How Good vs. Bad Graphics Effect Your Business with Annette

Since marketing was invented, the need for graphic design has been ever-growing. However, graphics aren’t used to simply sell your business like they’ve been used in the past, instead, they represent your business.

Graphics are the foundation of your brand.

They not only represent how you present your company but also whether or not potential clients feel a connection with your company, whether your company can be taken seriously to not only clients but possible employees.

Today, I partnered up with Annette Mcdonald, the founder of Easil, an online DIY Graphic Design solution for brands and teams, as well as, MD of Copirite, a leading design, print & digital agency located on the Gold Coast, to teach you a little on what it entails to have Good vs. Bad Graphics. 

The Importance of How You Portray Your Business

In order to grow your business, it is so important to create a quality design that can live in many different elements. Whether you using graphics for print, on the web, or for social, the most important thing you can do to create a quality design is making sure your graphics are consistent.

While your voice and style may change amongst the platforms, your brand style needs to remain the same. The best way to manage your brand style is through a Brand Style Guide and a Brand Voice Guide.

Brand Style Guide

Your Brand Style Guide is a guide to remain consistent about how you want things to appear in relation to your business.

This includes:

• Brand Colors
• Fonts
• Selection of Imagery
• Logos
• Explanation of How You Use All of the Above

Brand Colors

Your brand colors should be 3 or 4 colors that you want to represent your brand. Now, it’s important that you don’t just say “pink and blue” this is where you have to be specific. A pink and blue hue can show up differently in different programs, on different mediums and all together can range from light to dark.

You’ll want to get the exact number from your color wheel and document it in your Brand Style Guide.

Fonts 

The fonts included should be two or three fonts you’ll use to represent the personality of your business.

Selection of Imagery 

Your selection of imagery will be ever-changing but should include things like a variety of headshots you’ll use, or different images you want to be the face of your business.

Logos

I’m sure you know you need a logo for your business but it’s actually a good idea to have a couple of logos drafted up so when making your graphics, you’ll have the perfect logo for all mediums.

How You Use All of the Above

In this section, you’ll want to explain how you use all the other items on your Brand Style Guide. Whether that’s where you position your logos, what colors you like to pair together, when to use a certain font, or any other details that you deem important for creating connections through your graphics.

Voice Guide

Your voice guide should show off the voice of your personality. Are you light-hearted or are you serious? Do you say puuurfect or perfect?

All of the simple things that design your company. 

Evoking Emotions through Graphics

The way your graphics present to the viewer can evoke so many emotions. Like when you saw the adorable sleeping kitten, you probably felt a small connection to how sweet, simple and cute it is!

When it comes to evoking emotion, you want to make the viewer feel a human connection with your company. For our industry, you’ll want to come off as caring and compassionate in all interactions. Always associate your business with natural emotions. 

We’re lucky! 

Everyone uses pet images to promote that human connection because everyone loves going on social media and commenting on pets.

Play the cards you were dealt and use all the animal-loving to your advantage! 

The Effects of Bad Graphics

When it comes to creating the best graphics that resonate the most with viewers, less is more.

Keep your graphics clear and concise. There is nothing worse than trying to jam-pack your graphic with every element possible.

You know how you feel when you go to work and your desk is cluttered with papers, pens, sticky notes, anything and everything that could be in your way?  That uncomfortable feeling, sometimes even anxiety-inducing feeling, is exactly how it feels to look at a graphic will too much going on.

Take Apple, for example, their design is as simple as it gets yet it evokes so many emotions! When you see Apple, you see the company leading the industry, you may even have a sigh of relief knowing everything will be made simple.

Sometimes we will only remember how something makes us feel rather than what was said. 

The 7 Deadly DIY Design Sins

If you’re struggling to put these concepts into practice, Annette’s article, the 7 Deadly DIY Design Sins, is a great way to further your knowledge on what will make or break your graphics.

Annette and Better Marketing with Bella

Have you loved learning from Annette’s 20 years of graphic and design experience? But are you left feeling like there is just no way you can add creating graphics to your daily tasks?

We’ve got news!

Better Marketing with Bella is stepping up our graphic game for 2020 by partnering up with Annette as our graphic designer! Join us for a six-month contract to get all the graphics, captions, square videos, cover videos, vertical videos, blog/video outlines, emails, individual and group coaching calls, and more.

Conclusion

Corresponding your graphics from social, to print, to the web, is necessary for growing your business and becoming recognized and trusted in your community. You’ll need to create a brand style guide and a voice style guide to really lay the foundation of how you want to be perceived by the public.

So much of your business is portrayed through your graphics, they need to be top-notch.

You want people to recognize your company in your graphics immediately from your use of consistent brand identifiers and be able to feel your compassion and love for your work through your images.