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Blog posts tagged design
Is your design losing you business?
November 24, 2010
Most of us realise that great design can win us more business. And many of us invest in professional graphic design for our brochures, leaflets and website.
But what about the rest? What about that PowerPoint presentation you send to clients? How about leaflets you take to networking events? What about the checklist for businesses you’ve uploaded to your website?
If we accept that great design will engage, inspire and build trust with your customers (existing and prospective), what effect do you think bad design will have? You probably don’t need me to spell it out…
Many businesses design things in house. Even marketing executives at big blue chips design some pieces of collateral. And there’s nothing wrong with that. It can save time and money. But it’s those bits of collateral – your leaflet, your PowerPoint, your case studies or your self-designed blog – that can undermine your professionalism.
The bad news is that usually people don’t realise there is anything wrong with their designs. Oversized logos compete with standard colours and standard fonts to create a look that jars with all your well-produced work. The result? Your clients are confused and lack conviction in you.
It’s unrealistic to expect you to use a graphic designer for every piece of communication you produce, but you can learn some simple graphic design rules that you can apply to everything you do. And you can reduce the gap between the professionally produced stuff and your own stuff.
Do a bit of research into what makes design work. Read magazines, books (Robyn Williams’ The Non-Designer’s Design Book is excellent) and learn important from designs that inspire you. You can also find advice here on the Donut sites, too, of course.
Fiona Humberstone, Flourish design & marketing
Logo finished – what’s next?
March 23, 2010
Those of you that have been following the trials and tribulations of the development of a logo for Flourish, my new branding, graphic design and marketing services business, on this and my own blog know how much hard work we put into getting it right.
And those of you that can read between the lines probably know how much I wanted to just put the finished logo in a box and forget about it. Designing your own logo feels a little like childbirth – you’re pleased with the end result but you wouldn’t want to go through it again. Of course, most of us do forget the pain and go back for more!
So I chuckled to myself when a friend emailed me and asked: “Great, I see your logo’s done. What next?”
“Well where do I start?” I typed back. “Erm… the stationery, business cards, website design, exhibition stands, brand manual, email signatures, folder, postcards, ‘leave behind brochure’… I could go on, but you get the picture”.
Designing a logo is just the start of it. The impact comes from everything we do around the logo, the identity we build and the image we create.
Most small business owners will invest in having a logo designed, but they often don’t see through the whole process. They take the logo and throw together their own stationery, “knock out” some leaflets or take up that offer from a friend to design their website.
Their brand identity doesn’t reach its full potential and they miss the opportunity to create the best impression. At worst, the homemade designs undermine all the hard work they’ve invested and that hard-worked-for impression goes by the wayside.
It’s only by designing several pieces of marketing literature, perhaps a website or some stationery as well, that you can build up a true picture of what fonts, colours, imagery and illustration styles really work for your identity.
We’ve test-driven several fonts and illustration styles before we’ve settled on the ones we’re using. Why? Simply because, when you put them into practice you find some don’t work as well as you’d hoped.
And I’ve found that my “extra stuff” – the fonts, quirky illustrations and the photos we’ve used – are what I love more than the logo itself. It’s the “heart” stuff, the magic, which blends so well with the sensible “head” decision of my logo. But you can’t have one without the other.
So if you can afford it, you should definitely have your logo designed by a professional. But from experience, I’d also strongly recommend you set aside some budget for developing the whole identity. It will make such a difference in the long run.
Fiona Humberstone, Flourish design & marketing
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