A Client’s Guide to Working with Designers

I wrote this for the maxiwill blog, you can find the original post here.

Ask yourself what your problems are, not what your solution is

Designers provide a service, but in many ways, they are problem solvers within their field, just like you are within yours. Offer an expert your problem, and if they know how to, they’ll to solve it. Offer an expert your solution without making them aware of the problem, and they’ll either not solve it at all, or create more problems for you.

First off, know what you want to achieve, or what problem you have that needs to be solved. “I want a logo and a website” is not a marketing strategy, and nor is it demonstrating awareness of your business. “I’d like to raise brand awareness, and I think we should develop and expand our customer base” is more like it. “Customers don’t seem to respond to our marketing, How can we improve sales?” is also better than “We need a logo”. Decide what you want to achieve, identify your problem, and you’ll make your designer’s job a whole lot easier.

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This entry was written by xander, posted on March 10, 2010 at 6:21 pm, filed under Words and tagged business partnership, design, design techniques, entrepreneur, professional practice. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink.

Brand Identity for Entrepreneurs; Your Mother Lied to You

You know that saying, “don’t judge a book by it’s cover”? Unfortunately, people do. You never get a second chance to make a first impression. People judge others on their appearance first, and instinctively, someone’s face is the first thing you judge. You’re probably just as guilty of it as I am.

How about an analogy? If your business is a person, your logo is its face, and your brand identity is its clothing. People will judge you on it, and make their choices based upon it. Large businesses lose big if they make bad branding choices; Just look at the 2012 London Olympics, the Tropicana rebrand, or in the 90’s, “New” Coke.

Logo design is a specialised field of design. Successful logos should simultaneously communicate multiple business values, inform the consumer of the appropriate business sector, and should influence the target audience’s opinion. They should work as well in monochrome as they do in colour, and they should work as well on a business card or email footer as they do on a billboard. That’s a big ask. Get it wrong, and you can communicate all the wrong things. Get it right, get the consumer on your side, and the battle is all but won. (more…)

This entry was written by xander, posted on January 14, 2010 at 4:09 pm, filed under Words and tagged branding, entrepreneur, graphic design, logo. Leave a comment or view the discussion at the permalink.