses tend to get only overused logos but even they have a scope to introduce creativity in their work. Attracting skilled and efficient logo designers might seem like a daunting task but it can be easily achieved by going that extra mile. Once they are convinced that their work will not lead to monotony and plain old recreation of the same thing, they would definitely want to work for you, even if they are paid more handsomely by another dentist.

The trick is to find the one element in your business that stands out from the rest and to use it to your advantage. Introduce that element and use the logo to highlight it. It might as well become a new way of representing your business and eventually enhance your credentials.

Uniqueness and creativity never go in vain. If you feel that your company is just like any other in the market, do invest some time to find out what is that one factor you would want the world to know about your work. Ask yourself; “what makes it my own company?” The answer is the solution to all your problems and to a never-seen-before logo design!