5 Design Tips
Our latest round up of expert tips comes from one of our top Design Consultants Claire. With 20 years of graphic design experience and working on a wide variety of client briefs from Branding & Identity through to Point of Sale, Printed Marketing Materials, Social Media and Digital Design; Claire is versatile, flexible and able to work to tight timelines. She has kindly shared her top 5 design tips of the most important things to think about when developing branding and working on design in general.
Tip 1 - Fonts
When it comes to choosing what fonts to use, try not to use too many and stick to a maximum of 3. Use fonts to make text stand out, e.g. use one for the heading, subheading and body copy. These can be different fonts of just different weights of the same fonts. Most fonts have a regular, medium and bold version. Always remember whichever fonts you use you need to own the copyright. A good resource for fonts is google fonts, all of which are free for commercial use. Creativemarket.com is a good place to look for more unique fonts which can be purchased at a good rate.
Tip 2 - Images
When using images to represent your brand always be consistent with the style of the image. Make sure the images are good quality and look professional. If you can invest in professional photography for your brand it really is worth it to make the imagery unique to you and your business. If that’s not an option however and you are taking the photos yourself it’s worth learning a bit about photography; there are lots of online resources to help you with this.
You can also use stock photography, this is where you purchase photos to use in your design material or online. When choosing images, be mindful of the style you are looking for and always pick similar shots in terms of look and feel to keep it consistent for your brand. When using images make sure they are the correct format for your project. RGB, 72 dpi (dots per inch) for online use and CMYK, 300 dpi (dots per inch) for print jobs.
Tip 3 - Colour
Choose a great colour palette and STICK TO IT! Being consistent with your brand colours will help to reinforce your brand. You can take your colour Inspo from anywhere and everywhere, look at what others are doing in your sector or other brands you like. Pinterest is a good resource for colour inspiration. Colour types, PMS, RGB, CMYK and HEX confusing right? I’ll try to demystify it a bit for you below!
PMS - Stands for Pantone Matching System; these are special inks used within the printing process to keep a consistent colour across all printed materials. Brands like Coca Cola would use a Pantone special colour to ensure their trademark red always appears the same tone across all of their brand assets.
CMYK - Stands for Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black. These are the colours used within the printing process and all colours are made up of these 4 colours. All design work that needs to be printed should be designed in CMYK.
RGB - Stands for Red, Green, Blue. These are the colours that make up all colours that are seen on screen. All design work that is to appear online should be designed in RGB.
HEX - Stands for Hexadecimal color codes. These are web safe colours and would be used on your website and online.
Tip 4 - Commissioning designers
When commissioning a professional designer to work on your project make sure you get an estimate beforehand which details what is included in the quoted price. It is a good idea to ask them to include one or two rounds of corrections within that price. Before you send the designer any copy make sure it has been copy proofed and is correct as this will cut down on the amendment time needed. Always supply the designer with a detailed brief before work commences. This again will save time and therefore money in the long run.
As with photography, good design and finding the right designer is a great investment for your business.
Tip 5 - Consistency
All of the above are valued parts that contribute to your brands’ look and feel and how you portray yourself and your business to your customers or clients. You should make sure you have a strong idea of your brand and the style you wish to use to portray it. Make a brand toolkit, which should include your fonts, images, colour palette along with other brand elements. These can all make up part of your brand guide; an invaluable item which can be used when commissioning designers or other creatives. This ensures all your marketing material and communications are kept consistent and in turn enhances your brand and its values.