My good bud and amazing travel-writer Stephanie Vermillion recently interviewed for an article on Adorama. We talked about the what's and why's of my recent rebrand of Vicarel Studios.
Being intentional about branding and positioning myself has enabled me to tap into my true creative calling and has landed me clients such as NBC, New Belgium Brewing, Sharpie, and it even got me on an episode of the Real Housewives of Dallas. Herein I talk about some of the how’s, why’s and what’s in regards to branding/rebranding yourself as a business, and I also address a few relevant questions from my newsletter subscribers. If you’re interested in getting access to submitting questions, get signed up.
Before diving in, let's first acknowledge what “a brand” or "branding” is. Your brand is not just your logo. Along with things like your colors, typography and photography, your logo is a part of your "visual identity”. Your brand is the perception that others have of your business. Your brand is customer equity and perceived value. It’s the feelings your business instills in your customers when they think of your business.
1) How to brand yourself/your business (or another business, for that matter).
Megan B. asked "How do you even begin tackling the process of defining a brand? What are your first steps? I tried to answer some questions like, who am I, what do I do, what is my mission, but I still feel like I don't have a solid understanding of what I am.” Amazing question.
Branding is a pretty in depth and complex process. When considering your brand, you’re considering everything — what you stand for, what you say, how you say it, why you’re in business, the visual presentation and consistency of these considerations, etc. This only scratches he surface, and that’s why some larger agencies charge hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars to strategically design and implement a brand.
But you don’t need to invest a lot to start understanding and begin the process of rebranding yourself. Here’s a few tips to get started:
Do the business stuff
It might make you squirm to hear it, creative friends, but the best starting point is "the business stuff.” It can prove to be hugely important to establish your businesses vision, mission and values. Yes, even if you’re just a 1-person business.
However, don’t let this hold you up. If you don’t even know what that babble above means, or if you’re just dipping your toe into the waters, start here:
Key branding insight: Try to articulate: what do you do, who do you do it for, and why are you doing it or why is what you do important?
Here’s an example for Vicarel Studios:
What?: I’m trying to implement strategic design with an artful touch.
Who?: Eclectic brands with something to say.
Why?: I’m doing it because I think there is substantial merit to humanizing business communications and touchpoint through the approachability and perfectly imperfect quality of thoughtfully considered artwork. It’s important because I want to help brands tell stories authentic to their experiences — stories that captivate their ideal audience.
With that What, Who and Why you will find clarity, and that clarity helps give you direction for your business decisions. With these questions answered, I was able to write the Vicarel Studios brand positioning statement:
(what)"A hybrid creative studio focused on the artful implementation of strategic design. Specializing in artful branding, lettering and mural painting, we combine intentional design thinking with fine art techniques (why)to communicate the honest stories of (who) eclectic brands.”
Don’t put too much pressure on yourself to make this perfect. It can change and evolve with time. Again, a lot of this comes experience and with time. I just started doing this for myself about two years ago, and I didn’t have true clarity until earlier this year…and I’ve been running my business for 6 years—Ha!
Sometimes you will best benefit from simply doing. Do what feels right, do it a lot, and do it well, and then try to explain it later. My internet-bud and brand strategist Melinda Livsey said in a recent interview: “Go forward and take action, and your key differentiator will rise to the surface. People will start seeing what makes you different, and they will articulate it back to you.” This is exactly what I did as well. Simply listening to your audience or industry-equals and learning what other people think/say about your business can give you a perfect jumping off point to ultimately rephrase their words to help define your what, who, why.
Understand who your ideal client is. Speak to them.
It’s also quite important to think through who your ideal client is, and you’ll then want to cater all of your copy towards that target. Are you a designer trying to make logos for a small business owner, a lettering artist hoping to do work for large agencies, an artist trying to teach other artists? Each of these target demographics thinks, acts and speaks differently, and you want to be sure that you’re catering your communication towards the right group. Learn what they say and how they say it, and then consider catering your language to them. Your ideal client is more likely to hire you if you’re speaking in a way that they’re familiar and comfortable with; this implies that you understand them and their business problems.
In doing a business audit, I realized that much of my fun, higher-paying work was coming from large agencies or large businesses. That being said, I catered everything on my website to accommodate that insight. I knew that large agencies and businesses generally have a creative director or marketing director with a creative eye — I decided that I should speak to them.
I learned from my mentor who has experience as a creative director for brands like Disney and Kelloggs that when high level creative directors are looking for illustration/lettering/design contractors (like myself) they generally spend ≤1min on their website. With only 1 minute, you must have immediate impact and clarity of messaging. Moving from the top of my homepage downwards, the following considerations were made in order to be immediately captivating, and immediately convey what I do to these high-level creative directors:
Animated logo in various styles (captivating and shows a breadth of lettering styles)
Hype reel (high energy and high impact way to show all of my top work in less than 1min)
Value proposition (as explained above)
Client Proof (top clients listed prove i can execute quality work for big brands)
Testimonials (further proof that I’m a business worth working with)
At this point in the site, I’ve made my impact (and you’re only about 1 scroll down!). From here, I start to show more thorough case studies and talk a bit more about what I do and how I do it.
At the beginning of starting a freelance creative career, a lot of this might feel a bit cheeky. However, the sooner you try to think this stuff through, the more professionally you’ll be able to present yourself, and the better rates, clients and projects you'll begin to land.
K.I.S.S
In order to best keep brand elements and assets consistent, K.I.S.S.
Remember this from 5th grade writing? Keep it simple stupid. Consistency and simplicity are important. Specifically speaking to your online presence, I think it's valuable to consider the idea of not letting your brand over-power the work. Your portfolio site is there to showcase the client/art work you've done. You don’t need to overthink or overcomplicate how you present that. Have a similar presentation or layout cadence for your projects on your website, consider a consistent style of presenting your work on Instagram, and speak to your work and process similarly whenever you have that opportunity. Remember, branding is more than just the visuals.
Each of these considerations was a HUGE part of my process in rebranding Native Roots, Colorado’s largest cannabis dispensary. You can see the full case study here, or read more details on my branding process here.
2) When is that crucial moment in your business that you decide to rebrand?
This is an amazing question asked by Anna P. Like many aspects of design or business, this is pretty subjective. And of course, it’s worth acknowledging that sometimes you’re not getting the work/clients you desire simply because you haven’t been doing “this" long enough, or you don’t yet have the experience. In this instance, time, practice and persistence are key.
A great time to consider rebranding and/or repositioning your business is when you are experiencing one of the following:
You have newfound clarity with the work you want to be/are doing
Growing pains. The work you’re doing has surpassed the current outward perception brand/business.
If you look at your direct competition (or the individuals/businesses you want to be more like) and there’s a stark visual or brand-presentation difference.
Work Clarity
My rebrand not only intentionally conveyed that my business is more than just me, but also repositioning myself as an “artful designer.” For years, I have been focused on fusing fine art with traditional graphic and digital design. I just never knew how to say it. I now choose to lead with that langauge in the hopes of getting more of that type of work. I'm outright saying this in my website copy, showing it in my portfolio, and I'm asking for more of it! You need to tell the world what you want so that the world knows that’s what you do.
As I discuss a bit more in the Fake Projects section below, you need to put out in the world what you want to receive. I realized that my portfolio and website didn’t accurately present my work and what I can do for businesses, so I focused on presenting things differently.
Try finding clarity through reflecting back on who you've worked with, what type of work you're doing, what type of work you love to do, how much you're getting paid, how much that's netting out hourly, what is your true profit and revenue, what industries are hiring you the most, how and who is hiring you (agencies, studios, clients, individuals, businesses (what size) etc.). Additionally, really think about what services you have that you want to be getting paid for. Thinking through all of this will help you align on what work you want to be doing, and think through how to best explain what value you offer.
Growing Pains
After about 3 years of working for myself, I was experiencing more frequent projects with larger businesses and I was growing a team of contractors. My brand positioning was no longer representative of me as a business, and that was the catalyst for my rebrand. At the time, I was branded as “Adam Vicarel, an outdoorsy designer.” That worked to get me to where I was, but I wanted to present my business as more than just the singularity of “Adam Vicarel."
If you think you want assistance or support with your business, you've likely needed it for some time already. Don’t let your ego get in the way of you asking for support or hiring out work! Finding other designers to contract and help support my business growth has enabled me to take on more work, focus on relationships, network and connect with other businesses that has enabled me to further grow my own business. Contracting out support will give you more control, not less.
Competition
As you begin to build your online brand presence, you’ll want to consider two words: complement and contrast. In some ways, you’ll need to fit in to the mould of your industry. Your digital brand presence needs to “complement” the industries expectations — you need to abide by some of the rules and expectations so that people understand what you do and continue to associate you with “that” industry. At the same time, you want to “contrast” what the rest of the industry is doing. This will help you stand out. You can harness your contrasting elements — colloquially, your points of difference — by thinking through, articulating, and leaning into the uniqueness that you bring to the table. That special “thing” that makes you different from your competition. For me, this was leaning into the hybridity of traditional fine art and strategic design.
As I was rebuilding and rebranding Vicarel Studios, I took a good hard look at what the art and design studios I looked up to were doing. Did their websites lead with work, with a brand positioning statement, or other? Did they utilize motion, do they have a capabilities section, how do they talk about their work and how it’s special? I took a lot of notes from what others were doing, and I then splashed a bit of my own sauce on that.
Key Takeaway: Remember you don’t need to reinvent the wheel — follow some of the industry standards, and then differentiate a bit based on your own business, offerings or special uniqueness.
3) Why rebranding could be beneficial for you
Here again, let’s reiterate that “rebranding" speaks to the idea of trying to reposition the perceptions that others have of your businesses. Not just updating your logo. Remembering this better sets the tone for the following:
Rebranding brings you clarity
The process of going through a rebrand—thinking through the what, who, why and thinking through how these people think and talk— will help you find clarity in your day-to-day business decision making and process. As my buddy James Martin of BabyGiant said: clarity gains purpose, purpose gains direction, direction gains routine, routine gains focus, and focus leads to happiness. With clarity in your business you will be able to more easily attain happiness and fulfillment from your work.
The what, who, why helps you better understand where your sweet spot is. To find your sweet spot, draw a venn diagram with three circles: what you’re good at, what you're passionate about, and what you can get paid to do. The middle portion is your sweet spot. Finding this sweet spot takes practice, experimentation and time. But trust me, it’s worth figuring out, and it’s worth leaning into.
A few different people wrote in asking about how to tackle the instance of being multi-disciplinary and having a lot of offerings. How do you convey all of what you do without being unclear? This is a whole separate article, but a few broad thoughts below.
Overall, simplification is key. Consider the 3-part venn diagram explained above. While yes, you as an individual may offer a huge variety of services, you don’t need to try and monetize all of them. Or maybe you’re not as passionate or as skilled in some of them. Think about what are you passionate about, what are you best at, and what can make you money, and lean into the services that check all of those boxes as your business offerings. Let the other “stuff” either be personal work you do on the side, or continue to foster those practices until they can check all three boxes.
I personally do WAY more than I currently market on my website. I do commissioned artwork, custom wood and steel signage, map drawings, I paint, I make furniture, and so much more. Ultimately, I decided that much of this is better to be “a side passion.” That side passion work doesn’t really show it’s face on my business website.
Rebranding can help strategically position your business where you want to be
When you are clear about branding yourself, you’re “strategically positioning yourself” to be a highly-considered contractor or business for your ideal customer. This intentional positioning basically just means that you’re putting the right work in front of the right people in the right way. This can lead to higher paying and better clients whose brand ethos more closely align with yours. This means you’re making more money fostering better relationships while executing more quality work that is more fulfilling. Win, win, win, win.
When you are able to concisely and articulately present your business and its offerings, you’re perceived as professional. In this case, people treat and regard you as such. Being intentional about how you present your business sets the precedent for the expectations and interactions with others moving forward. An intentional brand and position can help you come across as more of a consultant and less of the puppet that we as designers frequently resent becoming.
Rebranding can help your business be more efficient
Being clear in your business goals and initiatives enables you to be consistent and direct in your actions. This leads to efficiency and productivity. Having clarity on your brand can help you grow your business much faster and with less winding speed bumps. Less work to produce better work that pays you more money...Are you seeing a theme in here?
4) Fake Projects
Paraphrasing a question from Emma W, she asked “how do you rebrand yourself and build a portfolio with very little portfolio-worthy client work?
This is a great and crucial question to consider. The answer: personal projects! Everyone will tell you that you need to show the work that you want to be hired to create. Seems like a no brainer, but so many creatives, myself included, get caught up in “showing everything." Don’t show website design if you want to be hired to design logos. Don’t show your custom bracelets and necklaces if you want to be hired to paint animal portraits. What goes out, comes in. Remember that!
Though, it’s easy for personal projects that are created to be "portfolio worthy” to flop. Oftentimes this is because we try to make these personal projects a unicorn; we try to do all of the things that we've ever wanted to do in the same project, and it takes forever to complete or it starts to feel too crazy or disjointed.
In order to create a successful, “fake” personal project for your portfolio, treat it as if it was a client project. Set constraints and timeliness just as client work has, and this will help narrow your focus and enable you to move efficiently and quickly. Consider the following visual brand identity example:
Fake Company
You’ll want to start by making up a fake company, a fake point of difference, and a fake target consumer. i.e. A coffee shop in Amsterdam catered to hipster millennials that is known for their psychedelic mushroom coffee. Come up with a clever name, tagline and start building your visual identity from there: Tops Tea “every sip is a trip”. It doesn’t need to be overly clever — just make it happen.
Design
Like any client project, you’ll want constraints. Maybe this client had a smaller budget (CLASSIC!) and only wanted a few iterations of the logo, an illustration and a menu and business card design. Create those assets, and then move forward to with making things look real!
Mockups
When laying out your project, find some studios or agencies (their websites or Behance's) and see how they're laying out similar projects (coffee shops, bakeries, or breweries). When presenting my work I personally prefer a cadence of real photos, mockups, and digital/vector images. However, if it's a fake company, go ham on those mockups. Some are so good that you can’t even tell the difference. If you can't find what you need, you can always make your own or consider spending $10-35 for the premium ones from places like Yellow Images or Creative Market. Here’s an example of a project I recently worked on that, while yes it was a real client project, I didn’t have any photographed images — this is 100% vector elements and mockups.
What goes out, comes in
You MUST put out into the world the work that you want to be hired to create. These fake projects can help cater your portfolio towards receiving the work you truly want to be hired to do. If you want the majority of your work to be branding for other businesses, but you only have client project, I personally suggest getting 2-4 additional (fake) branding projects in your portfolio to clearly represent your style and skillset.
Here’s a few considerations that I thought through when thinking about what goes out dictates what comes in:
I want to do more lettering, branding and murals. So, that's what I show!
Yes, I can design websites and brochures — but that's not what I want clients to hire me for, so I don’t really show it.
I leaned into my differences. Your differences are what make you unique and more alluring to hire and work with. For me, that was "artful design.” I made a point to let that sing in all facets of my brand. If you're weird, be weird in your brand presence. Look at someone like Jessica Walsh of Andwalsh. Her work is super quirky, and so is the presentation.
Lastly, don’t discount the merit of making a project that you’ve already completed more robust.
Did you create just a logo for a company? Consider mocking that up on business cards, tote bags, and signage. Take that logo and develop a corresponding type system, color palette and some illustrations to go along with it that help this project feel more considered and robust. Ultimately, it’s not about showing real-life work, as much as being about showing real-time creative problem solving.
There’s a lot to consider when rebranding yourself or your business. If you feel daunted by the process, you can always hire soMEone to do it for you!
If you have any more questions on branding — hit me in the comments below!
-Adam