Get There from Here

This is a group of quick business editorial style illustrations we created for the Alternative Board who provide business improvement advisory and consulting services. The concept for the illustrations is based on the idea of “There” as an idyllic mythical place where your business should be. The graphics express getting “There,” steering your business “There,” and building your business “There.”

To learn more about what Carey Jolliffe Graphic Arts can do for your business, please visit cjolliffe.com.

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Mad Men (ish)

I wanted to post these to show a bit of our methods so anyone interested in working with a designer for the first time might know what they might expect.

Design is a process and there are usually several phases to a given project which refine a design so it will serve the client’s needs. These can include a first round conceptual phase, multiple rounds of revisions and final production of finished art. We’re going to focus here on the very first stage: the conceptual phase.

When working on advertising, marketing campaigns or strategic messaging the first round it’s all about conveying ideas. At the very beginning of this type of project we’ll often pitch numerous concepts for a client to choose from. Budgets almost never allow us to do full computer designs with photo shoots or full illustrations for each concept so we’ll present sketches. These aren’t works of art, they are quickly done comps with just enough visual detail to help a client decide on a direction. They’re made to elicit discussion and help develop specifics. Elements like body text, color or fonts which might distract or influence the client are not included. At this point we’re only selling the idea and leaving the details to be sorted out later.

So here is a little peek behind the curtain for a fairly typical advertising pitch:

* The above images are actual client work but the company name has been changed

To learn more about what Carey Jolliffe Graphic Arts can do for your business, please visit cjolliffe.com.

For All the Creatives in the Hizzouse

This one’s going out to all our friends in the ‘bidness.’ PhotoShelter has an excellent FREE 53-page e-book called The Freelancers Online Marketing Blueprint. It’s packed with scads of information, tools, tips and strategies for creative professionals to keep growing their businesses. It covers some pretty heavy new media essentials like utilizing social media, search engine optimization, content creation, sticky posts, blogging, email marketing and pay-per-click advertising.

“Grow your revenue by creating more ways for potential clients to find you and engage with your content online.”

It’s specifically written for designers, photographers, copywriters, illustrators, etc but much of the information could apply to just about any business looking to utilize web marketing.

Click here to get the guide

To learn more about what Carey Jolliffe Graphic Arts can do for your business, please visit cjolliffe.com.

How To Hire A Great Graphic Designer

Businessinsider.com has a good article on finding and working with the right Graphic Designer for you. One thing the piece alludes to but doesn’t flat out say is that working with a designer is a collaborative relationship. Rather then thinking of a designer as a decorator who’s there to make you look good, you should think of them as a creative problem solver who works with you to meet your objective.

But overall, I think the article spells out a good basic overview of the preliminary steps needed to get the best out of working with a designer.

Click here to read the article

To learn more about what Carey Jolliffe Graphic Arts can do for your business, please visit cjolliffe.com.

The Power of Color

When you walk down the street and see a brown panel truck, do you think UPS? What about a yellow moving van or a green tractor? When you go to the soda aisle and see the color red, what brand comes to mind? These are really powerful examples of brand colors that we all encounter multiple times every day. No matter what industry your in, you can use color to keep your business in the front of your customers’ minds and differentiate you from your competition.

Now obviously you’ll never own a color like red, blue or green but you can own it within your market. If you own a landscaping business and all your competition has mismatched white trucks, you’ll stand out by having your’s be blue. Carry that blue across to your uniforms, website and advertising and you have recognizable brand continuity. The goal is to have customers immediately identify your company before they have time to think. We’re talking wham-bam first impressions even before they get a chance to see your logo.

Today I gave myself a challenge. I went to my local supermarket, took off my glasses so I couldn’t identify any logos and glanced down every aisle trying to find brands that owned a color within the context of similar products. It’s really surprising how easy it is to buy exactly what you want by color alone.

To learn more about what Carey Jolliffe Graphic Arts can do for your business, please visit cjolliffe.com.

Put on a Brand New Face

Had a lot of fun creating these graphics for our new website homepage:

To learn more about what Carey Jolliffe Graphic Arts can do for your business, please visit cjolliffe.com.

Manifesto on Making and Consuming Things

Ulla-Maaria Mutanen, a Ph.D. student at the University of Helsinki in Finland, has been thinking about why we enjoy making things. Creator of the HobbyPringcess blog, she developed a Crafter’s Manifesto that could just as easily be read as a call for makers to unite.

1. People get satisfaction for being able to create/craft things because they can see themselves in the objects they make. This is not possible in purchased products.
2. The things that people have made themselves have magic powers. They have hidden meanings that other people can’t see.
3. The things people make they usually want to keep and update. Crafting is not against consumption. It is against throwing things away.
4. People seek recognition for the things they have made. Primarily it comes from their friends and family. This manifests as an economy of gifts.
5. People who believe they are producing genuinely cool things seek broader exposure for their products. This creates opportunities for alternative publishing channels.
6. Work inspires work. Seeing what other people have made generates new ideas and designs.
7. Essential for crafting are tools, which are accessible, portable, and easy to learn.
8. Materials become important. Knowledge of what they are made of and where to get them becomes essential.
9. Recipes become important. The ability to create and distribute interesting recipes becomes valuable.
10. Learning techniques brings people together. This creates online and offline communities of practice.
11. Craft-oriented people seek opportunities to discover interesting things and meet their makers. This creates marketplaces.
12. At the bottom, crafting is a form of play.

To learn more about what Carey Jolliffe Graphic Arts can do for your business, please visit cjolliffe.com.

How Colors Effect Purchases

Ever wonder why you choose Coke (red) over Pepsi (blue) or Continental (blue) over Virgin Atlantic (red)? This chart from Kiss Metrics breaks it down.

To learn more about what Carey Jolliffe Graphic Arts can do for your business, please visit cjolliffe.com.