Barack Obama's 2008 campaign logo may help him beat John McCain in the US Presidential Election later this year. DesignBay's recent Study of Symbolism and Tradition in Presidential Logo Design found that the logos used by presidents during their successful campaigns tend to possess 5 core attributes:
- Red, white and blue
- The year
- The candidate's surname only
- Red stripes
- A serif typeface
Barack Obama's campaign logo possesses all 5 of these 'positive' attributes (while his rivals' logos do not) and deserves a 10 out of 10 for symbolism (see diagram below).
Although Obama's new Obama-Biden logo design does not include the year it still trumps John McCain's campaign logo for symbolism. McCain's 2008 logo scores 2 out of 10 on symbolism while the McCain-Palin logo scores just 1 out of 10 (see analysis below). McCain's logos include some unusual design choices (such as using the colour yellow) that have not worked for any candidate in the last 25 years. McCain uses a military star but avoids any use of the American flag or the popular (and successful) red stripes.
Obama's Obama logo design is very strong. In addition to being better (on paper) than McCain's logo, it may have given Obama the an edge over Hillary Clinton in winning the Democractic Party's nomination (see our Why Hillary Clinton's Logo Design Failed).
Candidates cannot win by simply having strong symbolism in their logo. Obviously, other factors like the candidate, their policies and their advertising budget influence the result. But Barack Obama's logo is clearly stronger than McCain's and to ram home his advantage he will probably have a bigger budget for advertising.
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