The First Date

We say that launching your new website is like a first date – you want to make a great first impression. Even before words are read, your eye starts giving emotional clues. Is the look contemporary and fresh? Is it immediately clear what the product or service is? Taking the time to procure graphics and photos that are cohesive with your brand will elevate you in this “first date”.

Elevating Your Brand

Here are some suggestions for elevating your brand and getting more bang for your visual bucks:

1. Hiring a graphic designer to develop a cohesive brand before you create your website will return your marketing investment much quicker. (Definition of a business brand: “The marketing practice of creating a name, symbol or design that identifies and differentiates a product from other products. An effective brand strategy gives you a major edge in increasingly competitive markets.” –source: entrepreneur.com)
2. Use a professional photographer for taking photos of your product. If you are a house painter, ask the homeowner if you can take photos after the furniture is back in. Set this up with the photographer and owner before you start the painting job. Tell them you’d like photos for your portfolio. This will let your clients know that you intend to do a fantastic paint job. And your best selling tool is showing a job well done.
3. For your home page imagery, it is important to show high-quality photos that represent work that you are capable of. And if you don’t own high-quality photos of work YOU have done, it would better to search for a stock photo that really shines, rather than using a phone camera shot of the product or job.   (If you are using imagery from the world wide web, make sure you purchase rights to use it or make sure it is a public domain image.  If you are not sure…don’t use it. Images you find on the internet are someone’s lively-hood.  Artists’ and photographers’ work is copyrighted, and it is a serious offense to “steal” these images.)
4. Pick one style of graphics and photos and do not stray. Again, the BRAND. You may see a photo or an illustration that you think is cool, but if it does not stay within the color palette or style of the rest of your images, don’t be tempted.
5. Color, texture, and imagery are trends that evolve. If you want to emote that you are a business that MEANS BUSINESS, you must evolve as well. Update well and often.
6. Use no more than three fonts (including your logo font) in your brand and on your website. Choose easy to read fonts that emote your business personality. If you have a pet product business, you could go with a more playful font than a lawyer would use.

So let’s go on a date! I am looking forward to seeing your company’s “first impression” look.

Source: Annette Frei – 360 Web Designs Sr. Project Manager / Creative Director