bonus all right welcome everybody
another hangout super excited to have
you on with me here today I’ve got Mike
Smith with me from Aweber Mike welcome
aboard thanks thanks for having me mike
is a designer at a weber and for those
of you this might be your first time
checking us out we’re doing a monthly
series where various people from Aweber
kind of joining in to answer some
entrepreneurial questions they do email
marketing software and I’ve been using
them for my newsletters for the past ten
plus years so I guess a lot of designs
that have come from Mike I’ve seen as a
customer uh so yeah Mike does a lot of
the the designs there and he is a
passion for design and branding and kind
of art direction Mike you have a just
quick intro beyond what I said and then
we’ll get into the questions ya like
like Evan said one of the designers here
at Aweber a lot of my role is now moving
the design forward so I’ve been fear for
almost three years and we’ve grown a lot
in those three years as far as our
design language is concerned and and
trying to continue to push that forward
so yeah it’s a lot of fun I love it so
the way that blob works here is if you
guys have a question you can type in /q
space and then type your question in and
it’ll show up on the side and as we get
to them i will try to answer them and
get through as many as we can because
that’s we’re here to do today is help
help you guys with branding and building
your business so let’s pop in on on the
first one now J reyez I’m popping the
question up on the screen here I know he
knows I know he loves a lot about design
and branding and if you saw the pre-chat
he’s been dishing a lot of wisdom and
knowledge about branding so when he’s
asking here does making a brand pop
really matter you know I think that’s
more for entrepreneurs how do you tell
an entrepreneur that who’s just trying
to get sales and try to get something
coming in the door and they’re
struggling to pay the bills that they
need to focus on design instead of you
know pick up the phone and trying to
make a sales call sure yeah I mean both
are incredibly important you can’t
obviously run a business without any
sales however I really do think that if
you don’t stand out
the market in some way you’re just going
to blend in like every other company so
those are the L that’s kind of the area
where popping is important you know I
like to think of branding and the visual
aspects and company objectives as
working together not against each other
so if you think of like a double helix
like a DNA strand one strand is your is
your company objectives your goals and
things like that the other strand is
your brand so the kind of work
hand-in-hand and I don’t I don’t and
this may just be me you know touting
this but I don’t think you can really do
one without the other both are integral
to the success of a business so what in
your mind how do you make a brand pop
how do you you know what are the
elements for people who may not be as
versed in design you know they don’t
have a Mike Smith on board on their team
kind of helping guide their direction
one of the things that they need to
worry about or focus on to to make the
brand stand at ya consistency is is key
if you’re constantly putting out pieces
that look completely different than each
other you’re not going to build a brand
identity of brand vision so consistency
is huge you know you making it pop stand
out you know you could say bright colors
you could say really bold graphics but
if that’s not who you are as a company
then that’s not going to speak to you so
making it pop is like staying true to
who you are figure out who that is and
then look for inspiration that speaks to
that and just consistently put that out
over and over again in unique ways in
traditional ways you know whatever that
is you can really get yourself out there
um toppings like a relative term you
know if I’m not interested in your
business your information may never pop
to me right so is there so for an
entrepreneur who you know it’s really
good at what they do but may not have a
sense of design or branding how do they
how do they get started on that process
you know so as an example I own one of
my business
studio so I have the I own the largest
dance studio in probably North America
so say I’m just really good at dance and
I just want to teach people how to dance
how do i turn that into a brand that
will pop and attract attention yeah and
I think every business should go through
an exercise of figuring out what i call
the three P’s and that’s your purpose
your position and your personality you
know purpose being high level like why
are we here what are we doing this
business for so for your dance studio
you know figuring out what the what you
want your dance studio to stand for so
that’s your purpose your position then
is what is unique to your dance studio
that would make you stand out from all
the other Dance Studios in North America
and then what are those personality
traits that then give you that feel of
and and and vibe of your particular
dance studio so when you when you build
those three things together and pull
everything back to those three it
becomes an easier to be consistent time
and time again interesting okay so so
just kind of walking down that path I
like those three steps of purpose
position and personality for for this
school just as an example the purpose is
to give people a sense of community and
to have fun so most people don’t come to
the dance student learn how to dance
they’re coming because they’re you know
they hate their jobs and think this
might be like the best part of their
week is coming to learn how to dance and
release some stress and make some
friends and community so if that’s kind
of why people are coming then how do I
figure out the next steps in terms of
brand and I think it could be helpful
just for people watching to go through a
real life scenario yeah so I mean
knowing that that’s why people are
coming is not just to learn dance but to
take a break you can really play up that
in all of the materials that you put out
so you wouldn’t want to have your
traditional you know little girls in
tutus lined up against a balance beam
kind of ballet studio types
you could go a completely other end of
the spectrum where it’s like you know uh
much more adults people having a lot of
fun you want to emphasize a lot of you
know smiling faces and all that kind of
stuff because that is core to why people
are coming to your particular dance
studio and what they’re getting from it
so to share that sense of feeling in a
visual way is really what you’re trying
to convey you know whether that’s done
through photographs or iconography or
color or even you know the creative
headlines that you use you know that’s
what’s important to to convey and
communicate are there are there so I
love your three P’s there aren’t there
you talked about icons a little bit and
you know logos and fonts and colors are
there is there another list of like here
are the 10 things or five things you got
to focus on as you’re building your
brand the kind of general buckets for
people to pay attention to uh yes and no
yes in a sense that there are generally
the same things for every company to be
aware of but since each company is
unique those things can be tweaked and
altered just a little bit so to build
off of my three P’s I have this great
thing that I developed and I think it
helps a lot of people understand how to
take those three P’s and then apply them
to the brand so if you think of those
three P’s that’s like the center of a
target so the bullseye those are your
your core identity who you are you
always come back to those things as this
is our you know once again our position
our personality and our purpose and just
outside of that the next ring of this
target is your brand elements so that
would be things like your logo your
colors your photography style your
illustration style all of that kind of
stuff and then the ring outside of that
is the application of those things so
how does your logo get applied to all of
the elements that you put out how are
the colors applied and that those become
things like your mailers or your
facebook ads or your website and all of
that kind of stuff so that’s kind of the
framework and structure that I like to
think of when thinking of brand and
application I love it have you guys
turned that into like an infographic
uh internally interact and we’re
actually working with each team to
develop what does that team so our
mobile team I just didn’t exercise with
them and determining what are the mobile
team elements and application for their
particular thing and that bullseye once
again stays consistent across every team
so for for for a larger team that’s
applicable for a small team you know you
may only end up with one bullseye target
right that that’s pretty cool man uh you
know I don’t know I don’t know if you’re
open to it but I’d love to be able to
share some version of that with people
watching is like a tick away yeah yeah
definitely i can send you over something
recently i just saw Ryan ask does a were
actually use those it’s something that
we’re starting to use more recently so
we haven’t fully fleshed all of them out
but there are a few that have been
floating around and we’re letting those
influence our decisions moving forward
cool okay and so uh it might send me
something overall added to the
description of the video that we put on
YouTube figure I still kind of check out
and download like that doesn’t be a
super practical helpful piece yeah
awesome ah great so let’s move on to
Rishi ricci Cup TV my brain is both
silly and serious I’m not sure how to
capture both through design any ideas
yes so going back to and probably on
references a lot going back to the
target you know your personality traits
can be both silly and serious or maybe
you’re selling a serious thing but you
want your approached a bit too to be a
bit silly um you can’t accomplish that
and I was looking through the pre-chat
someone said Pixar is a good example of
that it’s kind of a serious ish company
but they their application are are very
silly you know their movies are silly
their characters are silly but you
wouldn’t say that overall Pixar is a
silly company because they’re very
successful so there’s got to be some
elma business realm of business
seriousness to that who I think I Rishi
cup is a long time kind of your
subscriber she’s been on all the Aweber
chats that we’ve done uh she has a
youtube channel and she has a
combination of
her sharing what she’s doing with her
friends it’s kind of a vlog but there’s
also her singing and her unique she says
she’s a songwriter and she has days
where she sings her songs she uses the
cup as part of her branding so you can
see in her purity she’s got the cup and
sometimes we know we’ll ask her what’s
in the cup today so whatever she’s
healing so is their advice for so if her
focus is kind of focused on YouTube
there is their advice for her on how she
can so if you even look at her you look
at her name you’ll get her picture you
look at her colors is their advice you
could give her on what she’s doing now
without I mean you haven’t seen her
videos and got you all her materials but
even as she’s branding herself now that
first impression what comes across yeah
that concept of a cup oh man you could
take that so many cool ways and whether
that cup is consistent and you overlay
things on top of it or each day each
mood each thing gets another different
cup thrift store is a great resource for
that so if you’re doing YouTube videos
you go to the thrift store buy a whole
bunch of twenty-five cent mugs or you
know tea cups or whatever and each day
within your YouTube thing have a cup
that relevant that relates to you know
what the topic is so like if it’s
serious maybe you have like a very
floral and like serious toile kind of
mug or if it’s like a lot of fun get
like a quirky mug that’s one approach to
take I think it could be a lot of fun if
you want to have a consistent cup though
that doesn’t necessarily apply if it’s
that white mug I see that you have in
your in your photo maybe that’s not the
direction to go but that’s a way to keep
seriousness fun silly you know all of
that yeah and so is interesting because
we’re having a conversation a couple
months ago I think about her branding
and and she almost dropped the cup she’s
like I don’t know if I should keep the
cup or not or should just be my name and
everyone’s kind of encouraging to keep
the cup and she really likes it I like
I’m yeah I mean I think it could also be
even if you’re keeping the same cup and
every episode could be what you put in
right there where you actually put in
like if you’re drinking coffee or if
you’re drinking beer if you’re drinking
water based on your mood or even just
as a metaphor like hey my cup was filled
with love today or my cup is filled with
with anger today or my cup is filled
with whatever right like you couldn’t
choose you I love it of having different
cups but if the white cup is you’re
always your thing then you can either
with actual liquid inside or with you
know in theory you know your your
emotions inside think it could be cool
way to express it yeah and it would be a
fun element of surprise cuz like you
don’t know what’s going to be in there
and then as you pan up you find out you
know oh it’s filled with glitter today
you throw the glass I want to know Rishi
what’s in your cup today right it’s like
we’re looking forward to it every day I
would watch just to find out what’s in
the cup there you go there’s some
Brandon in action so it’s good and so
she’s got in her name Ricci kept TV and
she’s got it in her picture as well um
cool cool okay let’s go let’s go to the
next one Jennifer price another longtime
loyal viewer what do you think is the
one thing to start with to help create a
signature look / design for your brand
the best represent your values and biz
yeah and going back to the 3 p’s again
you start with that bullseye and let
that inform what you how you apply it so
I would say you know in branding a lot
things are getting more and more similar
so find other things out there that you
that inspire you that speak to you and
speak to what your bullseye is and then
take those and put your own unique twist
on it so don’t just steal it straight up
but take ideas and thoughts and images
you’ve seen that you like bring them in
see if they align to your personality
traits then take those personality
traits and tweak the the images and
stuff that you found to make it you
that’s the best place I could suggest to
start and then just be consistent after
that cool cool the metric that I used to
the methodology I use is more through
finding your one word this relates to
purpose I guess for me so mine is
believe I can find the one word that
they kind of resonate best with and then
in terms of Cretan design and elements
you look at a logo right my logo is here
it’s a paper airplane because I believe
in entrepreneurs and when you’re
starting up as an entrepreneur you want
to fly but you’re also super frail and
weak and like you can get blown around
and you don’t have the you know tons of
money from venture capitalists and but
you’re still going to go off and chase
your dream and so starting with your one
word or starting with your purpose and
then saying okay well how do i create a
logo around that and how do i then
create you know the font has meaning
like the fun is here for a specific
purpose it could be a lot more fun or
could be a lot more serious you know you
see the walt disney font that means
something or if you have the army fought
that means something and so starting
with the purpose or mike is the one word
can help integrate into every design
aspect of your print yeah it goes back
to the rationale so you can have you
know any any element but if you don’t
have a reason as to why you chose your
one word or the reason why you chose the
paper airplane for your logo you know
that’s really what’s what score to that
idea is having that rationale behind
things cool now i’m curious to find your
first impression because because
jennifer has been on before and I know
her uh Jennifer is a copywriter okay and
so you see her face there you see her
icon and you see her name is this as
much what what do you get what are your
first impressions from a branding point
of view from what she’s done with her
her naming and her picture right um this
as much probably means a lot more if I
were to visit her site so right now i
don’t i don’t know whole about this as
much but it is unique so that’s good you
know that that would cause me to stop
and be like what does this as much like
why is she calling yourself this as much
and then i would want to find out more
so that is awesome um being in
copywriter I think her using her own
face if so there are a lot of
solopreneurs or small businesses where
you’re a service oriented company and
your face or your image becomes your
brand image as well so
it becomes hard to separate yourself
from it I think Evan you’ve done a great
job in creating this believe and this is
paper airplane but just as much Jennifer
could use you know her her avatar as
long as it’s consistent across a lot of
things as her her brand image and people
get familiar with her face then they
become familiar with her so it is an
approach to take and I think it’s a very
valid and good approach to take a lot of
times because it humanizes the brand as
well it’s not like Oh someone’s writing
your copy for me for you it’s no
Jennifer this face in my avatar is
writing a copy for you right yeah I
think it’s one of the biggest advantages
that you have as an entrepreneur is your
story and the human element is if I
could hire a big company versus hiring a
small company the big company has all
the respect and the name that I know and
a lot of traditions so why would I go
with a start-up unless they were cheaper
you know you’re going to go with
somebody who’s smaller because you like
their story in your passion and so many
entrepreneurs if you look at their
website they’re trying to emulate the
big guys it’s just like this boring
corporate website you go to the about
page there’s no pictures there’s no
story of the founder it’s super boring
and like you know you can point form
because that’s what you think you need
to be professional but you can’t compete
with those big guys playing their game
your way in is just tell the heart like
to show your passion for what you do and
that’s how you start winning and and be
able to charge more because you feel
like this person really understands that
this person really is excited and not
just hiding behind a corporate story
yeah do you do you touch on that I know
like do you consider that part of design
like that the storytelling component or
do you tell stores who design but how do
you guys deal with that in Aweber I do I
think that really awesome designers are
trying to communicate something and so
they need to use whatever means possible
to communicate that story and so
sometimes it’s stripping away all of the
design elements and letting the word
speak for themselves or stripping away
all of the frills and and and nonsense
from time to time and letting the image
p
for itself so you know I I see myself as
a storyteller um and that applies in a
multitude of ways whether i’m working on
a marketing project or you know aweber
being a technology company working on
our sit our service itself you know the
dashboards and the interactive elements
and things like that but even then
you’re telling the story so yeah I see
it as incredibly important and I spend a
lot of time in my current role I spend a
lot of time thinking more than I do
actually designing how is this going to
apply how are people going to respond to
this and we’re telling the right story
we’re putting forward the right face and
all that kind of stuff so when just out
of curiosity when you guys are planning
a campaign if you’re working on see you
we’re going on YouTube video are you
working on newsletter you know you’re
going to send your Aweber sending their
own newsletter out to their clients yeah
obviously you’re a part of that because
they need you to design something
amazing yet who else is involved in what
are the roles and how do you talk about
what’s the thought process before you
actually get to actually creating the
content and the design for the
newsletter yeah um that’s a really good
question we have we have a really solid
team our team consists of content
writers traditional marketers web
designers visual designers all of that
so generally our process goes we figure
out what we need to communicate and who
we need to communicate to as like an
overarching idea and then we’ll take the
time and the content writer will come up
with a copy and so here are the words
that we’re trying to communicate and
then the design team will take that and
go and run with you know so how can we
take these words and make it most
compelling most interesting and the most
useful too however the person is
receiving it and there’s a lot of
collaboration within that I made that
seem like a I hand it off to you you
hand it off to me you know it’s we’re
all working together along the way to
figure out what is the best way to
communicate to the audience we’re trying
to I love it and then I mean
we’re talking about newsletters in
Aweber for for clients who are then
planning their own email campaigns is
something I do yeah I sent two emails a
week to my newsletter list you know as a
solo entrepreneur for most entrepreneurs
or they may have seen Oh some part-time
staff but assume it’s just them uh they
may not have like five people to
collaborate and connect with and figure
out what the emails going to look like
you know what what process would you go
through to say okay i want to send an
email out I’m fighting my autoresponder
sequence is what I’m you know setting up
my you ever counting and apply my
autoresponder so you can see the next
ten weeks that goes out what should my
thought process be in terms of figuring
to what stores i want to tell and then
bring that down to the tactical of okay
headlines colors nail goes pictures yeah
hopefully a lot of that so if you’re new
starting out first time doing your
newsletter all of that is a task that
you have to accomplish it’s it’s a
challenge and you have to figure out all
right how am I going to communicate
within the inbox visually to my readers
so ideally you’re only focusing on that
may be the first few times and then
after that it’s just consistent and you
you can focus on the writing and all of
that stuff but you know asking questions
all along the way how is this going to
look on a desktop device how is it going
to look at on someone’s phone you know
am I am I needing to convey this with
imagery so what images do i need to add
and at what point throughout my
newsletter should i add them or is it
simply words and the images are just
going to distract entirely from my
message um you know i personally follow
a very simple structure when it comes to
sending out emails and that’s if it’s
for a business logo at the top and then
if there’s imagery that’s going to
support what i’m going to talk about or
catch someone’s attention image and then
text occasionally images throughout but
you know all of those elements within
the body of the email could go in or out
depending
on you know how personal do you want
this to look you want it to look like a
letter do you want this massive email
sending to thousands of people look like
it was a personal email that I sent you
well then you should probably steer
clear of imagery altogether to have that
more like personal email touch if you’re
selling something you should probably
show what you’re selling within the
email so it’s very case-by-case basis
but asking all of those questions as you
go through on who am i sending this to
and what do I want them to do with what
I’ve said cool I think too it’s never
been easier to uh not be a designer and
still get great designs yeah if you use
so if you use like an a weber for your
newsletter they have templates that
maybe you might have it a role in
designing and planning that has the
colors and pictures and all of that that
you can easily put in or if you’re
starting the website you can use
wordpress and there’s lots of themes for
you to do that and you don’t have to
create everything yourself or spend tons
of money necessarily hiring somebody but
you may not have when you’re starting up
so you can also leverage the tools that
are out there yeah to help you get great
designs without you having to spend the
time to learn it and be a designer
yourself and there are a lot of like
low-cost ways to do that as well so the
envato marketplace is a place where you
can buy email templates and then kind of
customize them and you need a little bit
of HTML knowledge to be able to do that
but i know a weber does this offers a
template customization for you know like
twenty nine dollars or something so you
could easily be like hey i love this
template i’m not sure how to fix it hey
you guys help me out and we could you
know our customer support team is
awesome and they’ll be able to easily
help you guys out so um yeah right
thanks for not know this I’m writing it
down template customization yes alright
very cool what was the other one you say
the end what was a lot of truth envato
Orion actually posted it in the chat
there on the side envato com there you
go perfect and co and that integrates
with Aweber uh no that would just be a
place to go find
some templates you would need HTML
knowledge then to be able to edit it
yourself but you could paste that into a
weber once you’re done with it okay cool
that’s getting 102 I mean you know with
the updated HTML files compared to just
design it from scratch yeah is way way
easier yeah and a lot of times they
include like PSD files in there so if
you wanted to just mess around if you
add Photoshop and you wanted to mess
around before getting into the code you
could do it that way as well I’m
learning something new I love it okay
let’s keep moving we got Nathan Nathan
fellow Toronto entrepreneur my brand is
serious clean tech company that
innovates I’m not sure how to capture
through design that could make it easy
to understand our company to customers
from a website any ideas Thanks telling
a story of our company I don’t know
Nathan but in in the previous just
before we started we were chatting and
he has a he wants to do green technology
for cell phones so you can charge your
cell phones with green power so how to
make that easy to understand and tell
the story through design yeah I wouldn’t
necessarily even consider that too
serious or who doesn’t have to be
serious um but because there’s that
innovative element to it so there’s
there’s so much imagery whether it be
through you know showing the green side
of things or showing the technology side
of things and charging and phones and
different things like that yeah I mean
there are so many ways to go with this
you know if you want to stand out from
the crowd I would encourage you to not
just put a bunch of trees on your
website because that could be any
company so you know figure out what your
unique selling proposition is and then
what personality you want your company
to have and then build off of that you
know allow allow that to dictate how
your website ends up looking I think you
go a lot of different directions there’s
just idea after idea spinning in my head
well for the I me for the story of the
company it was come in the last part of
the questions like why is this important
to you Nathan yeah right why this is
matter so much why do you care about
green technology and cell phones so much
like if you told me a personal story
that i can say man that that guy really
cares because there’s so many companies
are going to be pitching similar things
but then if i feel like you have the
heart you’re not just some scam artists
trying to capitalize on an opportunity
but you let you actually care trying to
build something important that would
resonate with me and I’d be kind of
drawn into your story a lot more and and
I think for a lot of people were trying
to this might be more than like the
wording Park a lot of people worry about
getting the exact words like I’m not a
copywriter I can’t write until they end
up not doing it the intention is in my
view way more important in the actual
words like if people can feel your
passion and if you said say the wrong
thing but you don’t use the exact right
word it doesn’t matter as much because
the intention of the passion is coming
through that’s much more what you want
and so I wouldn’t let the fear of not
knowing the exact words to say hold you
back from writing a passionate story to
put on on your website yeah and I think
your story would separate you from maybe
others within your you know space
because it is so personal to you cool ah
John what are some ways a brand can
differentiate from looking too much like
Instagram even though the content is
displayed rather similar um that’s
interesting question are I don’t know if
John is still here if he can clarify any
of this but are you a mobile app company
or I guess you know there’s a desktop
you too um native jontron I still hear
John if you want to throw you’ve got a
native app yeah um that’s a really
that’s a really tough question because
the web and apps are starting to look
more and more and more alike and so you
go and you look at something and the
most popular one becomes the one that
everyone’s like oh you’re just copying X
or you’re just copying why I would say
don’t worry about it if that is the best
way to present the information or the
imagery or whatever you’re trying to
convey then uh find ways to
differentiate yourself from them but i
use the best best method possible to
still communicate that so even if you’re
going to be similar it may not be the
end of the world because you know that
may just be the best way to present that
kind of information or those kind of
pictures yeah I look at this question I
think so he’s asking what are some ways
a brand difference from looking too much
like Instagram I’d be I’m more concerned
with how are you how are you actually
different than Instagram not just like
not just looking different but how is
your company different than Instagram
and understanding that first right going
back to the purpose or going back to
your one word how is your business
different than everything else not just
Instagram just everything else out there
how are you different and then you can
worry about what the visual ends up
looking like and so I think we’re
struggling on the question because we
don’t know much about your business so
your native app that looks like
Instagram you haven’t told us about your
purpose your position your personality
your one word you know why you’re doing
this and so it’s kind of hard to answer
and I think just as a general rule as
you’re communicating and telling people
about what you’re doing leading with
that instead then generates interest and
excitement and the ability to kind of
dive deeper and help so I I would echo
Mike’s point to say that I don’t know
that matters that much about how you
look different than an Instagram because
there’s a lot of websites that might
look like other websites adds a lot of
people who will copy things that I’m
doing in my youtube channel i don’t i
don’t care about them like you can’t you
know for people who are copying you
never the original right the original in
my view lease is always going to be
better because i’m always innovating I’m
always doing something new there’s the
heart and soul and intention behind it
and the Google Cochran it’s all going to
do that and then they can’t innovate
they can’t keep up and they don’t have
the the innovative capacity to keep
going and so in a round right wing
coming back to how was your business
actually different what do you staying
for John your business right because
then we could have maybe tied it into a
little bit more of a helpful
conversation he says a follow up there
what about the color being used we want
to use blue to establish trust but I
don’t want it to look too much like IG
Instagram yeah I mean blue is not the
only trustworthy color you know there is
psychology to colors and and their their
value and things like that if it’s a
concern that you’re going to look too
much like them and your app is too
similar to them and then you’re going to
use a color that’s just like them i
would say consider like what what about
your app is is different and play that
up and make sure that it becomes you
know different enough from instagram as
a whole to to differentiate yourself I
wouldn’t stay away from blue because
Instagram uses blue I wouldn’t stay away
from instagrams layout because Instagram
uses instagrams layout I would say what
makes you different at your core and
then allow that to dictate dictate
everything else about you know your
colors your look your logo all of that
its gotta end color question was also
asked a little bit before Deborah wrote
in asking about colors so can you just
touch on that colors what they mean
picking a color you know why Aweber has
its colors or what entrepreneurs should
think about when picking a color as
opposed to just oh I like pink so I’m
gonna go pink like there’s meaning and
significance and a color is itself a
language yeah each color and you can you
can google this like what do colors mean
each color has a psychological effect on
humans as well as you know subconscious
effects on humans so they begin to stand
for different things they begin to
communicate different things some
companies have gone so far as to patent
certain colors like t-mobile has
patented their pink color for but they
can only patent their pink color within
the mobile phone space of you know
businesses so you know as you do think
through it think through who else is in
my space so if Instagram is in your
space like John’s question and your app
is very similar to them well if you use
a blue color just like they’re using a
blue color you may not differentiate
differentiate yourself enough from them
so blue might not be the best choice
even though it may be your favorite
color or it may engender trust you have
to consider all of the different aspects
when going to choose a color so am I
going to be different enough are there
other people in my space that are using
this color and will I be able to
differentiate myself um so beyond just
the psychology of color you have to
consider all of those things as well
cool ah Peter what are your thoughts on
using terms like biz and for you if it’s
your personality do it um you know it
might be a little past its prime I
probably would not do it but if it fits
your personality and you can own it then
own it and do it yeah I think I think
there’s a certain stigma against the for
you when I think of for you I feel like
I’m being scammed I feel like there’s
just so many people who the people who
have used it there’s no like big brand
that really dominated an added class to
for you and you could be the for you
that adds the class um anyway I don’t
know I feel like I’m being scammed
what’s happening but even even biz like
I don’t I haven’t really used biz much
unless I’m trying to shorten something
down in Twitter as an example so I think
it just depends on on on as Mike said
your personality and also your audience
so Rosalyn is posting a rappers used for
you all the time in their songs and it’s
part of the culture awesome you know I’m
obviously not a ingrained in rap culture
enough to comment on that
but if that’s the culture right and
that’s who you’re selling to and they
get it and like they feel like you
understand them too and you’re part of
the same family then then it works ah if
it’s not so like if you’re going to go
all in on rap culture and and your
marketing and your brain and your logos
and your font like all kind of
represents rap culture then great it
could work if you’re trying to be if
you’re trying to do like be I don’t know
bees you’re trying to sell newsletter
software and you’re telling yourself
newsletters for you to a business market
that might seem a little scam you at
least that’s my initial class so that’s
it Peter I want to know what you’re
selling Peter give us some context one
stea he wrote on the side a colleague is
trying to drive the business in that
direction and I’m trying to resist
that’s exactly how I feel yeah I think I
may have met Peter before Peter you are
you in the philly area I don’t know if
that’s a question you want to answer but
I feel like we met at a meetup one time
hippy cool okay Tom Tom do I build a new
website or do I put up a website that I
had to develop recreate that in my
opinion looks like crap awesome um if
you don’t believe in it and you can’t
get behind it I would say don’t put it
live there’s a rough balance I I tend to
want to put things out that I’m
incredibly proud of that I can get
entirely behind but if that prevents you
from just doing something then that’s
when it’s going to hinder you so if the
website doesn’t poorly represent you and
you just personally hate it and it’s
preventing you from starting your
business then I say just do it just put
it out there if it’s going to be a poor
representation of who you are your
personality going back to that bullseye
in that case i would say hold off revise
it to where you’re happy enough with it
and then put it out
soul some UK is saying that that’s like
using another person’s dating profile um
you know I’m a big believer and that you
have to be proud of what you’re creating
you know you need to I want to create
something this was the mindset it take
to when I’m making my youtube videos
yesterday was filming day and you know I
want my videos to be something I can
hang my hat on and say I made this and I
could show my grandkids and say this is
what grandpa Evan made you know when I
was in my prime this is what I put that
right and so I think a lot of people
just mail it in like that’s okay you
know put it up and I get it because
you’ve got a million things to do this
is one of them ah but I feel like you
should you should release something that
you’re proud of and and especially
prison like a website does you the
visual representation of your brain you
have to look at that every day and every
day that you look at that you’re going
to get upset and more and more angry
that that is there and the one that you
wanted isn’t and I think sometimes it
can be hard because you may have
invested a lot of resources and time and
energy and you hire just developer maybe
that was all the budget you had for your
business and you poured it into this guy
and he didn’t deliver a great product
since you feel like I gotta put this up
now because of all this money but it’s
really a sunk cost and and you know on
my team we throw away more stuff than
most people even create it’s just insane
the amount of awesome stuff that we
create that we never use or we put up
when do once and just will throw it away
to go after something even better and so
don’t let that like sunk cost hold you
back from creating something that you
can be proud of and can be the visual
visual representation of your brand yeah
he did say is a current business so I
would say you know hold off put
something you’re proud about to put
something out that you’re proud about
cool yeah and again the some questions
that I see the icj your eyes is doing an
awesome job posting for people if you
have a question you could do /q space
and then type the questioning of a
pop-up on the side for us but thank you
jr eyes for posting some for us so this
one came from katra i have my own
clothing label where I designed and
handcraft each piece my background the
story is very unique
my designs reflect that how do you
embrace that without confusing my
audience asked by katra yet tell that
story end to end and then once your
story is written and a piece each unique
piece fits into the story let people
know where that fits in and what the
influence is through your you know your
timeline were so you know if something
happened in your life here and this
piece is inspired by that thing well
make mention back to where that was and
what the inspirations were so I don’t
think that I don’t think it will be
confusing at all if you tell a cohesive
story about who you are and then how
those pieces fit back into who hat into
that story I think it will be very
cohesive in it and a very compelling
story yeah for anybody who’s creating
art you know I see clothes in his art
yeah there’s a lot of love that goes
into that i would i would have two
stories i would have one for the company
like you matthew why did you start this
business I know Matthew could use a
comment from my youtube channel uh why
was this important why did you get
started what’s the positive change you
know what’s your purpose what’s your one
word what are you staying for all the
stuff we’ve been talking about and then
for each piece because because he
doesn’t have a million different pieces
right ever this is like some high-end
stuff a lot of love and effort went into
creating each design uh tell me the
story of that design right tell me why
you created this piece or which artist
you work with on this piece and why it’s
important even if there’s like
behind-the-scenes pictures if you were
making a door like a time-lapse video or
even a YouTube video if you just sharing
your thoughts I think I think that’ll
work to really draw me in I think
artists as a general rule don’t do a
good enough job of explaining what their
art means to them and the process that
went into it might be easy to to to
digest like a pop song it’s meant to be
populist meant to be easily digested but
there’s a lot of great art that passes
over a lot of people’s heads an artist
will if they are those guys don’t get it
well no like you maybe didn’t do a good
job of explaining to people what it
means and it doesn’t mean you have to be
a great salesperson or great
marketer just telling your genuine
authentic story because as an artist you
understand how much love has to go into
creating this piece of work that’s
coming out right that’s insane love and
so if you don’t explain that story where
it comes from people will miss it and so
just tell the story so so for katra
that’s what i would do i have one story
that kind of talks about the company and
why you started this and then individual
stories for each piece that you’ve
created yeah you can even name them you
know thinking back to art a lot of art
pieces are named you know name your name
your pieces that you design your
clothing that you design and then I’m
envisioning like on your website you
have this gallery of designs that you’ve
made and then you know each one is named
and then you can click on it and maybe
each one has a blog post that design
that describes the process of why you
did what you did and um yeah and then do
everything that Evan just said I so
there was you use the word gallery which
I really love there and I think it
depicts what he’s doing really well and
I’m and you know when you say the word
gallery I think of art gallery and it
and it kind of immediately makes me
think of this is high-class stop that is
worth being shown off and I’m wondering
for entrepreneurs who are just getting
started who may not have the branding
that people can recognize yet how can
they leverage words or themes that
people already know to apply meaning to
their brains so like if they’re if they
want their thing to show off and they
create it in an art gallery kind of
style immediately if I hit that I’m
thinking that it’s higher end and classy
and it’s art because he intentionally
gave me that message to his design and
someone in for entrepreneurs who are
trying to build up their brand how can
they model others or leverage existing
trends or words or names or styles that
can apply meaning to what they’re doing
in their business yeah if if I
understand you know what you’re asking
if if there’s a specific idea or thought
that you need to get across uh maybe the
photos alone are not going to
communicate that so you know in an art
gallery you could walk in and you have
the painting and you have the name and
you have the medium and that’s about all
the context you have now if you
understand the artist story and you
understand what he was going through at
the time that he created the painting
you have a little bit more insight into
why he did what he did so similarly for
entrepreneurs and small businesses a
photo alone of like hey I did this thing
may not be enough to tell someone why
that’s important or how that speaks to
who you are as a company so going beyond
that and just you know telling the rawls
telling the process details because the
case study of how you came to the end
result may speak more to another
business if your business to business to
another business owner then the piece
itself because that piece may not fit
into who they are but the process could
speak to you know something that they
can see themselves in right yeah I’m
also think in terms of the the imagery
that you use like I picked a paper
airplane for a reason because the paper
airplane is is flimsy and can get blown
around and talked about the store
earlier on the session and people can
associate with the paper airplane you
know you guys I have got it here you
know got AJ here right we got him here
to use your little stuff guy oh nice I
got to get one of those for my son who
loved that limited to down like you
picked an astronaut for a reason right
like it’s not hey we’re gonna do what
Don key or we’re going to do a tree your
ring like yeah so but by picking these
things you have you know if you picked a
tree then maybe that in the other
example was that’s a symbol of green
green technology right or maybe it’s a
symbol of strength and trust so like by
picking these symbols that already have
meaning
it attaches meaning to your brand yep
right and so is there a process that you
can recommend for entrepreneurs and
they’re picking symbols for their
company that already have meaning that
then they can figure out okay here’s
what I’m going to put in my logo or
here’s where Anna I’m leading my
newsletter off talking about trust and
so I’m going to lead with a picture of a
lock or a bank or a safe or you know
just that important as opposed to I’m
going to put that picture because it
looks pretty right like there’s meaning
behind the pictures just like there is
behind the colors yeah and and we went
through that process as we were
developing AJ the astronaut that we were
just talking about you know what does a
certain character or what does a certain
image yeah there is what does that
convey about who we are so there was
another idea that was floated out that
kind of spoke to and dehumanizing
element of a weber so it was like you
know there’s this this idea and I don’t
want to share it but there was this idea
and it came out and it was like well
that kind of says that you know where
there’s not real people behind this
brand so what is something that can more
aligned to what we’re trying to
communicate that there are real people
here that are working hard to help you
achieve your goals so I think the same
is true when when you’re going for any
any association with imagery and even in
your email newsletters like you were
saying if there’s a your email
newsletters about trust if someone hits
your opens your email newsletter and at
the top there’s a very an image that
conveys that feeling well then before
that person even begins reading their
understanding that oh this person is
trying to convey this idea to me so if
you can bring those associations in that
people have from all of the internet
from culture from you know whatever
their life experience that it experience
is and you can like bring those
associations together closer then you’re
going to already achieve a better
relationship with that person a better
connection with that person so yeah be
very thoughtful when choosing images
icons you know mascots logo all of that
can you can you talk a little bit more
about the selection of AJ and why the
astronaut
in may be anything else about the
designs I think like the example the
case study helps sir yeah bring it home
for people to do it themselves yeah so
AJ is an astronaut and his idea is that
he is enabling and helping you through
the journey of email marketing so we
wanted to have a very technological idea
so that the astronaut in space speaks to
that we wanted to have a very fun idea
as well and then you know going into the
specifics of his name AJ we didn’t want
to pigeonhole him into either male or
female or into a specific name or
anything like that so we went very
generic AJ um you may never see him take
off his helmet because the mystery and
intrigue that’s there like who’s
underneath the helmet um that adds
another element of like the choice that
went into it um I will say like the one
idea that we did have was a robot and a
robot was way too Jetsons desk you know
you think about can’t remember the
robot’s name but she was the maid that
ran around the house and it kind of took
on this element of you know there’s not
real people here but AJ has this
friendliness that pulls that human
element back into it that there is
someone underneath that helmet you just
don’t know who it is Rose pop your kid
your colleague Tom wrote in the side I’m
the only one who knows what AJ say a
fool doesn’t and it doesn’t have period
stuff that’s how I was in the same time
it doesn’t have the periods where I can
you know what is Santa without putting
the periods in man anyway cool you
didn’t name him a little ripping a
little bit for those of you remember Tom
we did a session a while back on time
management that still gets a lot of
comments so yeah it’s he had some good
value um cool Valerie is writing in uh
she needs help designing for WordPress
do you have any ideas on design ideas
for wordpress um yes in vodacom again
they have amazing wordpress themes that
you can buy for around you know forty to
fifty dollars and then apply them much
more custom they have everything from
very blog asked themes to full-on
website
themes so I would say start there I’ve
used a number of them I’m not great at
developing WordPress sites or designing
WordPress sites but i have used the
templates and was able to customize them
from there 24 for the different projects
I’ve been working on I love WordPress if
I was starting my website from scratch I
would use WordPress I think it’s just so
much easier and you don’t have to be a
designer I to know like how to make
everything fit together a program or
especially and there’s so many great
designs you can pull from then put in
your own pictures yeah um I’ve got to
look up in bada kaam rise on line is is
pitching divi he loves Divi Divi Divi
Divi please use divvy I am NOT but I’ve
heard of a number of things that plug in
or sit on top of WordPress that are very
helpful I think Tiffy’s of so we use
divvy on some of it it’s a framework
that sits on top alleged ease the design
landing pages custom pages awesome again
you’re not a designer so I want to look
like that and you just Yaga date and it
looks like that yeah it’s never been
easier and I think it’s you know with
WordPress if so if you’re using invite
or calm or some of the other sites
there’s a lot of free templates and
there’s a lot of amazing templates for
50 bucks yeah that just spend the 50
bucks and get an amazing looking website
because it’s going to generate business
for you um a lot of people chipping out
on that and I just go for the free one
that doesn’t quite look what what they
want this it’ll do a world of it makes a
world of difference to have a good
design and I will say if you are
shopping on in bot oh look at the
reviews i’ve bought some with low
reviews and there’s a good reason that
they had low reviews so go towards the
one with higher reviews like there’s a
star rating go towards the five stars
because it’ll make a big difference and
the reviews are about what how easy it
was to integrate or the support with the
founder or what of how easy it is to to
customize how well it works and what the
customer supports like yeah because each
developer within envato is responsible
for their own customer support got it um
since we’re talking about newsletters
and getting people on to our news at our
list
are their best practices with design in
terms of you know if I want to give away
a free ebook or some product and I you
know I want people to sign up for my
newsletter list if they’re coming from a
YouTube video or tweet a Twitter post
and putting up or you know landing page
of my website and I want to I want to
get people to sign up for my newsletter
list what are some design best practices
or guidance that you give people I know
there’s a lot of templates yeah on a
weber that you can test different light
boxes and pop-ups and free guys and
stuff but if what would you say to
somebody who wants to build their
newsletter list from various sources
from the design point of view um be
abundantly clear and as simple as
possible so if it’s difficult for me to
sign up for your list or there’s you
know 12 fields that I had to fill out
just to download this ebook that’s a
poor experience and and it goes beyond
just how it looks that’s a poor design
decision is having someone having to
fill out 12 fields so keep it as simple
as possible let’s just take the example
of an e-book if you’re going to drive
traffic from YouTube or Twitter I set up
a dedicated landing page just for that
ebook that clearly has the e book
clearly states what’s in the e-book and
then has as few fields as possible so
they can quickly sign up and get that
delivered to them yeah there’s some
great tools and plugins that integrate
with Aweber as well that make that
really easy ooh like what I’m curious
over my own use yeah leadpages is one of
them leadpages is a great landing any
page software and they also just came
out cept with some really cool a plugin
for wordpress for web forms that slide
down the page with you slide in the page
and are really sleek and easy to use so
that’s called a rapid ology that’s the
plugin for wordpress for like a web form
but all of that integrates with Aweber
and and may may be easy to align to your
brand a little bit more cool i’ll check
it out the other thing I really love
about online businesses you can test all
this stuff right like if you’re if you
have a light box that pops up on your
site that is going to then promote your
ebook to then some of your newsletter
page you can you can test three
different versions of that through a
weber and then see which one wins and
then always try to be you know beat the
best right if you have like eighty
percent going to the bass and then that
twenty percent you’re always trying to
beat the best it’s never been easier to
run those kinds of tasks yeah as opposed
to the old school way of taking out a
newspaper ad or direct mail campaigns do
you guys have best practices for that
like how many you should test against
each other if I’m doing a new light box
to promote my newsletter um it depends
on what you’re trying to test if you’re
testing you know you could test design
you could test number of fields you
could test the actual words that you use
you could test same words different
incentive so it really depends on what
you’re trying to accomplish but I I
would do a B test if you’re really
curious ABC would be the most i would do
but yeah fine and and there’s a lot
online about best practices for landing
pages for input fields for button color
all that kind of stuff we’ve tested a
lot of that here and found that it
really depends on your audience so the
audience on the case studies online we
didn’t find that to be identical for our
results so you really have to test for
yourself and don’t just take someone
else’s word for it right and the last
session was on conversion so we talked a
lot about that but but I agree like you
want to I found for my audience that
it’s totally different than what the
reports come out and say yeah when’s the
best time to send out a newsletter well
for me it’s wednesday at five in the
morning you know it’s different for
others that say it’s sunday evening or
whatever it says so I but it’s easy to
text right to your point just a be test
it and see which one does better than
always try to be the best but there’s a
lot of design elements like if you’re
testing the even just if you put on an
e-book the cover of the e-book can make
a big difference to how many people sign
up yeah and even we tested showing a
mock-up of the e-book so like a fake
mock-up of the cover on a book that you
get online or of taking a photograph of
someone holding that and then putting
the cover on the book and the human
element of someone holding it tended to
respond a little bit better than the
just a mock-up itself so very
interesting that were like this I don’t
know if it will work for you guys but
it’s a day at a time yeah I like it does
it because at the end of my youtube
videos I have I do I have I promoted me
you guide that I doubt that you can
download the assignment from newsletter
but may be fine now i should add a new
picture of me like holding it see how
I’m write that down I’m getting lots of
ideas too Mike today um okay maybe last
question here let me pull it up on the
screen here another one that Jay Reise
posted on behalf of lawman photo I’ve
been doing photography 16 years and have
a logo and name for myself how do I take
what I have and make it pop I wish we
could let me see on the side because I
kind of want to see what the what yeah
Jay Wright JR I just kind of posted this
on behalf so it is up there wow man
photo if you scroll up you can kind of
see it it’s a black logo and it says
Lynn on the top Lindblom when I guess
that’s her name well it kind of you
advice for photographer who wants to
take their name and logo and make it
make it pop yeah um if if your logo was
made 16 years ago there’s a chance that
it may not pop as much as it is today
without starting over got it okay okay
they’re going up so now we can see how
yeah um how do you make it pop um in my
experience in working with photographers
and I know many and was one for a brief
period of time uh your images are going
to speak louder than your
logo itself so if i were you i would say
take your logo make sure it’s on all of
the images you know all of the
watermarks all that kind of stuff that
photographers tend to do but it’s strong
enough to stand and be unique just make
sure that the images that you put it
with are the type and style that you
want to continue to do and are your best
images those images will pop then
someone’s like oh who took this Oh Lynn
did very cool and so your your logo is
just going to reinforce the element and
I don’t think your logo is the piece
that actually needs to pop it’s the
photography because that’s what
someone’s hiring to you to do so your
logo is very important to you it may not
be important to your clients or future
clients so let your photography pop and
then just make sure that your logo is
there for the Association so that’s when
someone does come to your site they’re
like oh yeah this is this person you
have a couple quick thoughts one um I
love logos that look good when they’re
small to you know I can’t read this I
barely see Lynn and I can’t see the
bottom part so this logo only works when
it’s a lot bigger where if you look at
iconic like if I saw McDonald’s or Nike
or Apple that size I would instantly
know what it is you saw the airplane
that size you’d be able to see it so I’d
love to see something where it looks
good on a small scale to for a personal
brand I think you’ll get much higher
leverage out of your face then out of a
out of an icon but if you are going to
do an icon then make it something that
represents back to her kind of initial
how we started this whole thing was
what’s your purpose right yeah what why
are you doing this you know you want so
the name itself doesn’t mean as much as
if you had you know an airplane or a
tree or a car or whatever something that
relates to what you stand for is a human
being and what you’re trying to drive
into your business much more than just
saying your name so those options i
would still probably lean towards having
your face though i think it would i
think it makes it more personal because
the business is named after you but if
you’re not going to do that then pick an
icon that relates to the mission that
you staying for not
your name yeah and there are some small
tweaks you could make this to to bump it
up without having to start completely
over well quickly such as what would you
such as adding icon oh you know you
leave the word mark so there’s two types
of logos there’s word mark logos where
your word is the logo j.crew you know
Lynn your your logo and then there is a
more about icon mark so where there’s a
combination of the two like aweber right
um so you could combine your current
word mark with some sort of icon mark
and to beef that up to make it a pop a
little bit more um you know you could
also leave the Lynn the way it is and
then beef up the way I can’t read the
word that’s at the bottom but beef up
Lauren wellman yeah or you know I see a
outline of a square maybe that outline
of a squirrel be square becomes a bold
square instead of just the outline so
little tweaks like that could take your
existing logo and make it more in fact
impactful or pop yeah especially the
name of your business Islam in
photography and then all i see is Lynn
in the logo when it’s small it’s a
little in congruence so just be from
that it might help to cool a little bit
over Mike thank you for the time just
before we sign off I’m going to do a
quick giveaway this for the youtube
channel Aweber sent me some stuff
including this shirt they sent me two
shirts of medium that are my size and
two shirts that are large at are too big
for me so I’m going to give away the two
large ones the first one is was AJ that
we talked a lot about and the second one
is their logo here with some funky
design ah the American Apparel feel
beautiful way to class up on the shirts
there and so for the youtube channel
people watching whoever leaves the two
comments that get the most thumbs ups
i’m going to mail you this shirt will
connect afterwards a send your direct
message and send it off to you so they
can be a kind of full up Wow a fun I
said a kind in fool instead of fun and
cool kind of waiting why
spread some love Mike thank you for the
time for people who want to find out
more about you and asking maybe
questions afterwards where’s the best
way to be able to reach you yeah connect
with me on twitter @ m e smith design
yes Michael my name is Michael Smith its
most generic name ever so m e smith
design is my online persona you can find
me at that pretty much any on any social
network but Twitter is probably the best
for here awesome Mike thank you so much
thank you guys for joining and we’ll see
you soon thanks Evan
another hangout super excited to have
you on with me here today I’ve got Mike
Smith with me from Aweber Mike welcome
aboard thanks thanks for having me mike
is a designer at a weber and for those
of you this might be your first time
checking us out we’re doing a monthly
series where various people from Aweber
kind of joining in to answer some
entrepreneurial questions they do email
marketing software and I’ve been using
them for my newsletters for the past ten
plus years so I guess a lot of designs
that have come from Mike I’ve seen as a
customer uh so yeah Mike does a lot of
the the designs there and he is a
passion for design and branding and kind
of art direction Mike you have a just
quick intro beyond what I said and then
we’ll get into the questions ya like
like Evan said one of the designers here
at Aweber a lot of my role is now moving
the design forward so I’ve been fear for
almost three years and we’ve grown a lot
in those three years as far as our
design language is concerned and and
trying to continue to push that forward
so yeah it’s a lot of fun I love it so
the way that blob works here is if you
guys have a question you can type in /q
space and then type your question in and
it’ll show up on the side and as we get
to them i will try to answer them and
get through as many as we can because
that’s we’re here to do today is help
help you guys with branding and building
your business so let’s pop in on on the
first one now J reyez I’m popping the
question up on the screen here I know he
knows I know he loves a lot about design
and branding and if you saw the pre-chat
he’s been dishing a lot of wisdom and
knowledge about branding so when he’s
asking here does making a brand pop
really matter you know I think that’s
more for entrepreneurs how do you tell
an entrepreneur that who’s just trying
to get sales and try to get something
coming in the door and they’re
struggling to pay the bills that they
need to focus on design instead of you
know pick up the phone and trying to
make a sales call sure yeah I mean both
are incredibly important you can’t
obviously run a business without any
sales however I really do think that if
you don’t stand out
the market in some way you’re just going
to blend in like every other company so
those are the L that’s kind of the area
where popping is important you know I
like to think of branding and the visual
aspects and company objectives as
working together not against each other
so if you think of like a double helix
like a DNA strand one strand is your is
your company objectives your goals and
things like that the other strand is
your brand so the kind of work
hand-in-hand and I don’t I don’t and
this may just be me you know touting
this but I don’t think you can really do
one without the other both are integral
to the success of a business so what in
your mind how do you make a brand pop
how do you you know what are the
elements for people who may not be as
versed in design you know they don’t
have a Mike Smith on board on their team
kind of helping guide their direction
one of the things that they need to
worry about or focus on to to make the
brand stand at ya consistency is is key
if you’re constantly putting out pieces
that look completely different than each
other you’re not going to build a brand
identity of brand vision so consistency
is huge you know you making it pop stand
out you know you could say bright colors
you could say really bold graphics but
if that’s not who you are as a company
then that’s not going to speak to you so
making it pop is like staying true to
who you are figure out who that is and
then look for inspiration that speaks to
that and just consistently put that out
over and over again in unique ways in
traditional ways you know whatever that
is you can really get yourself out there
um toppings like a relative term you
know if I’m not interested in your
business your information may never pop
to me right so is there so for an
entrepreneur who you know it’s really
good at what they do but may not have a
sense of design or branding how do they
how do they get started on that process
you know so as an example I own one of
my business
studio so I have the I own the largest
dance studio in probably North America
so say I’m just really good at dance and
I just want to teach people how to dance
how do i turn that into a brand that
will pop and attract attention yeah and
I think every business should go through
an exercise of figuring out what i call
the three P’s and that’s your purpose
your position and your personality you
know purpose being high level like why
are we here what are we doing this
business for so for your dance studio
you know figuring out what the what you
want your dance studio to stand for so
that’s your purpose your position then
is what is unique to your dance studio
that would make you stand out from all
the other Dance Studios in North America
and then what are those personality
traits that then give you that feel of
and and and vibe of your particular
dance studio so when you when you build
those three things together and pull
everything back to those three it
becomes an easier to be consistent time
and time again interesting okay so so
just kind of walking down that path I
like those three steps of purpose
position and personality for for this
school just as an example the purpose is
to give people a sense of community and
to have fun so most people don’t come to
the dance student learn how to dance
they’re coming because they’re you know
they hate their jobs and think this
might be like the best part of their
week is coming to learn how to dance and
release some stress and make some
friends and community so if that’s kind
of why people are coming then how do I
figure out the next steps in terms of
brand and I think it could be helpful
just for people watching to go through a
real life scenario yeah so I mean
knowing that that’s why people are
coming is not just to learn dance but to
take a break you can really play up that
in all of the materials that you put out
so you wouldn’t want to have your
traditional you know little girls in
tutus lined up against a balance beam
kind of ballet studio types
you could go a completely other end of
the spectrum where it’s like you know uh
much more adults people having a lot of
fun you want to emphasize a lot of you
know smiling faces and all that kind of
stuff because that is core to why people
are coming to your particular dance
studio and what they’re getting from it
so to share that sense of feeling in a
visual way is really what you’re trying
to convey you know whether that’s done
through photographs or iconography or
color or even you know the creative
headlines that you use you know that’s
what’s important to to convey and
communicate are there are there so I
love your three P’s there aren’t there
you talked about icons a little bit and
you know logos and fonts and colors are
there is there another list of like here
are the 10 things or five things you got
to focus on as you’re building your
brand the kind of general buckets for
people to pay attention to uh yes and no
yes in a sense that there are generally
the same things for every company to be
aware of but since each company is
unique those things can be tweaked and
altered just a little bit so to build
off of my three P’s I have this great
thing that I developed and I think it
helps a lot of people understand how to
take those three P’s and then apply them
to the brand so if you think of those
three P’s that’s like the center of a
target so the bullseye those are your
your core identity who you are you
always come back to those things as this
is our you know once again our position
our personality and our purpose and just
outside of that the next ring of this
target is your brand elements so that
would be things like your logo your
colors your photography style your
illustration style all of that kind of
stuff and then the ring outside of that
is the application of those things so
how does your logo get applied to all of
the elements that you put out how are
the colors applied and that those become
things like your mailers or your
facebook ads or your website and all of
that kind of stuff so that’s kind of the
framework and structure that I like to
think of when thinking of brand and
application I love it have you guys
turned that into like an infographic
uh internally interact and we’re
actually working with each team to
develop what does that team so our
mobile team I just didn’t exercise with
them and determining what are the mobile
team elements and application for their
particular thing and that bullseye once
again stays consistent across every team
so for for for a larger team that’s
applicable for a small team you know you
may only end up with one bullseye target
right that that’s pretty cool man uh you
know I don’t know I don’t know if you’re
open to it but I’d love to be able to
share some version of that with people
watching is like a tick away yeah yeah
definitely i can send you over something
recently i just saw Ryan ask does a were
actually use those it’s something that
we’re starting to use more recently so
we haven’t fully fleshed all of them out
but there are a few that have been
floating around and we’re letting those
influence our decisions moving forward
cool okay and so uh it might send me
something overall added to the
description of the video that we put on
YouTube figure I still kind of check out
and download like that doesn’t be a
super practical helpful piece yeah
awesome ah great so let’s move on to
Rishi ricci Cup TV my brain is both
silly and serious I’m not sure how to
capture both through design any ideas
yes so going back to and probably on
references a lot going back to the
target you know your personality traits
can be both silly and serious or maybe
you’re selling a serious thing but you
want your approached a bit too to be a
bit silly um you can’t accomplish that
and I was looking through the pre-chat
someone said Pixar is a good example of
that it’s kind of a serious ish company
but they their application are are very
silly you know their movies are silly
their characters are silly but you
wouldn’t say that overall Pixar is a
silly company because they’re very
successful so there’s got to be some
elma business realm of business
seriousness to that who I think I Rishi
cup is a long time kind of your
subscriber she’s been on all the Aweber
chats that we’ve done uh she has a
youtube channel and she has a
combination of
her sharing what she’s doing with her
friends it’s kind of a vlog but there’s
also her singing and her unique she says
she’s a songwriter and she has days
where she sings her songs she uses the
cup as part of her branding so you can
see in her purity she’s got the cup and
sometimes we know we’ll ask her what’s
in the cup today so whatever she’s
healing so is their advice for so if her
focus is kind of focused on YouTube
there is their advice for her on how she
can so if you even look at her you look
at her name you’ll get her picture you
look at her colors is their advice you
could give her on what she’s doing now
without I mean you haven’t seen her
videos and got you all her materials but
even as she’s branding herself now that
first impression what comes across yeah
that concept of a cup oh man you could
take that so many cool ways and whether
that cup is consistent and you overlay
things on top of it or each day each
mood each thing gets another different
cup thrift store is a great resource for
that so if you’re doing YouTube videos
you go to the thrift store buy a whole
bunch of twenty-five cent mugs or you
know tea cups or whatever and each day
within your YouTube thing have a cup
that relevant that relates to you know
what the topic is so like if it’s
serious maybe you have like a very
floral and like serious toile kind of
mug or if it’s like a lot of fun get
like a quirky mug that’s one approach to
take I think it could be a lot of fun if
you want to have a consistent cup though
that doesn’t necessarily apply if it’s
that white mug I see that you have in
your in your photo maybe that’s not the
direction to go but that’s a way to keep
seriousness fun silly you know all of
that yeah and so is interesting because
we’re having a conversation a couple
months ago I think about her branding
and and she almost dropped the cup she’s
like I don’t know if I should keep the
cup or not or should just be my name and
everyone’s kind of encouraging to keep
the cup and she really likes it I like
I’m yeah I mean I think it could also be
even if you’re keeping the same cup and
every episode could be what you put in
right there where you actually put in
like if you’re drinking coffee or if
you’re drinking beer if you’re drinking
water based on your mood or even just
as a metaphor like hey my cup was filled
with love today or my cup is filled with
with anger today or my cup is filled
with whatever right like you couldn’t
choose you I love it of having different
cups but if the white cup is you’re
always your thing then you can either
with actual liquid inside or with you
know in theory you know your your
emotions inside think it could be cool
way to express it yeah and it would be a
fun element of surprise cuz like you
don’t know what’s going to be in there
and then as you pan up you find out you
know oh it’s filled with glitter today
you throw the glass I want to know Rishi
what’s in your cup today right it’s like
we’re looking forward to it every day I
would watch just to find out what’s in
the cup there you go there’s some
Brandon in action so it’s good and so
she’s got in her name Ricci kept TV and
she’s got it in her picture as well um
cool cool okay let’s go let’s go to the
next one Jennifer price another longtime
loyal viewer what do you think is the
one thing to start with to help create a
signature look / design for your brand
the best represent your values and biz
yeah and going back to the 3 p’s again
you start with that bullseye and let
that inform what you how you apply it so
I would say you know in branding a lot
things are getting more and more similar
so find other things out there that you
that inspire you that speak to you and
speak to what your bullseye is and then
take those and put your own unique twist
on it so don’t just steal it straight up
but take ideas and thoughts and images
you’ve seen that you like bring them in
see if they align to your personality
traits then take those personality
traits and tweak the the images and
stuff that you found to make it you
that’s the best place I could suggest to
start and then just be consistent after
that cool cool the metric that I used to
the methodology I use is more through
finding your one word this relates to
purpose I guess for me so mine is
believe I can find the one word that
they kind of resonate best with and then
in terms of Cretan design and elements
you look at a logo right my logo is here
it’s a paper airplane because I believe
in entrepreneurs and when you’re
starting up as an entrepreneur you want
to fly but you’re also super frail and
weak and like you can get blown around
and you don’t have the you know tons of
money from venture capitalists and but
you’re still going to go off and chase
your dream and so starting with your one
word or starting with your purpose and
then saying okay well how do i create a
logo around that and how do i then
create you know the font has meaning
like the fun is here for a specific
purpose it could be a lot more fun or
could be a lot more serious you know you
see the walt disney font that means
something or if you have the army fought
that means something and so starting
with the purpose or mike is the one word
can help integrate into every design
aspect of your print yeah it goes back
to the rationale so you can have you
know any any element but if you don’t
have a reason as to why you chose your
one word or the reason why you chose the
paper airplane for your logo you know
that’s really what’s what score to that
idea is having that rationale behind
things cool now i’m curious to find your
first impression because because
jennifer has been on before and I know
her uh Jennifer is a copywriter okay and
so you see her face there you see her
icon and you see her name is this as
much what what do you get what are your
first impressions from a branding point
of view from what she’s done with her
her naming and her picture right um this
as much probably means a lot more if I
were to visit her site so right now i
don’t i don’t know whole about this as
much but it is unique so that’s good you
know that that would cause me to stop
and be like what does this as much like
why is she calling yourself this as much
and then i would want to find out more
so that is awesome um being in
copywriter I think her using her own
face if so there are a lot of
solopreneurs or small businesses where
you’re a service oriented company and
your face or your image becomes your
brand image as well so
it becomes hard to separate yourself
from it I think Evan you’ve done a great
job in creating this believe and this is
paper airplane but just as much Jennifer
could use you know her her avatar as
long as it’s consistent across a lot of
things as her her brand image and people
get familiar with her face then they
become familiar with her so it is an
approach to take and I think it’s a very
valid and good approach to take a lot of
times because it humanizes the brand as
well it’s not like Oh someone’s writing
your copy for me for you it’s no
Jennifer this face in my avatar is
writing a copy for you right yeah I
think it’s one of the biggest advantages
that you have as an entrepreneur is your
story and the human element is if I
could hire a big company versus hiring a
small company the big company has all
the respect and the name that I know and
a lot of traditions so why would I go
with a start-up unless they were cheaper
you know you’re going to go with
somebody who’s smaller because you like
their story in your passion and so many
entrepreneurs if you look at their
website they’re trying to emulate the
big guys it’s just like this boring
corporate website you go to the about
page there’s no pictures there’s no
story of the founder it’s super boring
and like you know you can point form
because that’s what you think you need
to be professional but you can’t compete
with those big guys playing their game
your way in is just tell the heart like
to show your passion for what you do and
that’s how you start winning and and be
able to charge more because you feel
like this person really understands that
this person really is excited and not
just hiding behind a corporate story
yeah do you do you touch on that I know
like do you consider that part of design
like that the storytelling component or
do you tell stores who design but how do
you guys deal with that in Aweber I do I
think that really awesome designers are
trying to communicate something and so
they need to use whatever means possible
to communicate that story and so
sometimes it’s stripping away all of the
design elements and letting the word
speak for themselves or stripping away
all of the frills and and and nonsense
from time to time and letting the image
p
for itself so you know I I see myself as
a storyteller um and that applies in a
multitude of ways whether i’m working on
a marketing project or you know aweber
being a technology company working on
our sit our service itself you know the
dashboards and the interactive elements
and things like that but even then
you’re telling the story so yeah I see
it as incredibly important and I spend a
lot of time in my current role I spend a
lot of time thinking more than I do
actually designing how is this going to
apply how are people going to respond to
this and we’re telling the right story
we’re putting forward the right face and
all that kind of stuff so when just out
of curiosity when you guys are planning
a campaign if you’re working on see you
we’re going on YouTube video are you
working on newsletter you know you’re
going to send your Aweber sending their
own newsletter out to their clients yeah
obviously you’re a part of that because
they need you to design something
amazing yet who else is involved in what
are the roles and how do you talk about
what’s the thought process before you
actually get to actually creating the
content and the design for the
newsletter yeah um that’s a really good
question we have we have a really solid
team our team consists of content
writers traditional marketers web
designers visual designers all of that
so generally our process goes we figure
out what we need to communicate and who
we need to communicate to as like an
overarching idea and then we’ll take the
time and the content writer will come up
with a copy and so here are the words
that we’re trying to communicate and
then the design team will take that and
go and run with you know so how can we
take these words and make it most
compelling most interesting and the most
useful too however the person is
receiving it and there’s a lot of
collaboration within that I made that
seem like a I hand it off to you you
hand it off to me you know it’s we’re
all working together along the way to
figure out what is the best way to
communicate to the audience we’re trying
to I love it and then I mean
we’re talking about newsletters in
Aweber for for clients who are then
planning their own email campaigns is
something I do yeah I sent two emails a
week to my newsletter list you know as a
solo entrepreneur for most entrepreneurs
or they may have seen Oh some part-time
staff but assume it’s just them uh they
may not have like five people to
collaborate and connect with and figure
out what the emails going to look like
you know what what process would you go
through to say okay i want to send an
email out I’m fighting my autoresponder
sequence is what I’m you know setting up
my you ever counting and apply my
autoresponder so you can see the next
ten weeks that goes out what should my
thought process be in terms of figuring
to what stores i want to tell and then
bring that down to the tactical of okay
headlines colors nail goes pictures yeah
hopefully a lot of that so if you’re new
starting out first time doing your
newsletter all of that is a task that
you have to accomplish it’s it’s a
challenge and you have to figure out all
right how am I going to communicate
within the inbox visually to my readers
so ideally you’re only focusing on that
may be the first few times and then
after that it’s just consistent and you
you can focus on the writing and all of
that stuff but you know asking questions
all along the way how is this going to
look on a desktop device how is it going
to look at on someone’s phone you know
am I am I needing to convey this with
imagery so what images do i need to add
and at what point throughout my
newsletter should i add them or is it
simply words and the images are just
going to distract entirely from my
message um you know i personally follow
a very simple structure when it comes to
sending out emails and that’s if it’s
for a business logo at the top and then
if there’s imagery that’s going to
support what i’m going to talk about or
catch someone’s attention image and then
text occasionally images throughout but
you know all of those elements within
the body of the email could go in or out
depending
on you know how personal do you want
this to look you want it to look like a
letter do you want this massive email
sending to thousands of people look like
it was a personal email that I sent you
well then you should probably steer
clear of imagery altogether to have that
more like personal email touch if you’re
selling something you should probably
show what you’re selling within the
email so it’s very case-by-case basis
but asking all of those questions as you
go through on who am i sending this to
and what do I want them to do with what
I’ve said cool I think too it’s never
been easier to uh not be a designer and
still get great designs yeah if you use
so if you use like an a weber for your
newsletter they have templates that
maybe you might have it a role in
designing and planning that has the
colors and pictures and all of that that
you can easily put in or if you’re
starting the website you can use
wordpress and there’s lots of themes for
you to do that and you don’t have to
create everything yourself or spend tons
of money necessarily hiring somebody but
you may not have when you’re starting up
so you can also leverage the tools that
are out there yeah to help you get great
designs without you having to spend the
time to learn it and be a designer
yourself and there are a lot of like
low-cost ways to do that as well so the
envato marketplace is a place where you
can buy email templates and then kind of
customize them and you need a little bit
of HTML knowledge to be able to do that
but i know a weber does this offers a
template customization for you know like
twenty nine dollars or something so you
could easily be like hey i love this
template i’m not sure how to fix it hey
you guys help me out and we could you
know our customer support team is
awesome and they’ll be able to easily
help you guys out so um yeah right
thanks for not know this I’m writing it
down template customization yes alright
very cool what was the other one you say
the end what was a lot of truth envato
Orion actually posted it in the chat
there on the side envato com there you
go perfect and co and that integrates
with Aweber uh no that would just be a
place to go find
some templates you would need HTML
knowledge then to be able to edit it
yourself but you could paste that into a
weber once you’re done with it okay cool
that’s getting 102 I mean you know with
the updated HTML files compared to just
design it from scratch yeah is way way
easier yeah and a lot of times they
include like PSD files in there so if
you wanted to just mess around if you
add Photoshop and you wanted to mess
around before getting into the code you
could do it that way as well I’m
learning something new I love it okay
let’s keep moving we got Nathan Nathan
fellow Toronto entrepreneur my brand is
serious clean tech company that
innovates I’m not sure how to capture
through design that could make it easy
to understand our company to customers
from a website any ideas Thanks telling
a story of our company I don’t know
Nathan but in in the previous just
before we started we were chatting and
he has a he wants to do green technology
for cell phones so you can charge your
cell phones with green power so how to
make that easy to understand and tell
the story through design yeah I wouldn’t
necessarily even consider that too
serious or who doesn’t have to be
serious um but because there’s that
innovative element to it so there’s
there’s so much imagery whether it be
through you know showing the green side
of things or showing the technology side
of things and charging and phones and
different things like that yeah I mean
there are so many ways to go with this
you know if you want to stand out from
the crowd I would encourage you to not
just put a bunch of trees on your
website because that could be any
company so you know figure out what your
unique selling proposition is and then
what personality you want your company
to have and then build off of that you
know allow allow that to dictate how
your website ends up looking I think you
go a lot of different directions there’s
just idea after idea spinning in my head
well for the I me for the story of the
company it was come in the last part of
the questions like why is this important
to you Nathan yeah right why this is
matter so much why do you care about
green technology and cell phones so much
like if you told me a personal story
that i can say man that that guy really
cares because there’s so many companies
are going to be pitching similar things
but then if i feel like you have the
heart you’re not just some scam artists
trying to capitalize on an opportunity
but you let you actually care trying to
build something important that would
resonate with me and I’d be kind of
drawn into your story a lot more and and
I think for a lot of people were trying
to this might be more than like the
wording Park a lot of people worry about
getting the exact words like I’m not a
copywriter I can’t write until they end
up not doing it the intention is in my
view way more important in the actual
words like if people can feel your
passion and if you said say the wrong
thing but you don’t use the exact right
word it doesn’t matter as much because
the intention of the passion is coming
through that’s much more what you want
and so I wouldn’t let the fear of not
knowing the exact words to say hold you
back from writing a passionate story to
put on on your website yeah and I think
your story would separate you from maybe
others within your you know space
because it is so personal to you cool ah
John what are some ways a brand can
differentiate from looking too much like
Instagram even though the content is
displayed rather similar um that’s
interesting question are I don’t know if
John is still here if he can clarify any
of this but are you a mobile app company
or I guess you know there’s a desktop
you too um native jontron I still hear
John if you want to throw you’ve got a
native app yeah um that’s a really
that’s a really tough question because
the web and apps are starting to look
more and more and more alike and so you
go and you look at something and the
most popular one becomes the one that
everyone’s like oh you’re just copying X
or you’re just copying why I would say
don’t worry about it if that is the best
way to present the information or the
imagery or whatever you’re trying to
convey then uh find ways to
differentiate yourself from them but i
use the best best method possible to
still communicate that so even if you’re
going to be similar it may not be the
end of the world because you know that
may just be the best way to present that
kind of information or those kind of
pictures yeah I look at this question I
think so he’s asking what are some ways
a brand difference from looking too much
like Instagram I’d be I’m more concerned
with how are you how are you actually
different than Instagram not just like
not just looking different but how is
your company different than Instagram
and understanding that first right going
back to the purpose or going back to
your one word how is your business
different than everything else not just
Instagram just everything else out there
how are you different and then you can
worry about what the visual ends up
looking like and so I think we’re
struggling on the question because we
don’t know much about your business so
your native app that looks like
Instagram you haven’t told us about your
purpose your position your personality
your one word you know why you’re doing
this and so it’s kind of hard to answer
and I think just as a general rule as
you’re communicating and telling people
about what you’re doing leading with
that instead then generates interest and
excitement and the ability to kind of
dive deeper and help so I I would echo
Mike’s point to say that I don’t know
that matters that much about how you
look different than an Instagram because
there’s a lot of websites that might
look like other websites adds a lot of
people who will copy things that I’m
doing in my youtube channel i don’t i
don’t care about them like you can’t you
know for people who are copying you
never the original right the original in
my view lease is always going to be
better because i’m always innovating I’m
always doing something new there’s the
heart and soul and intention behind it
and the Google Cochran it’s all going to
do that and then they can’t innovate
they can’t keep up and they don’t have
the the innovative capacity to keep
going and so in a round right wing
coming back to how was your business
actually different what do you staying
for John your business right because
then we could have maybe tied it into a
little bit more of a helpful
conversation he says a follow up there
what about the color being used we want
to use blue to establish trust but I
don’t want it to look too much like IG
Instagram yeah I mean blue is not the
only trustworthy color you know there is
psychology to colors and and their their
value and things like that if it’s a
concern that you’re going to look too
much like them and your app is too
similar to them and then you’re going to
use a color that’s just like them i
would say consider like what what about
your app is is different and play that
up and make sure that it becomes you
know different enough from instagram as
a whole to to differentiate yourself I
wouldn’t stay away from blue because
Instagram uses blue I wouldn’t stay away
from instagrams layout because Instagram
uses instagrams layout I would say what
makes you different at your core and
then allow that to dictate dictate
everything else about you know your
colors your look your logo all of that
its gotta end color question was also
asked a little bit before Deborah wrote
in asking about colors so can you just
touch on that colors what they mean
picking a color you know why Aweber has
its colors or what entrepreneurs should
think about when picking a color as
opposed to just oh I like pink so I’m
gonna go pink like there’s meaning and
significance and a color is itself a
language yeah each color and you can you
can google this like what do colors mean
each color has a psychological effect on
humans as well as you know subconscious
effects on humans so they begin to stand
for different things they begin to
communicate different things some
companies have gone so far as to patent
certain colors like t-mobile has
patented their pink color for but they
can only patent their pink color within
the mobile phone space of you know
businesses so you know as you do think
through it think through who else is in
my space so if Instagram is in your
space like John’s question and your app
is very similar to them well if you use
a blue color just like they’re using a
blue color you may not differentiate
differentiate yourself enough from them
so blue might not be the best choice
even though it may be your favorite
color or it may engender trust you have
to consider all of the different aspects
when going to choose a color so am I
going to be different enough are there
other people in my space that are using
this color and will I be able to
differentiate myself um so beyond just
the psychology of color you have to
consider all of those things as well
cool ah Peter what are your thoughts on
using terms like biz and for you if it’s
your personality do it um you know it
might be a little past its prime I
probably would not do it but if it fits
your personality and you can own it then
own it and do it yeah I think I think
there’s a certain stigma against the for
you when I think of for you I feel like
I’m being scammed I feel like there’s
just so many people who the people who
have used it there’s no like big brand
that really dominated an added class to
for you and you could be the for you
that adds the class um anyway I don’t
know I feel like I’m being scammed
what’s happening but even even biz like
I don’t I haven’t really used biz much
unless I’m trying to shorten something
down in Twitter as an example so I think
it just depends on on on as Mike said
your personality and also your audience
so Rosalyn is posting a rappers used for
you all the time in their songs and it’s
part of the culture awesome you know I’m
obviously not a ingrained in rap culture
enough to comment on that
but if that’s the culture right and
that’s who you’re selling to and they
get it and like they feel like you
understand them too and you’re part of
the same family then then it works ah if
it’s not so like if you’re going to go
all in on rap culture and and your
marketing and your brain and your logos
and your font like all kind of
represents rap culture then great it
could work if you’re trying to be if
you’re trying to do like be I don’t know
bees you’re trying to sell newsletter
software and you’re telling yourself
newsletters for you to a business market
that might seem a little scam you at
least that’s my initial class so that’s
it Peter I want to know what you’re
selling Peter give us some context one
stea he wrote on the side a colleague is
trying to drive the business in that
direction and I’m trying to resist
that’s exactly how I feel yeah I think I
may have met Peter before Peter you are
you in the philly area I don’t know if
that’s a question you want to answer but
I feel like we met at a meetup one time
hippy cool okay Tom Tom do I build a new
website or do I put up a website that I
had to develop recreate that in my
opinion looks like crap awesome um if
you don’t believe in it and you can’t
get behind it I would say don’t put it
live there’s a rough balance I I tend to
want to put things out that I’m
incredibly proud of that I can get
entirely behind but if that prevents you
from just doing something then that’s
when it’s going to hinder you so if the
website doesn’t poorly represent you and
you just personally hate it and it’s
preventing you from starting your
business then I say just do it just put
it out there if it’s going to be a poor
representation of who you are your
personality going back to that bullseye
in that case i would say hold off revise
it to where you’re happy enough with it
and then put it out
soul some UK is saying that that’s like
using another person’s dating profile um
you know I’m a big believer and that you
have to be proud of what you’re creating
you know you need to I want to create
something this was the mindset it take
to when I’m making my youtube videos
yesterday was filming day and you know I
want my videos to be something I can
hang my hat on and say I made this and I
could show my grandkids and say this is
what grandpa Evan made you know when I
was in my prime this is what I put that
right and so I think a lot of people
just mail it in like that’s okay you
know put it up and I get it because
you’ve got a million things to do this
is one of them ah but I feel like you
should you should release something that
you’re proud of and and especially
prison like a website does you the
visual representation of your brain you
have to look at that every day and every
day that you look at that you’re going
to get upset and more and more angry
that that is there and the one that you
wanted isn’t and I think sometimes it
can be hard because you may have
invested a lot of resources and time and
energy and you hire just developer maybe
that was all the budget you had for your
business and you poured it into this guy
and he didn’t deliver a great product
since you feel like I gotta put this up
now because of all this money but it’s
really a sunk cost and and you know on
my team we throw away more stuff than
most people even create it’s just insane
the amount of awesome stuff that we
create that we never use or we put up
when do once and just will throw it away
to go after something even better and so
don’t let that like sunk cost hold you
back from creating something that you
can be proud of and can be the visual
visual representation of your brand yeah
he did say is a current business so I
would say you know hold off put
something you’re proud about to put
something out that you’re proud about
cool yeah and again the some questions
that I see the icj your eyes is doing an
awesome job posting for people if you
have a question you could do /q space
and then type the questioning of a
pop-up on the side for us but thank you
jr eyes for posting some for us so this
one came from katra i have my own
clothing label where I designed and
handcraft each piece my background the
story is very unique
my designs reflect that how do you
embrace that without confusing my
audience asked by katra yet tell that
story end to end and then once your
story is written and a piece each unique
piece fits into the story let people
know where that fits in and what the
influence is through your you know your
timeline were so you know if something
happened in your life here and this
piece is inspired by that thing well
make mention back to where that was and
what the inspirations were so I don’t
think that I don’t think it will be
confusing at all if you tell a cohesive
story about who you are and then how
those pieces fit back into who hat into
that story I think it will be very
cohesive in it and a very compelling
story yeah for anybody who’s creating
art you know I see clothes in his art
yeah there’s a lot of love that goes
into that i would i would have two
stories i would have one for the company
like you matthew why did you start this
business I know Matthew could use a
comment from my youtube channel uh why
was this important why did you get
started what’s the positive change you
know what’s your purpose what’s your one
word what are you staying for all the
stuff we’ve been talking about and then
for each piece because because he
doesn’t have a million different pieces
right ever this is like some high-end
stuff a lot of love and effort went into
creating each design uh tell me the
story of that design right tell me why
you created this piece or which artist
you work with on this piece and why it’s
important even if there’s like
behind-the-scenes pictures if you were
making a door like a time-lapse video or
even a YouTube video if you just sharing
your thoughts I think I think that’ll
work to really draw me in I think
artists as a general rule don’t do a
good enough job of explaining what their
art means to them and the process that
went into it might be easy to to to
digest like a pop song it’s meant to be
populist meant to be easily digested but
there’s a lot of great art that passes
over a lot of people’s heads an artist
will if they are those guys don’t get it
well no like you maybe didn’t do a good
job of explaining to people what it
means and it doesn’t mean you have to be
a great salesperson or great
marketer just telling your genuine
authentic story because as an artist you
understand how much love has to go into
creating this piece of work that’s
coming out right that’s insane love and
so if you don’t explain that story where
it comes from people will miss it and so
just tell the story so so for katra
that’s what i would do i have one story
that kind of talks about the company and
why you started this and then individual
stories for each piece that you’ve
created yeah you can even name them you
know thinking back to art a lot of art
pieces are named you know name your name
your pieces that you design your
clothing that you design and then I’m
envisioning like on your website you
have this gallery of designs that you’ve
made and then you know each one is named
and then you can click on it and maybe
each one has a blog post that design
that describes the process of why you
did what you did and um yeah and then do
everything that Evan just said I so
there was you use the word gallery which
I really love there and I think it
depicts what he’s doing really well and
I’m and you know when you say the word
gallery I think of art gallery and it
and it kind of immediately makes me
think of this is high-class stop that is
worth being shown off and I’m wondering
for entrepreneurs who are just getting
started who may not have the branding
that people can recognize yet how can
they leverage words or themes that
people already know to apply meaning to
their brains so like if they’re if they
want their thing to show off and they
create it in an art gallery kind of
style immediately if I hit that I’m
thinking that it’s higher end and classy
and it’s art because he intentionally
gave me that message to his design and
someone in for entrepreneurs who are
trying to build up their brand how can
they model others or leverage existing
trends or words or names or styles that
can apply meaning to what they’re doing
in their business yeah if if I
understand you know what you’re asking
if if there’s a specific idea or thought
that you need to get across uh maybe the
photos alone are not going to
communicate that so you know in an art
gallery you could walk in and you have
the painting and you have the name and
you have the medium and that’s about all
the context you have now if you
understand the artist story and you
understand what he was going through at
the time that he created the painting
you have a little bit more insight into
why he did what he did so similarly for
entrepreneurs and small businesses a
photo alone of like hey I did this thing
may not be enough to tell someone why
that’s important or how that speaks to
who you are as a company so going beyond
that and just you know telling the rawls
telling the process details because the
case study of how you came to the end
result may speak more to another
business if your business to business to
another business owner then the piece
itself because that piece may not fit
into who they are but the process could
speak to you know something that they
can see themselves in right yeah I’m
also think in terms of the the imagery
that you use like I picked a paper
airplane for a reason because the paper
airplane is is flimsy and can get blown
around and talked about the store
earlier on the session and people can
associate with the paper airplane you
know you guys I have got it here you
know got AJ here right we got him here
to use your little stuff guy oh nice I
got to get one of those for my son who
loved that limited to down like you
picked an astronaut for a reason right
like it’s not hey we’re gonna do what
Don key or we’re going to do a tree your
ring like yeah so but by picking these
things you have you know if you picked a
tree then maybe that in the other
example was that’s a symbol of green
green technology right or maybe it’s a
symbol of strength and trust so like by
picking these symbols that already have
meaning
it attaches meaning to your brand yep
right and so is there a process that you
can recommend for entrepreneurs and
they’re picking symbols for their
company that already have meaning that
then they can figure out okay here’s
what I’m going to put in my logo or
here’s where Anna I’m leading my
newsletter off talking about trust and
so I’m going to lead with a picture of a
lock or a bank or a safe or you know
just that important as opposed to I’m
going to put that picture because it
looks pretty right like there’s meaning
behind the pictures just like there is
behind the colors yeah and and we went
through that process as we were
developing AJ the astronaut that we were
just talking about you know what does a
certain character or what does a certain
image yeah there is what does that
convey about who we are so there was
another idea that was floated out that
kind of spoke to and dehumanizing
element of a weber so it was like you
know there’s this this idea and I don’t
want to share it but there was this idea
and it came out and it was like well
that kind of says that you know where
there’s not real people behind this
brand so what is something that can more
aligned to what we’re trying to
communicate that there are real people
here that are working hard to help you
achieve your goals so I think the same
is true when when you’re going for any
any association with imagery and even in
your email newsletters like you were
saying if there’s a your email
newsletters about trust if someone hits
your opens your email newsletter and at
the top there’s a very an image that
conveys that feeling well then before
that person even begins reading their
understanding that oh this person is
trying to convey this idea to me so if
you can bring those associations in that
people have from all of the internet
from culture from you know whatever
their life experience that it experience
is and you can like bring those
associations together closer then you’re
going to already achieve a better
relationship with that person a better
connection with that person so yeah be
very thoughtful when choosing images
icons you know mascots logo all of that
can you can you talk a little bit more
about the selection of AJ and why the
astronaut
in may be anything else about the
designs I think like the example the
case study helps sir yeah bring it home
for people to do it themselves yeah so
AJ is an astronaut and his idea is that
he is enabling and helping you through
the journey of email marketing so we
wanted to have a very technological idea
so that the astronaut in space speaks to
that we wanted to have a very fun idea
as well and then you know going into the
specifics of his name AJ we didn’t want
to pigeonhole him into either male or
female or into a specific name or
anything like that so we went very
generic AJ um you may never see him take
off his helmet because the mystery and
intrigue that’s there like who’s
underneath the helmet um that adds
another element of like the choice that
went into it um I will say like the one
idea that we did have was a robot and a
robot was way too Jetsons desk you know
you think about can’t remember the
robot’s name but she was the maid that
ran around the house and it kind of took
on this element of you know there’s not
real people here but AJ has this
friendliness that pulls that human
element back into it that there is
someone underneath that helmet you just
don’t know who it is Rose pop your kid
your colleague Tom wrote in the side I’m
the only one who knows what AJ say a
fool doesn’t and it doesn’t have period
stuff that’s how I was in the same time
it doesn’t have the periods where I can
you know what is Santa without putting
the periods in man anyway cool you
didn’t name him a little ripping a
little bit for those of you remember Tom
we did a session a while back on time
management that still gets a lot of
comments so yeah it’s he had some good
value um cool Valerie is writing in uh
she needs help designing for WordPress
do you have any ideas on design ideas
for wordpress um yes in vodacom again
they have amazing wordpress themes that
you can buy for around you know forty to
fifty dollars and then apply them much
more custom they have everything from
very blog asked themes to full-on
website
themes so I would say start there I’ve
used a number of them I’m not great at
developing WordPress sites or designing
WordPress sites but i have used the
templates and was able to customize them
from there 24 for the different projects
I’ve been working on I love WordPress if
I was starting my website from scratch I
would use WordPress I think it’s just so
much easier and you don’t have to be a
designer I to know like how to make
everything fit together a program or
especially and there’s so many great
designs you can pull from then put in
your own pictures yeah um I’ve got to
look up in bada kaam rise on line is is
pitching divi he loves Divi Divi Divi
Divi please use divvy I am NOT but I’ve
heard of a number of things that plug in
or sit on top of WordPress that are very
helpful I think Tiffy’s of so we use
divvy on some of it it’s a framework
that sits on top alleged ease the design
landing pages custom pages awesome again
you’re not a designer so I want to look
like that and you just Yaga date and it
looks like that yeah it’s never been
easier and I think it’s you know with
WordPress if so if you’re using invite
or calm or some of the other sites
there’s a lot of free templates and
there’s a lot of amazing templates for
50 bucks yeah that just spend the 50
bucks and get an amazing looking website
because it’s going to generate business
for you um a lot of people chipping out
on that and I just go for the free one
that doesn’t quite look what what they
want this it’ll do a world of it makes a
world of difference to have a good
design and I will say if you are
shopping on in bot oh look at the
reviews i’ve bought some with low
reviews and there’s a good reason that
they had low reviews so go towards the
one with higher reviews like there’s a
star rating go towards the five stars
because it’ll make a big difference and
the reviews are about what how easy it
was to integrate or the support with the
founder or what of how easy it is to to
customize how well it works and what the
customer supports like yeah because each
developer within envato is responsible
for their own customer support got it um
since we’re talking about newsletters
and getting people on to our news at our
list
are their best practices with design in
terms of you know if I want to give away
a free ebook or some product and I you
know I want people to sign up for my
newsletter list if they’re coming from a
YouTube video or tweet a Twitter post
and putting up or you know landing page
of my website and I want to I want to
get people to sign up for my newsletter
list what are some design best practices
or guidance that you give people I know
there’s a lot of templates yeah on a
weber that you can test different light
boxes and pop-ups and free guys and
stuff but if what would you say to
somebody who wants to build their
newsletter list from various sources
from the design point of view um be
abundantly clear and as simple as
possible so if it’s difficult for me to
sign up for your list or there’s you
know 12 fields that I had to fill out
just to download this ebook that’s a
poor experience and and it goes beyond
just how it looks that’s a poor design
decision is having someone having to
fill out 12 fields so keep it as simple
as possible let’s just take the example
of an e-book if you’re going to drive
traffic from YouTube or Twitter I set up
a dedicated landing page just for that
ebook that clearly has the e book
clearly states what’s in the e-book and
then has as few fields as possible so
they can quickly sign up and get that
delivered to them yeah there’s some
great tools and plugins that integrate
with Aweber as well that make that
really easy ooh like what I’m curious
over my own use yeah leadpages is one of
them leadpages is a great landing any
page software and they also just came
out cept with some really cool a plugin
for wordpress for web forms that slide
down the page with you slide in the page
and are really sleek and easy to use so
that’s called a rapid ology that’s the
plugin for wordpress for like a web form
but all of that integrates with Aweber
and and may may be easy to align to your
brand a little bit more cool i’ll check
it out the other thing I really love
about online businesses you can test all
this stuff right like if you’re if you
have a light box that pops up on your
site that is going to then promote your
ebook to then some of your newsletter
page you can you can test three
different versions of that through a
weber and then see which one wins and
then always try to be you know beat the
best right if you have like eighty
percent going to the bass and then that
twenty percent you’re always trying to
beat the best it’s never been easier to
run those kinds of tasks yeah as opposed
to the old school way of taking out a
newspaper ad or direct mail campaigns do
you guys have best practices for that
like how many you should test against
each other if I’m doing a new light box
to promote my newsletter um it depends
on what you’re trying to test if you’re
testing you know you could test design
you could test number of fields you
could test the actual words that you use
you could test same words different
incentive so it really depends on what
you’re trying to accomplish but I I
would do a B test if you’re really
curious ABC would be the most i would do
but yeah fine and and there’s a lot
online about best practices for landing
pages for input fields for button color
all that kind of stuff we’ve tested a
lot of that here and found that it
really depends on your audience so the
audience on the case studies online we
didn’t find that to be identical for our
results so you really have to test for
yourself and don’t just take someone
else’s word for it right and the last
session was on conversion so we talked a
lot about that but but I agree like you
want to I found for my audience that
it’s totally different than what the
reports come out and say yeah when’s the
best time to send out a newsletter well
for me it’s wednesday at five in the
morning you know it’s different for
others that say it’s sunday evening or
whatever it says so I but it’s easy to
text right to your point just a be test
it and see which one does better than
always try to be the best but there’s a
lot of design elements like if you’re
testing the even just if you put on an
e-book the cover of the e-book can make
a big difference to how many people sign
up yeah and even we tested showing a
mock-up of the e-book so like a fake
mock-up of the cover on a book that you
get online or of taking a photograph of
someone holding that and then putting
the cover on the book and the human
element of someone holding it tended to
respond a little bit better than the
just a mock-up itself so very
interesting that were like this I don’t
know if it will work for you guys but
it’s a day at a time yeah I like it does
it because at the end of my youtube
videos I have I do I have I promoted me
you guide that I doubt that you can
download the assignment from newsletter
but may be fine now i should add a new
picture of me like holding it see how
I’m write that down I’m getting lots of
ideas too Mike today um okay maybe last
question here let me pull it up on the
screen here another one that Jay Reise
posted on behalf of lawman photo I’ve
been doing photography 16 years and have
a logo and name for myself how do I take
what I have and make it pop I wish we
could let me see on the side because I
kind of want to see what the what yeah
Jay Wright JR I just kind of posted this
on behalf so it is up there wow man
photo if you scroll up you can kind of
see it it’s a black logo and it says
Lynn on the top Lindblom when I guess
that’s her name well it kind of you
advice for photographer who wants to
take their name and logo and make it
make it pop yeah um if if your logo was
made 16 years ago there’s a chance that
it may not pop as much as it is today
without starting over got it okay okay
they’re going up so now we can see how
yeah um how do you make it pop um in my
experience in working with photographers
and I know many and was one for a brief
period of time uh your images are going
to speak louder than your
logo itself so if i were you i would say
take your logo make sure it’s on all of
the images you know all of the
watermarks all that kind of stuff that
photographers tend to do but it’s strong
enough to stand and be unique just make
sure that the images that you put it
with are the type and style that you
want to continue to do and are your best
images those images will pop then
someone’s like oh who took this Oh Lynn
did very cool and so your your logo is
just going to reinforce the element and
I don’t think your logo is the piece
that actually needs to pop it’s the
photography because that’s what
someone’s hiring to you to do so your
logo is very important to you it may not
be important to your clients or future
clients so let your photography pop and
then just make sure that your logo is
there for the Association so that’s when
someone does come to your site they’re
like oh yeah this is this person you
have a couple quick thoughts one um I
love logos that look good when they’re
small to you know I can’t read this I
barely see Lynn and I can’t see the
bottom part so this logo only works when
it’s a lot bigger where if you look at
iconic like if I saw McDonald’s or Nike
or Apple that size I would instantly
know what it is you saw the airplane
that size you’d be able to see it so I’d
love to see something where it looks
good on a small scale to for a personal
brand I think you’ll get much higher
leverage out of your face then out of a
out of an icon but if you are going to
do an icon then make it something that
represents back to her kind of initial
how we started this whole thing was
what’s your purpose right yeah what why
are you doing this you know you want so
the name itself doesn’t mean as much as
if you had you know an airplane or a
tree or a car or whatever something that
relates to what you stand for is a human
being and what you’re trying to drive
into your business much more than just
saying your name so those options i
would still probably lean towards having
your face though i think it would i
think it makes it more personal because
the business is named after you but if
you’re not going to do that then pick an
icon that relates to the mission that
you staying for not
your name yeah and there are some small
tweaks you could make this to to bump it
up without having to start completely
over well quickly such as what would you
such as adding icon oh you know you
leave the word mark so there’s two types
of logos there’s word mark logos where
your word is the logo j.crew you know
Lynn your your logo and then there is a
more about icon mark so where there’s a
combination of the two like aweber right
um so you could combine your current
word mark with some sort of icon mark
and to beef that up to make it a pop a
little bit more um you know you could
also leave the Lynn the way it is and
then beef up the way I can’t read the
word that’s at the bottom but beef up
Lauren wellman yeah or you know I see a
outline of a square maybe that outline
of a squirrel be square becomes a bold
square instead of just the outline so
little tweaks like that could take your
existing logo and make it more in fact
impactful or pop yeah especially the
name of your business Islam in
photography and then all i see is Lynn
in the logo when it’s small it’s a
little in congruence so just be from
that it might help to cool a little bit
over Mike thank you for the time just
before we sign off I’m going to do a
quick giveaway this for the youtube
channel Aweber sent me some stuff
including this shirt they sent me two
shirts of medium that are my size and
two shirts that are large at are too big
for me so I’m going to give away the two
large ones the first one is was AJ that
we talked a lot about and the second one
is their logo here with some funky
design ah the American Apparel feel
beautiful way to class up on the shirts
there and so for the youtube channel
people watching whoever leaves the two
comments that get the most thumbs ups
i’m going to mail you this shirt will
connect afterwards a send your direct
message and send it off to you so they
can be a kind of full up Wow a fun I
said a kind in fool instead of fun and
cool kind of waiting why
spread some love Mike thank you for the
time for people who want to find out
more about you and asking maybe
questions afterwards where’s the best
way to be able to reach you yeah connect
with me on twitter @ m e smith design
yes Michael my name is Michael Smith its
most generic name ever so m e smith
design is my online persona you can find
me at that pretty much any on any social
network but Twitter is probably the best
for here awesome Mike thank you so much
thank you guys for joining and we’ll see
you soon thanks Evan
Please follow and like us: