We have deemed November “Free Lunch for Pi Month.” In order to score as many free lunches as possible I am willing to offer up all of my design and marketing expertise in exchange for a meal at the restaurant of your choice. You can pick my brain for the entire lunch. We can talk about how to integrate Social Media into your marketing, brainstorm about email campaigns, and figure out new target markets for you to explore.

There’s only one caveat – It must be a sit down and order restaurant because we will need a table large enough to spread out papers and work (the little paper place mat they give you at In-N-Out just won’t suffice). Also, I am trying to stay away from fast food joints at this juncture in life.

WHAT’S ON THE MENU:

1. An assessment of your existing marketing materials – I will look them over and we will discuss them. I will let you know, in my humble opinion based on 20 years in the industry, what I think works, what doesn’t work, and what could be improved.
2. Brainstorming session – Together we will throw around ideas on how to generate new leads, better communicate with your target market, and drive more traffic to your website.
3. Development of your target persona – I have a quick and fun way to help us understand your customers better and figure out what influences their interactions with you. By analyzing demographic and psychographic information we will create a fictional representation of your targeted buyer. This persona will allow you to create more tailored marketing strategies.

At the end of lunch you will have a better focus on where and how to direct your marketing attention. I will email you a “wrap up” document to remind you of all that we discussed along with a list of recommendations. This information will inspire you and allow you to keep your marketing fresh and relevant. I guarantee that you will be amazed how one lunch can increase your marketing ROI.

So call me (805.383.0054) or email me and let’s make a lunch date!

“QR CODE?!?! What’s that?” I hear you cry. Basically, it is a two dimensional bar code in which you can embed information like web URLs, videos, and contact information. People can access that information by simply scanning the codes with their smart phones. They are free to create and they hold a lot of information.

So next time you see a QR (Quick Response, in case you were curious) code, simply take a picture of it with your phone’s camera using a QR Code Reader application and you’ll be directed to the embedded information in that code, such as a website, video, or text message.

You can make your own for FREE and very easily at any QR code generating website, but the trick is, once you have created your neat little square, what will you do with it? Here are some ideas to get your marketing gears churning:

1. Simplify your business card by including all of your social networking profiles, phones numbers, email addresses into a QR code. It will make for a great conversation starter.
2. In grocery stores, recipes could be embedded in codes using the products found on nearby shelves. Then the recipe is easily available on your phone when you get home.
3. A QR code posted next to a painting in a gallery or museum could contain a link to the artist’s bio and the website to purchase a print of the painting.
4. Whole marketing stories could be told on small hang tags in clothing stores. Where did the cotton come from? Who designed this shirt? Is it sustainable?
5. Discount codes and virtual coupons can be scanned from fliers or direct mail pieces and then saved in your smart phone for later use. No more searching through your purse for the silly piece of paper.
6. Links to trailers can be printed on movie posters. I saw this one at the mall the other day.
7. A QR code on your resume could provide a link to your personal website or your LinkedIn profile.
8. Store wrapping paper or shopping bags could have links to their website or fashion videos.
9. Cocktail napkins at a networking event could take you to the sponsor’s website or a cool corporate video promoting their new product launch.
10. A counter card in your trade show booth could have a QR Code that, when scanned, enters you to win an iPad. Or better yet, put a QR code on your giveaways that has more corporate information than you could actually print in a 1″ x 1″ space otherwise.

The possibilities are endless. You can advertise, generate Facebook “likes,” offer discounts, or simply provide information through these nifty little graphics. They can be printed in your corporate colors and customized to a certain point as well. Feel free to call us to brainstorm ideas for using them in your marketing. We love playing with this exciting new tool that brings together the printed and cyber worlds.

I have put together a fun collection of these “new” infographics for your viewing pleasure.

The Periodic Table of Awesoments

This is a hilarious Table of truly awesome stuff that most of us geeks can relate to. Please notice that the number one element is bacon. This guy must know what he is talking about. Am I right?

The Periodic Table of Rockin’

This funny, interactive musical Table will keep you entertained for quite awhile.

The Periodic Table of Irrational Nonsense

The Periodic Table of Cartoon Characters

How many can you name without cheating? More than 40? More than 80? Seriously? All of them? Grow up.

The Periodic Table of Cars

In case you can’t get enough of these tables then try this shirt on for size.

After all that if you still want some more periodic-ness in your life, memorize this song and then tell me if you have had enough.

Here’s another of his keynotes. It’s a bit raunchy and in-your-face, but brilliant all the same.

Now go and get excited about what YOU do and CRUSH IT!

“Six Pixels of Separation” by Mitch Joel

If you have been putting off taking your business into the world of Social Media, hoping the silly time sucking craze will just go away, then you must read this book. Even if you have gotten your feet wet on Twitter, you still need to read this book. “Social media is not a fad,” says Mitch Joel. He guides you through the world of Wikis, Twitter and blogging and explains the necessity of getting involved in the conversations going on out there. Take control of your company’s messaging and branding through the great internet tools available now. READ THIS BOOK TODAY!

“Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die” by Chip Heath and Dan Heath

If want to learn how to make your ideas stand out amongst the barrage of information that is out there now, you have to read this book. After extensive research, Chip and Dan Heath discovered that ideas that “stick” share six basic principles. This book explains these principles and cites relevant examples from their studies. The authors explain why many people with important ideas can’t seem to get them across and yet urban legends and conspiracy theories spread like wild fire. The presentation of ideas was so fascinating that I ripped through this book like a kid opening presents at Christmas. The sure-fire methods for making your ideas “stickier” presented made me wish I could use a highlighter on Kindle! I recommend actually buying the book (not reading it on your Kindle or borrowing someone else’s marked up copy) because you will want to go back and reread many sections.

Read the Time Magazine article about the book here.

“Killer Brands: Create and Market a Brand That Will Annihilate the Competition” by Frank Lane

Frank Lane’s three basic principles to creating a “Killer Brand” are presented very simply in this fun, easy to read book. Through his years of experience he has narrowed the process down to three things: Focus, Alignment, and Linkage. While reading this book you will inspired to rethink your entire marketing process. I know I was. Don’t ask to borrow my copy though. It has been loaned out so many times I can’t remember who has it now.

NEXT ON MY LIST

Waiting patiently on the shelf are two more exciting books. “Crush It! Why Now is the Time to Cash in on Your Passion” is written by one of my heroes, Gary Vaynerchuk. He is the brilliant, straight forward, although sometimes loony, creator of “Wine Library TV.” His personal story and “in your face” style will inspire you to go out and do whatever it is you do better, NOW.

I have heard wonderful things about “Trust Agents: Using the Web to Build Influence, Improve Reputation, and Earn Trust” by Chris Brogan. So this one too, sits there on my shelf, staring at me, making me wish I had 4 or 5 more hours a day than everyone else so I could sit and read all day.

Feel free to add your comments on these books and/or add your recommendations. I look forward to hearing from everyone.

There are a constant barrage of business cards left on my front porch from tree trimmers, cleaning folks, landscapers, gardeners and others insinuating that I am not doing a very good  job of these things myself. I don’t take offense because I am busy and don’t put as much attention into my house as I probably should. Hopefully my friends and family get that and don’t think less of me. But, as I am sort of in the market for a cleaning person, I kept two cards in particular from last week. This first one wasn’t too horribly offensive design-wise. With a cute little cleaning girl and an easily legible typeface, I wasn’t tempted to throw it immediately into the trash. Monica and Lucio might be someone I would give a call regarding my need for help with the housecleaning though I am a bit worried about the “Chemical Included.”

But then the next day I found this treasure. I was blown away by the care and thought put into Jackeline & Dalinda’s marketing efforts. I really appreciate that they care enough about their image to create such an adorable business card. I truly believe that they will put that same care into the cleaning of my home.

So tell me, who would you call?

1. What services and/or products do you offer?
2. How would you describe your corporate culture?
3. What makes your company unique?
4. Where do you see your company in 5 years? 10 years?
5. Why do you want a new identity? How should it be different? How different do you want it to be?
6. Who are your target customers?
7. Who are your competitors? What are they doing right and wrong in your mind?
8. Do you have a slogan or tag line? Would you like it incorporated into the new identity?
9. Do you have specific imagery in mind? (Prosaic, abstract, concrete representation)
10. What are your existing brand colors and should they be maintained in the new look?
11. What feelings should your logo convey?
12. Do you have preferences for typefaces? (Script, Sans Serif, Bold, Thin)
13. What are the primary and secondary uses of the logo (website, signage, print, product graphics, etc). This will help designer determine if the logo should be horizontal, vertical, square, etc.
14. What is your deadline? (product launch, trade show, etc)

Typography involves the selection of appropriate typefaces and their arrangement on the page. Bad typography practices can negatively affect the reader’s view of your company. Good ones should be invisible, placing the focus on the content of the document and not the totally cool typeface you chose.        

It is a good idea to create some company standards and make sure that everyone follows them for all documents created for in-house use and especially for external usage. This will allow your audience to concentrate on your message instead of being distracted by the layout of the document. Below are some terms you should understand and some tips to follow.

Click here to skip straight to TIPS

Measure: The standard length of a line of type is called the measure. For ideal readability, the length of a line should be 2-3 alphabets (52-78 characters including spaces) long. If a line is too long the reader loses their place when starting a new line and often gets frustrated. If the measure is too short the it is very distracting and the message can get lost. A short measure can be OK if there is only a small amount of type.

Tracking: Also known as letter spacing, tracking can completely change the readability of the entire page. A more airy feel is created by slightly expanding the tracking across a body of text. In a title or headline that is all caps it can look elegant to extend the tracking a bit. Negative tracking throughout a document is a NO-NO. Negative tracking should only be used to adjust one or two lines of justified type. As designers, we carefully use tracking to keep hyphenated words to a minimum. This is the practice of working line by line adjusting the spacing little by little to create visually appealing layouts. The reader’s eye should flow through the copy without noticing the typeface, size or spacing.

Leading: This is a term that has been around since the days of hand-set metal type and it refers to the distance between the lines of type (also known as line spacing). Leading should never be less that the actual point size of the type. If you have created a wide measure (see above) then it is a good idea to increase the leading a bit to allow the reader’s eyes to easily find the next line. If you are reversing type out (making white type on a black background, for instance) then you should increase the leading and tracking. Because of the high contrast the letter forms need to be further apart, lighter in weight and have more space between the lines. You should also use a thinner font, by the way, in this case.

Hierarchy: A typographic hierarchy expresses an organizational system for content, emphasizing some information and diminishing others. A hierarchy helps readers scan text, knowing where to enter and exit and how to pick and choose among its offerings. Each level of the hierarchy should be signaled by one or more cues, applied consistently across a body of text. A cue can be an indent for a new section, or a change in type face color, size or style.

Typeface vs. Font: In this day and age where everyone uses computers the terms have become interchangeable but they actually mean very different things. The typeface is the original design of a style of type family. A font is a variation of a typeface like bold, italic or a particular size (9 pt., 10 pt., 12, pt. etc). I read a great distinction on The Font Feed where they compare typefaces to songs and fonts to MP3′s. You would not say, “I like that MP3,” in the same way you would not say, “I like the design of that font.” The font is the thing you actually use on the computer as a way of delivering a visual representation of the typeface. While we are on the subject of typefaces…

Typeface Selection: Skilled graphic designers choose typefaces based on their knowledge of history, awareness of trends and an understanding of the audience. We are constantly aware of the use of type around us all day long on signage, packaging, television, magazines. We instinctively know which typefaces represent fun, stability, elegance or action. When it comes to setting type for a business document you want to choose a typeface with a high degree of readability that disappears to the reader as their eyes take in the meaning of the words. Good choices are Helvetica, Garamond, Frutiger and Futura.

Typography Tips

1. Ideally in Word documents, you should set the left margin at 1.25″ or 1.5, while the right should be at least 1″ for easy legibility if you are using 10-12pt type.
2. Do not double space after a period. If you learned, as I did, to type in the prehistoric typewriter era then you are probably guilty of this type crime. When they invented the word processing software we all use today they built in certain spacing functions such as the perfect “space and a half” after periods as a signal to our brains to rest before continuing on to the next sentence. So stop doing it manually because it creates an unsightly (to us graphic designers) triple space and large visual gaps that create “rivers” throughout your document. Typographic rivers are a subject I will save for another blog.
3. When creating marginal notes or captions try using Flush Right on those sections to add visual interest.
4. BOLD, ITALIC, AND UNDERLINED CAPS should be used in moderation for emphasis. Never use all three in the same document. You only need one to get your point across.
5. Use 10-11pt type for documents that have a lot of copy (type). 9pt is often too small for some typefaces and people over 35 like me. 12pt can look clunky and elementary on an 8.5 x 11 piece of paper.
6. When you need a bold or italic font if at all possible use the pull down menu to choose the particular font (Helvetica Bold, Garamond Bold, Arial Bold, etc) instead of the toolbar icons provided in applications such as Microsoft Word. This may seem ridiculous to you but your eye does understand the subtle differences. Typeface designers carefully create each character in the entire type family (bold, regular, thin, italic, bold italic, etc) to ensure proper legibility of each letter and numeral to enhance the readability. The bold tool bar command will often just make the font thicker regardless of the thicks and thins inherent in the typeface and decrease overall legibility.
7. Using all caps in a headline can convey formality or power. But be careful not to make the headline too long or people will have a hard time reading it. Our eyes are trained to recognize word shapes in lower case so we tend to skip over long lengths of all cap type. A headline is supposed to stand out and be easy to read, not ignored.
8. Script fonts indicate formality and should be used sparingly for invitations, awards and other short important documents. Do not type an entire document in a script typeface. Also, never type anything in a script font in all caps unless you don’t want people to read it.
9. To create a clean professional document stick to fonts in the same family. Avoid pairing fonts that are only slightly different like two sans serif fonts (Univers Bold and Helvetica Regular) or two serif fonts like Garamond and Times New Roman. It is OK to make your titles in one typeface and your body copy in another as long as they are visually very different. It is always safe to use fonts within the same family (Bold, Italic, Thin). This is what they are designed for.
10. Don’t try to be edgy or cool by choosing a funky font for large amounts of copy. If you feel the urge to choose a crazy typeface to be different, again, use it sparingly. These typestyles can be draining on the eye if used for entire paragraphs at a time. The reader will become frustrated and likely lose interest in the information presented. So if you are trying to create a fun document go ahead and make the title in a crazy typeface and then set the rest in a more casual sans serif face like Helvetica, Gill Sans, Futura or Univers.
11. Don’t justify your type if you have more than one paragraph. The application you are using to create your document will stretch and squish at random to force the words and spaces to fit. Designers spend many hours of tedious work to type­set jus­ti­fied text that is truly well-​proportioned and leg­i­ble. A ragged-​right com­po­si­tion will give the text a more har­mo­nious appear­ance and make it easier to read.
12. When creating lists use bullets instead of hyphens or asterisks. Use Control+Shift+L on a PC and Option+8 on a Mac.

Look for more tips to come in future blogs and remember that all these seemingly small details can have a large effect on the professionalism of the overall document.

1. The flashing, pulsating, blinking bright yellow boxes with the red text on your home page look pretty.
2. No one ever contacts you from your site anyway…or at least they don’t stay long enough or dig deep enough to find the contact information which was supposed to appear on the home page but for some reason shows up on the third page of services and you have to scroll to the right to see it.
3. Your site loads rather quickly. By the time you make a cup of coffee and get back to your desk the home page is almost completely up.
4. It doesn’t matter that your site is all messed up when viewed in IE6 or Firefox because it looks just fine in Netscape.
5. Your IT guy says it looks awesome.
6. You don’t care that your company’s site shows up on page 126 of a Google search. It’s OK because you still have a yellow pages ad and people would rather lug out one of those big books than search on Google anyway.
7. The flapping flags and rotating globe let everyone know just how truly global your company is.
8. Those dead 404 Error links were fixed like two years ago.
9. You already spent an exorbitant $200 on your site back in 1999.
10. Your animated step and repeat logo background is outstanding. And so is your 3-D rotating logo with the flames.
11. The little visitor counter at the bottom of the home page is informative and cool.
12. Your MIDI background music ROCKS!

Do you relate to any of these? Contact us today so we can work with you to modernize your site. We can give you an attractive and functional web presence that will make customers want to pick up the phone and call you.

You really, really like Comic Sans and think it is perfect typeface for all your business documents.

OOPS! That’s eleven. We were on a roll here at Pi Design this morning. Perhaps it was more of a rant. Please comment below, especially if you’re a designer. We would love to hear more reasons why we should not be getting paid for what we do.