Not Just Pretty | Building An Effective Small Business Brand

Why do-it-yourself design is sometimes less-than-successful

It may seem simple to design a logo, marketing materials or a website for your business. After all, you've seen billions of logos. And you see marketing materials and websites every day.

So, you know what looks cool, and what you like to look at, right? So, you can just take what looks cool, and combine that with what you like to look at, and transform that into your marketing stuff?

There are a couple of issues with that:

1. What looks cool is typically based on trends. And, trends aren't a great way to design your small business's materials, because trends typically come and go over the course of a small business's life cycle. You want to build a brand that will last - and that won't look dated or out-of-fashion in a couple of years, or even a decade. You'll be basing all of your business's marketing on the designs that you create - and if you spend a few years with one look, and then suddenly change it all, you can lose your customers' trust quickly.

2. Brand design is actually based on more than what looks good. The best brands are based on creating designs that connect with your best customers. Creating that connection is based on symbology - the language of what shapes and symbols mean to a customer - and psychology - how your customers' minds work, and what associations they immediately and subconsciously make. You want to pick shapes, symbols, colors and fonts that are directly connected to the message that you want to communicate to your audience. And, unless you really study both your business and the elements of design, translating your business's Brand Definition into these shapes and colors can be really challenging.

A brand designer can make the process of creating a brand that won't fall apart when the trends change and that will communicate with your best customers easy for you - and can let you concentrate on running your business and creating products or providing your service!

7 Tips for Amateur Type Designers

Here's a great set of tips from Seth Godin on using typography well in your designs - this is a great few things to know if you design your own materials - Word documents, PowerPoint presentations, flyers, web pages, etc.

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2008/06/7-tips-for-amat.html

Large-format Trifold Brochure

Here's a trifold brochure that I created for Women In Consulting. I head their design committee.

This is a larger-than-normal trifold brochure; instead of folding out to 8.5" x 11", it folds out to 14 inches wide, which gives more real estate for copy.

My big fat website update

So, I spent a bunch of time this weekend updating the portfolio over at my website. Especially these sections:

Web Design
Blog Design
Stationery Set Design

And, I just thought someone ought to know about it.

Thanks for listening!

What Order To Design In? Part 2

Once you have your Brand Definition, Logo and Business Card, here are the next steps for a small business to consider:

4. Do you need a letterhead? Not all small businesses will need a letterhead as a first step, but some will. It all depends on how you plan to correspond with your customers. If you do want to create a letterhead, then think about whether you'll want to have sheets preprinted, or if you'd rather have your letterhead as a digital file in Word, that you can print out one sheet at a time. If you only print letters occasionally, and email more often, a Word letterhead may be all you need. And, you can use the header from your Word letterhead in Quickbooks, to brand your invoices.

5. Web site. These days, a website is going to be an important part of your marketing and sales strategy. I recommend that a small business start their business literature by creating their site, because it's a great way to work out the text for your other printed marketing materials (there's nothing worse than ordering 1000 brochures and realizing that they don't really say what you want them to!) The text on a website is easy to change, so you can test different messages out before committing to print.

Additionally, a website gives you an active piece of marketing collateral. The website's going to be out in the world, answering prospects' questions, which makes your sales cycle easier. And, if it's Search Engine Optimized well, the site will in new prospects also.

6. Printed collateral. Sales sheets, brochures, packaging, etc. should be the last pieces that you design. And, what you need will depend on how you're planning to market and promote your business. If you plan this section carefully, and make sure that you design pieces that you'll use (meaning that you'll give them out instead of letting them gather dust in your office) and that your prospects will read (instead of throwing them in the trash. So, think of marketing pieces that are going to be helpful to your prospects, so that you'll get the most benefit from giving them out!

What Order To Design In?

For a small business, the order that you design your materials in is as important as what you design and how you design it. Here's my recommendation:

1. Define Your Brand. This is a step that often gets skipped, but will help your entire design process go smoothly. You need to define what your business is all about, what you do, and who you want to work with, so that your marketing materials can be designed in a focused and appropriate way.

2. Logo Design. Your logo should go on all of your marketing materials, and you want all of your materials to match your logo as well – so you have to design it first! It’s worth the investment to do this step first instead of saving it for later. Doing this step first will give your materials a polished and finished look that will make your company look established, stable and successful – which makes your company easier for new clients to hire.

3. Business Card. Designing a business card is the next key – so that you’ll have these ready to give to new clients to get them in the door. If you’re looking to save money, then you might want to print your cards digitally instead of on a traditional press, so that you can get good-looking cards that don’t break the bank.