How to Use Social Media Logos on Your Website

[Treehouse Presents - Quick Tips: How to Use Social Media Logos on Your Website with Chris Zabriskie] 0:00 [Chris Zabriskie] How many times do you think you see the Facebook logo every day? 0:05 Not just on the Web, but on television, billboards, pizza boxes. Same with the Twitter logo or Tumblr or Pinterest. 0:10 Social media logos are everywhere—and for good reason. 0:17 Users know what they mean and know what to expect when they seem them or click on them. 0:21 And on the Web, social media icons are a great way to direct your users to your social media profiles— 0:25 all while using minimal screen real estate. 0:31 But when you're designing your site, where are you actually getting those icons from? 0:34 It's simple enough to go to Google Images and find some. There are lots of different ones there. 0:39 But which ones do you pick? Not all of them look the same. 0:44 Does it matter which ones you use? Yes—100% yes—it matters. 0:46 Every social media site has their own brand guidelines that it's your job to follow. 0:52 That Facebook logo, that's a trademarked property that belongs to Facebook. 0:57 You are legally allowed to use it on your site, but only if you follow their rules. 1:02 Finding a social media company's brand guidelines is easy. 1:07 Just Google Facebook or Twitter or whatever logo you're looking for, plus the words "brand guidelines." 1:11 At or near the top of the search results is going to be just what you're looking for. 1:19 You just need to make sure you're going to an official website. 1:23 If it's a Twitter logo you're looking for, make sure you're looking at the brand guideline page on twitter.com. 1:26 Don't get all your information about social media logos from blog posts. 1:32 Blog posts go out of date quickly. 1:37 Facebook and Twitter and all these other companies are going to keep their brand guidelines page up to date, 1:40 so you always know you have the latest and greatest logo to work with. 1:45 Each site is going to have these logos in different file formats for you to download and use. 1:49 But they're also going to have guidelines that you have to follow. 1:55 Twitter, for example, wants you to make sure that their logo always has the bird facing to the right. 1:58 and they also require a certain amount of space around the logo. 2:03 If you don't follow the brand guidelines of the site whose logo you're using, 2:07 you don't have their permission to be using the logo in the first place. 2:11 Make a point to check the brand guidelines a couple of times every year or whenever you make design changes to your site. 2:15 If the logo gets updated and you're still sticking with an older version, it's going to make you look behind the times, 2:22 and that is never a good thing on the Web. 2:27 So take a few minutes, look at the icons you're using on your site. 2:29 Then check those branding guidelines and make sure that you're up to date. 2:33

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