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Design

Robert Donnelly
Robert Donnelly
6,043 Points
Posted by Robert Donnelly
Robert Donnelly
6,043 Points

Social media icons...

I've done it, you've done it, we have all done it. But what exactly is the legal stance on modifying social media icons for your website's designs?

I have made a modified version of the Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc. logos for use on my company's website, changing the colours (only the colours) to the company's red. But now the marketing department are trying to get these modified versions printed on other assets and the agency they are working with are telling them that it is illegal.

I've always known that it was against their guidelines but did not really consider it much of a legal issue. Is it just one of those things that we all know is illegal but do it anyway? What are the chances of any real repercussions coming from this tiny infraction?

3 Answers

CJ Williams
CJ Williams
34,372 Points
CJ Williams
CJ Williams
34,372 Points

If any of the companies were to find out about the infractions, they would likely send you a cease and desist letter to stop the circulation of the printed material. This could be costly depending on the volume of the print run. I would say stick to each companies guidelines. They may have a monochrome or black and white version of their logo or mark that will work for your design. I have included some links to learn more about the branding guidelines of each company. As far as I know G+ is the only one that doesn't let you advertise your page in print materials.

https://www.facebookbrand.com/

https://about.twitter.com/press/brand-assets

https://www.youtube.com/yt/brand/using-logo.html

http://developer.linkedin.com/documents/branding-guidelines

https://developers.google.com/+/branding-guidelines

  • hope this helps,
  • CJ
Robert Donnelly
Robert Donnelly
6,043 Points
Robert Donnelly
Robert Donnelly
6,043 Points

Thanks for the reply CJ.

How do you think this effects the web design community? It seems that most large web design blogs are regularly offering design packs that include modified social media icon sets for use on websites. Should these sites be supporting the violation of the companies' brand guidelines, or is it so much of a grey area that it doesn't really matter?

CJ Williams
CJ Williams
34,372 Points
CJ Williams
CJ Williams
34,372 Points

I think it is a gray area within the creative industry especially. The Social Giants probably could care less about what the link looks like as long as they are getting the big piece of the pie in web traffic, unless you are a giant of a company yourself. I did do a fair bit of looking around on large companies' websites(Coke, Sharpie, Capital One, Oreo, QDoba, CrowdSpring, etc.) and found that the majority of them comply to the brand guidelines of the social networks. Once you get into smaller businesses' websites, you will start to see a shift in the compliance. The worst thing that would probably happen is the social company reaching out to you, saying to replace the logo with one of their approves logos or buttons.

Seems to me one of the best ways to add aesthetics while staying mostly compliant is to create a negative-space type button over a black, gray, or white background (similar to the ones found at the bottom of the Treehouse website), and use the social brands' colors as the roll-over color.