The Logo Geek Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

This episode is sponsored by The Perfect Match.

Take 30 minutes to create a quick mood board as a design exercise. You’ll get a $50 USD gift card for your submission, and if your mood board communicates clearly, you might be a contestant on the live game show and play to win $1,000 USD and a Wacom* tablet! Don’t freak out: submissions are not spec work and are only used as entries for game play.

This month’s mood board challenge is open to creatives residing in the United States, Canada (excluding Quebec), the United Kingdom, Denmark, Norway, Ireland, Finland, and the Netherlands. Government employees are NOT eligible to participate. Entrants that meet the requirements receive a $50 USD gift card and a $25 will be donated to the National Partnership for Women & Families on behalf of your entry.

To learn more and play head to https://www.theperfectmatch.co/play

*Game show contestants are eligible to win prizes sponsored by Wacom in August and September.

Mental health is a serious topic and all too common in the design industry, but due to fear most of us keep our problems private, and some never seek help.

To encourage people to open up, to talk about their problems and get the help they need, in this episode Ian interviews Abi Lemon to have an honest and open discussion about the challenges they’ve both faced with mental health, how they acknowledged they had a problem, how they sought out help, and how they’ve come through the other side with a positive outlook on life.

We also discuss toolkit ideas to focus on positivity, thoughts on imposter syndrome, how to work on personal development and a few book recommendations too.

Abi Lemon is the founder of Brand Pharmacy, focusing on adventurous outdoor brands.

• Brand Pharmacy
• Brand Pharmacy on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Linkedin
• The 5 Minute Journal Book – Buy on Amazon UK and Amazon US
• The 5 Minute Journal App
• Radical Candor by Kim Scott – Buy on Amazon UK and Amazon US
• Make Time by Jake Knapp and John Zeratsky – Buy on Amazon UK and Amazon US

Full show notes and interview transcription can be found here: https://logogeek.uk/podcast/mental-health/

Once your clients agreed the logo you’ve designed what files should you be sending? As a professional logo designer you need to provide the logo in a number of formats for web and print, as well as colour variations and configurations to ensure the logo you’ve designed is versatile.

In this episode Ian interviews Michael Bruny-Groth to learn how to create a comprehensive logo package, and the file types and formats that you should be including. We also learn about the story behind Logo Package Express, an illustrator plugin designed to speed up the process of preparing a logo package.

• Logo Package Express
• Designing Products People Love by Scott Hurff. Buy on Amazon UK | Amazon US
• 30×500 – A course to help you create predictable, repeatable sales.
• Astute Graphics

View the show notes for this episode along with a full transcription here: https://logogeek.uk/podcast/creating-a-logo-package/

At the age of 22 Joana Galvão made the decision to leave her junior design position to start her own agency, Gif Design Studios. Within the first 10 months she made over $100K, and was able to fulfil her dream to work with ambitious and revolutionary entrepreneurs, such as Lewis Howes, Danielle LaPorte, and Selena Soo.

But how did she do it? In this interview Ian uncovers Joanas story to learn how she was able to grew her design agency through traditional face to face networking, referrals and speaking, and how you can do the same.

• Joana Galvão Business Insider interview: “I made $100K within 10 months of quitting my job, and these are my 3 big takeaways for lasting success”
• Joana Galvão website
• Joana on Facebook and Instagram
• Gif Design Studios
• B-School
• YouPreneur Summit
• Traffic & Conversion Summit
• Logo Package Express (use promocode logogeek to get 20% off)

To view show notes, and a full transcription of the interview head here.

In 2012 when Google changed its algorithm, the company Logo Design Works went from having hundreds of enquiries a day, to almost zero. The founder Mash Bonigala hit rock bottom, and ultimately needed to let his team go. He made the decision to start again under the parent name of Spellbrand, which he built up to become a million dollar agency with offices in 5 countries around the world.

In this episode Ian Paget interviews Mash to learn how he built the business up from scratch, what the agencies sales funnels look like and how they use Facebook and Google Ads to pull in ongoing clients.

• Spellbrand Website
• Spellbrand on Facebook, Twitter & Instagram
• Bonigala.com
• Mash on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & Linkedin

For show notes, and episode transcription head here: https://logogeek.uk/podcast/mash-bonigala/

How do you stand out from other designers, attract clients, and work on projects you enjoy? One solution is to build a business that specialises in one area, that targets a specific niche audience. In this interview, Ian speaks to Sara Dunn who’s done just that. She transitioned from a general web agency to building a niche business offering SEO services for Wedding planners.

In this interview we discover how she decided what niche to focus on, how she used content marketing to attract the right clients, and how she productised & systematised the business too.

Show notes can be found here: https://logogeek.uk/podcast/creating-niche-business/

In order to be respected as a designer you need to be able to show the value of design. But how do you do that? In this weeks episode Ian Paget interviews Aarron Walter to find out. In this interview we learn how designers can gain the respect of business owners, how to measure the success of a project, Aarrons approach to UX design, and how you can use emotion to create incredible user experiences.

Aarron Walter is VP of Design Education at InVision, host of The Design Better Podcast, founder of the UX practice at MailChimp, and author of a number of publications including the book, Designing for Emotion.

• Aarron Walters website.
• Design Better by InVision.
• The Design Better Podcast.
• Designing for Emotion – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• Universal Principles of Design – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• The User Experience Team of One – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• Just Enough Research – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• Typographie Web – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• Emotional Design – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• The Design of Everyday Things – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• Responsive Web Design
• A Book Apart Collection
• Enterprise Design Sprints – Free eBook
• usertesting.com
• To keep learning and improving, use SkillShare and the courses from The Futur.

For show notes and episode transcription head here: https://logogeek.uk/podcast/aarron-walter/

The Logo Design Idea Book is the latest inspirational book from Steven Heller, which shares the story behind 50 successful logos. In this episode Ian Paget interviews Steven to discuss the new book, which leads down a path to discover the origins of logo design.

Steven Heller is the author, co-author, and/or editor of over 100 books on design and popular culture. For 33 years of his career he was art director at the New York Times, and among many other successes, is a recipient of the AIGA Medal for Lifetime Achievement.

• The Logo Design Idea Book – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• The Graphic Design Idea Book – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• The Typography Idea Book – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• The Illustration Idea Book – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• Paul Rand (a Biography) – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• Paul Rand Inspiration and Process in Design – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• The Swastika: The Earliest Known Symbol – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• Stencil Type – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• Teaching Graphic Design History – Amazon UK | Amazon US
• Unit Editions Standards Manuals – Manuals 1 | Manuals 2
• The Butler Box – Everything you need to level up and run your creative agency. Use promo code LogoGeek to get 25% off.

For full show notes, and an interview transcription head here: https://logogeek.uk/podcast/steven-heller/