Occasionally clients will tell me that they don’t get any business from their website because their prospects don’t use Google to find them. This is especially true in more industrial enterprises. It may be the case that your target audience doesn’t use a search engine to find your services, but they’ll use your site to…
Design is all about order – glorious order! But there is some truth in the old saying about creative minds being messy minds. After all, whether you’re a designer or baker of whimsical cupcakes, if you’re a creative entrepreneur, your mind is (hopefully) filled to overflowing with a constant stream of brilliant ideas. So how…
Where do design trends come from? We designers certainly spark our fair share. And designers, in turn, are influenced by other artists, by entertainers, by fashion and music. We’re influenced by preferences and pop culture. But the influence goes deeper. When we as people respond to Beyonce’s new video or to Apple’s new iPhone, it’s…
While your brand represents your business story, if done well it also becomes representative of your audience’s stories. For many Americans, McDonald’s is a fixture of childhood happiness that makes it difficult to disentangle from the brand (even when you know it’s not good for you). It’s too entrenched in memories of kiddie birthday parties…
You are a designer. I can hear some protests now. You might argue that you’re not a designer. You’re a baker or a marketer or the owner of a small retail shop. After all, design is something professional designers do. Engineers. Inventors. Architects. Nevertheless, you are a designer.
Achieving success as a designer in a crowded market is enough to make any graphic artist giddy. You’ve put in the time. You’ve earned a reputation for professionalism, skill, and ingenuity. You’ve got more projects lined up than you know what to do with. Which is the only real drawback to success. And it can…
On Broadway and in Hollywood, the true nature of a story emerges on carefully constructed sets. Lighting and artfully engineered backdrops create atmosphere. The subtle scoring that underlies each scene establishes mood. Actors’ actions and reactions, tone and costume, reveal motivations and morals. By the end of a powerful show, the audience has aligned themselves…
This is the most important virtue for a designer to possess. Discipline is the god of design that governs every aspect of a project… Without it, it is total anarchy, total randomness, pure chaos. Discipline is the attitude that helps us discern right from wrong and guides us to achieve consistency of language in whatever…
Today, Valentine’s Day is celebrated in many countries around the world. It’s hard to ignore it even if you don’t celebrate it. I decided to look into the story behind this major marketing holiday to get a better understanding of where it came from, how it originated and how it evolved into the marketing products…