To design a logo for our new product Crowd Control using “crowdsourcing” seemed like the natural way to go. Tapping the “wisdom of the crowd” is a great way to get many diverse ideas in a short amount of time. There are several sites for crowdsourcing logo designs including LogoMyWay.com, LogoSauce.com, and the one we used, 99Designs.com.

See the winner after the jump.

Now, it’s going to take some work on your part to make a logo design contest successful. Expect to be busy reacting to new ideas and giving the designers individual feedback to evolve the ideas you like. At a minimum you will need provide comments on a daily basis. Also, taking the extra time to review other contests and inviting designers whose work you like to compete in your contest may be a good idea.

You can choose more than one winner if your budget allows. Then the copyrights to those ideas will all be yours. It was a difficult decision for us but we did choose just one. That said, we made several contacts through the process that I hope to work with again.

Username “Blammie” won with a fantastic concept and execution. We highly recommend his work.

What?!? John McWade makes it seem so simple.

I got Seth Godin’s blog blurb in my inbox today. He mentioned some books by McWade and a couple other authors. I looked up McWade’s stuff on Amazon and decided I had a hankering for Before and After Business Graphics. Then my wife Mary pointed out after dinner that I had a sweet coupon for Barnes & Noble that was expiring today. Get in the car lady. I gotta go spend $20 to save five bucks, now!

No joy at the bookstore. They had another McWade book, and it looked really good too, but book discipline prevailed, for once, and I went home empty-handed.

Then I found his site, then his YouTube channel, and this fantastic video about making quick and dirty logos, that are actually quite professional and elegant. Next time you need something for an event or project show this video to your designer. Then get out of the way.

The “wisdom of the crowds” or at least the “logo designs of the crowds.” This describes LogoMyWay.com. In my opinion this is a fantastic way for a small business or other organization to get a great looking logo designed at a very reasonable cost.

Sure, a full-tilt pro logo designer may do a better job but who has that budget? If you want to go that route, how about this: Submit your concept for a logo design and see what you get from the crowd. If one of the designs is even close to what you want, select it as the winner, and you’ll have a great starting point to take to your big money designer.

On the other hand you might get a logo you love for very little money. So what’s the downside?