Not Just Pretty | Building An Effective Small Business Brand

Breast cancer benefit logo

This is the logo that I designed for a breast cancer benefit cocktail party. The signature drink was the appletini - thus, the green in the color palette. And the breast cancer ribbon seemed like a perfect substitute for a "twist".

Update your website like you update your wardrobe

Like the clothes in your wardrobe can go "out of style" as fashion changes through the seasons, your website graphics can begin to look dated after a few years. As new design trends become popular, and as web technologies change and grow, your website can soon begin to look behind the times.

To avoid having a website that's out of style, revisit the look of the website, the photos on your site, the color palette, and even the way that the site's written and coded over the years. You don't want everyone in your industry to have a Facebook link on their site, while your site is missing this simple update that makes you look up-to-date.

Buy-ology: truth and lies about why we buy

When you smile, people tend to remember your name. Did you know that? As a small business owner, this fact could easily boost your sales!

I don't often think that a business book is compelling and interesting enough to post about. But, this one keeps surprising me. I'm about halfway through, and have aready come up with a bunch of interesting information.

This book is all about the role of psychology in advertising, branding and why people buy. And it's not all based on guesses or thoughts — the author ran experiments and actual CAT-scans to see how peoples' brains really work.

It's full of interesting tidbits like: "... we're not only attracted to people who smile but we also tend to remember their names... 'We are sensitive to positive social signals... we want to remember people who were kind to us, in case we interact with them in the future'"(p. 61). This is regulated in the brain by mirror neurons, which are neurons that fire when an action is being performed and when that same action is being observed.

Expanding on this, if you smile in your business headshot, it may make you more memorable. Interesting, huh?

This book also talks about product placement, subliminal messaging, rituals, faith, selling to the senses, and more. I'm looking forward to the rest of the insight!"

Consider evolving your designs instead of starting over

If you need to make changes to your logo, marketing materials, or website (or all of the above), then consider evolving it slightly instead of throwing everything you have out and starting over again.

Evolving your designs will allow you to retain the visual history that you've developed while still refreshing your brand. And that can be valuable - to enable you to 

Also, evolving your designs will probably be less of a cost- and time-hit than it would take to redesign everything from scratch. And what small business doesn't like that?

Of course, if your designs really aren't working for your business, then you may want to consider redesigning - just consider also whether evolving them may work for you.

Use an autoresponder to allow your website to have a conversation

You can improve the effectiveness of your website by making it more interactive, and by making sure that you're not having a one-sided conversation with your customers.

But, most small businesses don't have the time to answer tons of email while delivering their product or service. Or, you at least want to be able to take evenings and weekends off while still having your website make basic contact with potential clients who visit.

The answer is to use an autoresponder, which is a little program that automatically sends a response email when a website visitor submits their email on your site.

You've seen autoresponders in action when people use them to send out their vacation auto-replys (you know, "I'm out of the office and won't return until next Tuesday...")

On your website, you can program an autoresponder to give your clients more information - to send them an article, information about your pricing, a link to an MP3 recording or video clip - there are tons of possibilities.

Why put this in an autoresponder instead of on your site? Because if it's in an autoresponder, people will have to give you their email address in order to get the information. And then you'll have their information, and you'll know how to follow up with them to keep the conversation going later on. 

Or, you can subscribe them to your email list to keep in touch (just let them know that they're signing up for your email list when they give you their email address.)

Speaking Engagement Announcement

10 Tricks to Easily Refresh Your Website

Women in Consulting, South Bay Luncheon

March 9, 11:30 am - 1 pm

At the Los Gatos Lodge in Los Gatos, CA

Register at this link

Are you embarrassed to hand out your business cards, because new contacts might notice your website address at the bottom of the card and actually go there? Are you tired of apologizing for the inaccurate information and has-been graphics on your business's website?

Clients look to your website to provide the basis for their evaluation of your brand's credibility. Make sure your site is in top shape and looks impressive, so your clients believe your business is successful and current on industry issues. 

Keeping your website current and fresh-looking doesn't have to be a chore. In this talk, you'll learn 10 easy, inexpensive tricks of the trade that you can use to take that not-so-fresh website and bring it up to date. We'll focus on the three major components of a website – the design, the copy and the functionality of the website. We'll discuss many different aspects of these components that could be the culprit that's sabotaging your website. And, we'll talk about how to fix each problem.

You'll walk away with specific ways to diagnose the issues on your own website, how to prioritize those issues, and how to actually get the changes made in an affordable, fast, and simple way.

What Your Logo Designer Needs to Know About Your Business

name, given me a quick description of what they do, and then asked me to design a their logo.

When this happens, it feels like I'm throwing a dinner party and one of the guests has invited someone I don't know (maybe a new love interest or an out-of-town guest). They've told me the guest's name, but nothing about their personality, food preferences, or even what they prefer to drink. So I'm left guessing—and hoping—that the guest likes pork, drinks red wine, and doesn't mind if our frisky puppy jumps on them a bit when they walk in the door.

I've made these decisions about the dinner based on my preferences and personality and various assumptions but not on facts or information that I really should have about the guest. On the other hand, if I know in advance that the guest can't eat pork and that the sulfites in red wine gives them migraines, I can be prepared instead of having a hungry and disappointed guest.

If someone asks me to design a logo based on a tiny bit of information, then I have to make just as many assumptions about the personality of the business, its customers, and the owner's personal taste as I do in creating my hypothetical dinner. And the logo I design winds up being more about me and my preferences than about my client's business.

A business's logo should tell your business's story. It should capture its flavor and essence. But, to do that, your designer must have information. The more information you give to a designer, the more likely it is that their designs will accurately reflect your business. Instead of a slice of information, give your designer the whole pie.

Information that's really useful when designing a logo includes:

• The reason you chose your business name. Does it have special meaning or significance? 
  
  

The products or services that you provide. Be detailed—provide a sales sheet or summary of each of your offerings. Or pretend that your logo designer is a potential client. What do they need to know about your process and approach? 

Your competition. To create a logo that stands out, it's very helpful to know the specific companies you're competing against. Are there a couple of companies like yours you keep running into at networking events? Or that you keep writing proposals against? 

What makes your business stand out? Specifically, why would someone hire you instead of hiring another company like yours? 

Who do you work with? Who do you love to work with? 

What's problem(s) do you solve for your clients? What's the end result that they get from working with you? 

What are your goals with your clients? How do you help people? 

What personality do you want your business to convey? If people were to describe your business using 5 adjectives, which ones would you want them to use?

To get this information, many designers—myself included—have created a questionnaire or worksheet for you to fill out. Or they may interview you and ask you these questions. I prefer the worksheet method because writing things down gives you a chance to think about the answers to these questions. You can also set the questionnaire aside for a day or two and Òsleep on itÓ to make sure that the answers are really right for you.

If your designer hasn't asked these questions, make sure that they're planning to get this information some other way—through reading your website, reviewing your marketing materials, etc. And, if they're doing their research this way, then make sure your materials are up-to-date and really reflect your business as it is now.

However you get this information to your designer, it will help them create a logo that really shows what your business is all about and gives prospective clients a taste of your business's style. 

New Design Project: Connecticut Mediation Center

I recently completed the design and launch of this new website for a family law and divorce mediator in Connecticut, Angela Green.

We did a Mapquest integration, Paypal button integration, and a YouTube video streaming on one of the pages.

The full site can be viewed at http://www.ctmediationcenter.com

Color facts

Color iss a really powerful tool in your design arsenal.

• 62-90% of product assessment is based on color alone.
• Color increases brand recognition by up to 80% (especially if the color is used consistently across all marketing and media)
• Color can improve readership up to 40% (if your information looks good, then people are more likely to want to read it.
• Color increases comprehension by 73% (think about the impact that color makes on charts and graphs - an otherwise unintelligible black and white pie chart can make more sense in color)

Initial facts are from the Allegra Print and Imaging newsletter.

People buy based on both emotion and logic

Customers will buy your products or services for both emotional and logical reasons.

Your marketing has many components, and each is suited to both emotional and logical buying triggers. But, these components are often more well-suited to one or the other.

Design Layout: Logic. You need a logical design layout to make your marketing easy to process and to make it make sense.

Color Palette: Emotion. People make strong emotional connections with certain colors - they'll evoke a feeling or a memory for them. Play off some of the most common color meanings to get the most bang from your color palette.

Descriptive/ "Marketing" Text: Emotion. Think of the short text or voice script in commercials or print ads. This sort of text plays to the buyer's emotions - tries to create a scene, feeling, or to describe the benefits of whatever it is that you're selling.

Factual Text: Logic. Most longer marketing pieces - sales sheets, web pages, brochures, etc. - have to have some sort of factual text. Information about the features of your product 

Logo: A good logo appeals to both. Emotional is handled by the icon (in the way that it's drawn) and color palette. And logical is handled by the icon (which needs to make sense) and the company name.

Keeping these roles in mind can help you to create the most effective design and marketing materials.