I’m guessing I’m not alone in the struggle to stay positive, and I started wondering if there is any design/art out there that could help cheer us up.

Just so you know, by “good design,” I mean colorful, graphic, fun design and art. If your jam is more along the minimal, subtle, monochromatic lines, you can probably skip what’s to come.

Planning the structure and content of your site in advance will do wonders for keeping your website project on budget and on schedule. Realizing half way through the process that you need additional pages or that the flow of the site needs to be changed up or even that content has to be rewritten adds to the work your designer needs to do, which adds to the cost of the site and the time it requires to complete. So, take my advice and sit down and take these actionable steps before you hire that snazzy designer (note: you can also hire a strategist to help you do this), so when she gives you her questionnaire or planner or whatever she uses, you’re all set to go.

To some, typography isn’t terribly sexy. Color is immediately noticable. Imagery is eyecatching. Typography, on the other hand, is subtle and when it’s done well, you might not even notice it. It’s the often-overlooked, unsung hero of graphic design. It’s almost always there, doing its job, communicating the message, and it can make or break a piece.

Now that I focus mostly on designing visual brands for online businesses, color is still a huge part of what I do. Truthfully, it’s one of the best ways to distinguish your brand from everyone else’s out there. Color creates emotional reactions and can shape how people think about you and your biz.

According to research, color can increase brand recognition by 80%! And people make sub-conscious judgments about an environment or product within 90 seconds of first impression. Between 62% and 90% of that assessment is made based on color.

So, to start, what the heck is my brand, anyway? To sum it up: your brand is who you are and how you show up in your biz and in life. It's what makes you different from everyone else and their sister. It's your reputation, bad or good. It's what you're known for.

Now, when business owners who want to create their own sites ask whether they should use WordPress or Squarespace, I recommend Squarespace without hesitation. Don't get me wrong, I think WordPress is an amazing platform, but for most new business owners who don't have a budget, I think it's just too much to handle on their own. 

We CAN generalize to some degree about the symbolism and meaning attached to various colors, but we should do so with the knowledge that nothing is written in stone or guaranteed. Read on for an overview of various colors and what they are GENERALLY interpreted to mean and what reactions they are likely to evoke. 

Finding, choosing and pairing fonts for your brand is an important, and fun, part of designing a brand identity. In an effort to make it more on the fun side, I’ve listed some tips and resources below to help guide you.

Choosing fonts is one of the most important steps in creating a killer brand identity that will last for the long haul. Fonts (or typefaces), like people and businesses, have different personalities. They can communicate many different messages. They can render a logo unreadable or provide the perfect pitch to complement a logo and reinforce a brand’s personality.