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Branding & Design with Christine Tafoya

Lesson 38 from: Unlock the Power of Pinterest

Melanie Duncan

Branding & Design with Christine Tafoya

Lesson 38 from: Unlock the Power of Pinterest

Melanie Duncan

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Lesson Info

38. Branding & Design with Christine Tafoya

Lessons

Class Trailer

Day 1

1

Bonus Video with Purchase: Create/Convert to a Business Account

07:39
2

Bonus Video wtih Purchase: Business Resource Center

04:25
3

Bonus Video With Purchase: Your Profile

06:27
4

Bonus Video With Purchase: How to Create Boards

10:16
5

Bonus Video With Purchase: How to Edit Your Pins

03:17
6

Bonus Video With Purchase: How to Follow

02:01
7

Bonus Video With Purchase: How to Pin

07:46

Lesson Info

Branding & Design with Christine Tafoya

so excited. So I'm going to just jump straight into this because I know Christine has a lot to talk about, and I am just more than excited to hear her talk about her expertise, which is branding and design. So what Christine's going to teach you about today is with your brand, how to keep it simple and, really, how to keep it together. She was telling me, You know, sometimes as a business owner, we've got a lot of different elements, were trying to keep in place, and there's a lot of moving pieces. So there's no one better than Christine to come in and actually let us know what you need to be paying attention to when you are working with the visuals of your brand. And she's even going to give us an in depth, step by step walk through of how to use the graphics pack you received when you purchased this course. So it's going to be very exciting to learn those things, and we've even got some special surprises with members in the in studio audience. She's going to give them a real time bra...

nd evaluation, show them areas of improvement that I know all of you are going to find very, very helpful. Interesting. So what I love to do is actually ask Christine to come on out. Christine Tafoya of Deluxe Modern Design. You'll probably remember Christine. She was here on day one, teaching us all of these fabulous things about visual content. Talking about how you're using Pinter's in your business. And now you're going to actually give us a focus. Look on brandy. Yes. So tell us what? What are you gonna be going over in the segment? Well, I think that one of the things that I'd like to show people is how to keep the branding for their business. Simple. We've talked about the way that we need to have a great presence for social media. We need to have a great presence online. What if you don't like your presence that you already have, right? I'm going to show you some steps that you can take Teoh back it up a little bit, refresh it without reinventing the wheel without having to go full through a full rebrand, and, um and then when it's time to go forward with the whole rebrand, we'll talk about that too, when it's just done and over. Yeah, kind of fresh story, so, Yeah, I love that. Well, I'm a huge fan of your work. I'm a huge fan of your presentations. I mean, give your under the way you understand marketing and design and how it works hand in hand together. I think it's so comprehensive. So I want to let you go ahead and take it away. There's a clicker there, right thing, and I'm just off to the side, okay? Anything but all right. Be wonderful. Yes, absolutely. Well, thank you all for having me back and thank you to Creativelive and Melanie. I can't wait. Teoh actually sit down and watch this entire course because I've learned so much in just the little bits I've gotten to see. So I'm really excited. It's been a really fun experience. Um, the one thing I want to do before anything else is read You guys an email that I got this morning. Let me find what I just did with it. It is from Margie. Do I need permission to read this onlys? Okay. All right. Great. Dear Christine, Thank you for all you've been sharing with us. during the Creative Life sessions. I to him, a designer, and I'm so enjoying your style when she talks about my polka dots and things. But the most exciting part is I'm a color expert and author of four books Working on My Fifth and a B jewelry designer. I had no idea what was possible on Pinterest. Already, I've made to sales, have 12 new followers and over 28 pins repent since implementing what you and Melanie have taught us in these last two days. So thank you, Margie, for sharing that that was so exciting. It's like we started this class Wednesday. She's already selling already, getting Repent, already excited about pin dressed and her brand and social media. So yeah, I'm super excited by that. That that that's what we want. That's what we're doing here. So people are Christine exclamation point. Christine is brilliant. So they are. Thank you so much. I'm a little bit less nervous this time, so hopefully well, they said, the 3 18 media says that you're feeling good. Good, Comptel awesome. Well, like I just was saying to Melanie, I want to talk about we've gone over so much of social media. What works? What doesn't what you should do to look awesome online. One of the things I thought of was so many people already have a full brand identity in place. Years have gone by and they've had this brand and they've been tweaking it here and there, and it kind of starts to dilute a little bit. And now suddenly they have this sort of mess on their hands or something that they don't like eso. What I think you guys should do is think about your branding for a minute and just take a quick mental assessment. Do you love it Doesn't make you cringe. I have a lot of clients who email and said, Can you just freshen it? I just don't know what to do here, and I don't I don't want to send, you know, emails out to my clients. And I don't want to even update my website because I don't like the way it looks. So I can't make that excuse anymore. A lot of people will, you know, I'll get email saying, Well, don't really look at my website. Just look at the work or just go to my Facebook page because that's where all the new stuff is, because I haven't updated my site and that you just can't do that anymore. So I want to show you ways. Teoh either love what you have or start over if it's time. Um and I think my biggest rule and my biggest since One of the reasons I got into design was that I loved the simplicity. I love bold, impactful, clean design, and I've always loved that. When I first started looks modern, the whole anthropology scrap of the vintage tape from the corners of things was what was all the rage. And it was not my style. So I tried to adapt, but I just It just never was my thing. Um, so one of the Golden Rules is this quote from Leonardo, who knows what he's talking about? Um, it is, I think, that simplicity is absolutely the ultimate form of sophistication. And so I also get a lot of violence, isn't it? Maybe that's gonna be boring. I don't Simple is to clean is not gonna enough Personality doesn't have to be that way, adding the detail, adding color, adding little elements that really make your personality showing through in your brand are going to keep it together and keep it fun and interesting for you and your clients. Um, if you don't look at your branding and smile and have that little you know Oh, I love that it's time for a change. That's my That's my rule. People do Ask me, How often should I change my Facebook cover? How often should I change my website? Are you sick of looking at it? The new clients were probably second looking at it, too, and it needs to be freshened up. So I've here aboard their board. Um, keeping it clean is a really easy way to keep your brand consolidated and consistent across all platforms. You know, when I started doing this, all you needed was a logo and a business card. That was in 2007. There was no Facebook. There was no Pinterest for sure. There was no real online marketing. It was yell design. You a logo on a business card? That's great. That's easy. Come a long way since that you need everything you need a blogger. You need a website. You need Facebook. Pinterest, Instagram tumbler. If you have it, you know, email, newsletters, all of that. And it all has to look good. So simplifying is a great way to do that. I'm gonna start by showing you, uh, Denise is brand something that we did for her that she's not even using quite yet. I'm going to show you the power of just using one word 11 word logo. One sentence, one attacks are one font. I'm sorry. And just a couple of photos that are I have so much impact I think I personally love. Okay, um, you can see how beautiful this is. An emotional This is just by using photographs and one word with some text over the top. I think that Denise is images were gorgeous. One of the things I wanted to point out that she does here. This photo shoot was specifically done for the branding. So it wasn't like we just took some photos that she had and made it happen. She did this on purpose. So she has room here to put text or her logo. Or if she's going to do a promotion of some kind, she's got the space there to do it and it looks great. I mean, the photos air just beautiful. And so they're sort of the rest of it. You can see again how simple it is. Grace is a division of her other company, modern love. Again, just it's literally one front that we've used and we've used it in italics and standard. And then we have this little icon here. But other than that, very simple, very clean, very easy for her to keep updated across all platforms without adding anything to it or taking anything away from it. So I want to show you guys how to be able to do that for yourselves. Can I just read it? Yes. Some comments that are, please. Jennifer kept saying, Wow, that is amazingly beautiful. Tractor Two funds there. I love what they did with the Grady INTs in the word great, very striking again. Another tough tootle saying that she loves the Grady int there within the words. And yes, people are loving the simplicity. Awesome. It's great. Awesome. When you try to describe it to someone they would say, you know, you could have someone think Oh, no, Maybe that's too simple, but when you show it it's, you know, anytime I do anything for Denise, I get so many requests for that exact thing. The first brand we did for her years ago. Everybody wanted it. And I said, You guys can't I can't do the exact same thing for you. Same thing here. I probably had at least 45 requests, at the very least, for this exact thing. So I did do a little bit of pink and gold after that, but nothing too similar. Um um, from dawn, Me So beautiful. But what is the significance of the word grace on the site if it's not your business name or your name? So is this a division of the brand that that line of the business? Just so people know that's a great question. Grace is actually going to be a division of modern love photography, so modern love photography shoots, weddings and boudoir photography. And my boudoir is a little more editorial and probably a little racier than most. Um, and I don't feel comfortable marrying that with senior portrait. It's women's portrait's glamour. So as much as I would like to keep it all in one place, we've made the decision that the way that I shoot boudoir is a little edgy and we should probably have a new brand. And, um, Grace is something that just came to me. It's something I'm always shooting for. It's something that I'm always looking to capture and create. Um, and I told Christine that that's it. It's Grace. And then she did all of this. And, man, I couldn't be happier. It's just beautiful. And like she said, I don't I don't shoot and hope that you know, I'm shooting with Client and I have a good enough shot to create some marketing material. I really collaborate with Christine, and I think that's important. If you want to create impactful good images, I specifically go out and shoot things to become my brand, to be the face of the business and to be really high impact. And I know with if I give Christine high impact image, she is going to turn it out and it's gonna be incredible. And I know Melanie covered that, too, you know, going out and taking specific shots, the shots you want, and I think that that makes sense for a lot of people with a product or something, a service to sell other than photography. But photographers maybe just kind of assume. Well, I already have everything I need. I'll just choose some of my own photos. But really, this, I think, makes such a big difference. We also have your Facebook page done this way, where she's left a lot of white, and that one wasn't taken specifically. Just turned out that way. Beautiful. Been here, you know, marketing mojitos. Wants to make sure you know what you just said. Grace is something I'm always shooting for. That's great. Great little wonderful, literally, I wonder. Good, good. So but anyway, the simplicity, It's beautiful. The images are beautiful. They support. I mean, Grace wouldn't stand on its own, But I really love this. And I think you know, it's not something that she's gonna be sick of in a year. It's not gonna be trendy or outdated. She's not going to like why I need to get rid of that, you know, whatever it might be. So it's just clean and simple. So some things you can dio to your brand if you have something that you're not in love with, but you can't really reinvent the wheel. Maybe you don't have the time. Or the resource is. Maybe you built up such a following that you're you want to change too much so that your clients don't think, Well, what where's the You know where they go where. You know, I'm not used to this. So there's These are a few things you can do to keep it fresh. One. You can change the color. Huge impact right there, changing out the photos you use. Just doing those two things are actually probably really all you need to dio. If you want to, you can add a pattern that's huge. Remove a pattern that's also huge, or just take the patterns out all to, um, just switch him out altogether. I should say you confined Tons of resource is online Doremus modern dot com or anywhere you know all over, etc. For patterns and the tagline I changed my tagline all the time. I'm talking to smaller businesses here like not, you know, Nike McDonald's. You guys probably shouldn't do that. You know the smaller, more personal brands. I think it's fun and, like, you know, you're like the tagline you just accidentally came up with and so things you don't want to change your logo. Just don't do it. Don't. That's where you're gonna start confusing people confusing your brand confusing yourself, um, and that you You should also just really try not to change your fonts if possible. Picking a few three is kind of my go to rule and sticking with those three throughout. Everything are kind of your best bet. If you are running a holiday promotion or you want to interject something fun here and there, that's great. But you don't want Teoh. I just recently saw a printed bridal magazine, the kind that you can kind of do yourself. And there were so many funds going on on the cover inside the text, the quotes that, you know, it was just like this. It's not professional. I just it can pull it apart really quick. You want to really stay away from that? If you can. On don't change your voice. We talked about the voice and how you address and talk to your people. The conversational tactics you used to brand and market yourself consistent with that as well. And we're gonna talk more about that cause I know you asked a question. Well, how do you you know, how do you find that voice? Don't you know it's not that easy? Um And then stick with the elements. Whatever elements, the solid core pieces of your brand should stay intact. Something. I'm going to show you what it looks like to go from this logo pretty pixelated up there. But this was just done recently for a friend of mine, Dakota Salvage works. It's her husband, and we chose Can't tell how Pixley that is. But anyway, it's a manly, you know, kind of Ah, kind of a brand. There's leather, there's some concrete in the background and there's more to this brand. But I just want to show you the impact of not changing anything but the color. We didn't change the layout. We didn't change the placement of anything. We didn't change the text. We didn't change the font way. Change the color. Let's see. Can we change that? So now it's suddenly looks something more like a stationery shop or something obviously more feminine. You can completely change the entire vibe just by changing your color on, so I think that that is a really easy way for people most you guys have, You know, Photoshop. Have illustrator have some way to do this? Not everybody, but most everybody. Watching, I would say, has some resource to be able to make small changes like that and change the change, the feel of their brand and updated a little bit. So you guys have any questions on that at all? Anybody from conversations going on online? 3 18 Media said then several people really, really love that, but says color psychology is really powerful, absolutely, really powerful it is. We're talking about that yesterday. So what I want to show you is that's a great way to do it. If you really still feel attached to your brand, feel like it's really working for your company. But you're just kind of tired of a tired of it and over it. But you know, you want some change. So then the flip side of that is when it's just kind of done, and you really need a whole overall change. Um, this is an example of a client that I just worked on. This is her Before picture. She came to me and said, You know, I just I want to take it up a notch. I'm ready to go high end with my baby photography. I really want to attract ah, hiring clientele. How can I do that? And I was like, Well, what? Which ones? Your logo. I This was in her email and this was her local on her website and other places. I wasn't sure which, which was even what she was using, but she was using both. And I see that a lot. You know, I got this little piece from over here. I'm gonna update that, and they're both fine. They both to me. Just don't say super high end baby photographer. So we went back and forth and, um, ended up coming up with something she loved pretty quickly on. That is her new logo. And what I love about this is that she can use this by it by itself. She can use this icon by itself. There's, like, some flexibility there, and that's a big thing for me. I want you to have a flexible brand so that you're not stuck and you don't feel trapped by this. It doesn't fit in this little space on my website template. We're gonna hear that a lot to you know, it's got toe work for you and with your business and with your company. So that's the logo. And then combined with the rest of the design elements, I don't know if you can see that. Very well. Um, can you see it? Yeah. Um, so these are this is the icon back and use here and again. Other icons that we added Teoh signify the different areas that she she shoots for. Also, he added, the little bow here for maternity and she's got patterns, textures, colors to choose from. She can use those where they work where they don't worry. You can leave him out. Include, um, but the brand is all going to stay tied together by the use of this icon and the use of her logo on. I have to tell you what Tam did that. I think it's so brilliant. This right here is an ad for the Cheesecake Factory menu. We designed that to go inside the Cheesecake Factory menu, and it was like, That's so random. Why would you do that? And she said, I a newborn baby photographer when I was pregnant. I wanted to go the Cheesecake Factory all the time. We were there constantly. So you know, her friends and pregnant friends and clients. That's where they go. They have something close by. So she's advertising there to the pregnant ladies who will now hire her afterwards, for I think that's just such a great idea. So she really understands her audience and who she's talking to and went right after them. And that was kind of her big advertising marketing splurge. And now she you know we'll do her social media and everything else. But this is like her one big push. How colors just colors. Not even the design elements that you put in there, but just how much the colors change. And from my own experience with you, I'm trying different colors with my branding like it's phenomenal, and when I get tired of it, I usually changed color up. Like Christine said, It keeps me happy and enables me to keep it fresh. But that's amazing how much the colors changed it. I've been having all those patterns to be able to use her. Awesome, I think, as creatives we get tired of they always want todo so having all of those different elements to use in different pieces. But still keeping it all tied together is really awesome. And that's one of the great things I realized. And I just started offering this not too long ago. I was never really just offering ah full brand identity as one package. So I do that now, like that's a whole kit. She will receive every single one of those elements in different ways that she can use them. And she'll have me designed some pieces for her. She can maybe do some herself so again goes back to being flexible. It can work for her. If she decides she wants that logo to be purple next week, she could make it purple. It's hers. She has it. And she doesn't feel trapped by, you know, having to come back to me, trapped by having a design that she doesn't love. Um and so that was tam O. Also, I just want to mention like I think anyone any client madness, they can use this as like a palette to use for years because you would never get tired looking all the textures and patterns. You you have. You can, you know, use that to create your pins. Facebook, you know, borders everything and just go on forever. And everything's distinct. It's just beautiful. Thank you so much. And yeah, I should point out to Melanie the little diaper pin on the pin. Me. I thought that was a fun when I got to do that. Um, so I really like that. She is really happy with the way it turned out, and it's not even in effect yet. It's pretty knew she hasn't. It's known upon her side or anything, so that's just been done in the last couple of weeks. Let's see. So I wanted to also go back. Was Denise or Adam asking about how to find your voice? So I googled that last night, and I'm gonna have to read this to you just because it's probably a little bit too small for the online viewers to read. But there are some great and easy ways to be able to do this. It's not that hard, and actually, this content was taken from the daily mews dot com, and if you want Teoh expand on the rest of the article, you can go over there and check it out. I think there's a little questionnaire eso finding your voice in a brand or a business. In a nutshell. This is the heart and soul of your communications. More than specific words and phrases, your brand voices the tone in which you speak and speak to and connect with your audience. Your voice can be authoritative, informative, fun or just plain witty. But whatever it is, it needs to be one very important thing. Authentic. As one blogger wisely wrote, Trying to fake your voice is like putting lipstick on a pig. In other words, your audience will be able to tell right away if it isn't your own true natural voice. Studies have shown throughout the years consumers buy products from brands they connect to on an emotional level and stay away from brands they don't. And I know that's a unifying thing that we've all talked about while we're here. That just really put yourself out there, show that show how you do it, show the behind the scenes, teach what you know, be authentic about it, and you will have clients and customers, Um, as you work on nailing down your voice. It's helpful to know who you're talking. Teoh. Beyond your audience is basic demographics. Pick one person from each of your target audiences, working parents, college students, urban hipsters and answer the following. And I don't know if you guys can see that there. But what do they look like? What do they care about? Where do they work? What do they do for fun? Just create that sort of, you know, image in your mind of who you're talking to, who you're selling. Teoh and I know that I mentioned creating that person and line is Miss Modern, just like my alter ego kind of a version of me. But I have her out there front and center. You don't need to do that. You're person can stay behind the scenes and just be your own. You know your own inspiration. Most importantly, what do they want from your brand? Getting into the head? Getting into the heads of the people you're ultimately trying to woo is a great way to get started thinking about your brand voice. So does that make sense to you guys? Does that seem like a good way to do it. Just make up your perfect client, make up your perfect person, the exact type of person or people that you'd want to come to your business and create for them, and I think that that's a great, great way of doing it.

Class Materials

bonus material with purchase

Post Design Elements.zip

bonus material with enrollment

MDBusinessPinterestH264.mov
How To Get Lots of Pinterest Followers Fast.pdf

Ratings and Reviews

a Creativelive Student
 

What an incredible amount of GREAT information that Melanie gives in this course! I couldn't watch it all live, but I saw enough in about 30 minutes to know I had to have it and so I bought it and it is worth EVERY PENNY! I can't wait to start utilizing all the great info to make my Pinterest boards work for me and have more fun pinning! Thank you CreativeLive and Melanie!

Stamperdog
 

So glad I saw this and got it to keep. With just a few tweaks, I turned my non-active boards into active boards and quadrupled my followers in just a few days. This spilled over into site traffic AND major lead generation for my mailing list. Thanks for the inspiration, Melanie.

Michelle Smith
 

Awesome learnt so much thank u

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