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Wednesday, September 2, 2015

Crowd's reaction to Google's new logo

Shortly after announcing a company restructuring plan, Google unveiled a new logo yesterday. Do people like the sans-serif design or still prefer the classic logo? I set out to ask the question on three popular crowdsourcing platforms: Amazon Mechanical Turk (MT), CrowdFlower (CF), and Google Consumer Survey (GCS). My survey displays the new and the classic logo and asks participants to pick the one they like more. They may optionally write down a line to explain their choice.



Over the past few hours, 874 valid responses have been collected. Across all three platforms, there's a predominance of preference for the classic Google logo.









All GCS participants come from the US while 99% of the CF crowd are from other countries. The demographics of participants on MT are unknown, but 80% of the overall workforce there are US-based according to mturk-tracker.




Although it's optional to provide a reason, many people did opt to write one. Their descriptions of the classic logo are universally positive while reception of the new logo seems mixed.

Common words that describe the two logos:

New logo
cute, clean, fun, playful, friendly, casual, fresh, modern, whimsical, minimalist, bold, childish, juvenile, bland, plain, awkward, boring,
clunky, dull, bubbly, cheap, ugly
Classic logo
sophisticated, professional, recognizable, trustworthy, credible, authentic, elegant, classy, fluid, sleek, pleasing, familiar, stylish, sharp, iconic, attractive, striking, mature, cool

It's probably too early to call Google's new logo a branding failure. The general public's initial negative reaction might be attributed to change aversion. I recognize that, for example, my personal bias against the new logo is not just an aesthetic judgment but also a result of an emotional attachment to the classic Catull font. Many of my Googler friends share the same sentiment, but some of them reported that after a week-long preview period, they hated it less. Maybe the sans-serif new logo will eventually grow on us as the company evolves.

8 comments:

  1. probably many went for the first answer thinking that it was for the top logo... I'm not if intentional but the order is confusing...

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    Replies
    1. Yes, I should've disabled randomized ordering on GCS. The order is fixed on other platforms, though.

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  2. Probably crowd didn't want this custom logo design as this has some old look but the old logo was good enough.

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  3. This the above comment is right and the custom logo design wouldn't fall under other category.

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  4. In my opinion Google classic logo its good and attraction compare new logo .Also I like the selection of Custom logo design fonts and colors.

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  5. Google is giving itself a makeover. Google says that it's made a version of its logo that's "only 305 bytes, compared to our existing logo at ~14,000 bytes." Given that one of new Google CEO Sundar Pichai's big goals is to bring the internet. If you are thinking about to change your old logo visit Logo Glaze its best Logo Design Firm

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  6. In my opinion new logo design is better then a classic one. Logo is the first think that remind your business to your client so it is very important to use colors which help customer to recall your brand easily via your logo design.

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  7. The reaction of the crowd on the new Google creative logo was superb, I like the new logo because it looks more professional than the old one.

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