fall forecast: conservative from the how design blog. the pantone color matching system has released it’s fall color forecast, and though it’s on the conservative side, it sure is pretty!
300&65 is showcasing a different ampersand every day of the year!
concepts
design quotes is a really cool site that rotates quotes about design or by designers through a spectrum of color. take a look!
maybe a new street sign is what the world needs now from the ted blog [gary lauder]. i love the concept that drivers would stop falling back on right-of-way or road rage and work together to make safe transportation and cooperation happen. this sign gives me hope that an effective cycling awareness sign can’t be far behind. from the ted blog: Lauder has registered the sign with a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND license — so share it freely (just credit him, don’t modify the sign, and don’t sell it). And imagine a world where every street sign contains the word “Please.”
best practices: press forward from print magazine. I found three people who work as consultants or within their own companies to come up with new and creative approaches to green the production process. Their innovative thinking could change everything about how designers print, from the paper chosen for a project to the boxes used to ship the final product. [jeremy lehrer] read the article to see what designers are doing to stay true to best practices.
my father has been getting increasingly interested in ceramics in the last few years, creating many decorative and functional pieces in his studio and bring them to a local kiln for firing. recently he sent me a package, and in addition to a book he intended to loan was some kind of abstract ceramic object i was instructed to call and ask about.
admittedly, i couldn’t figure out what it was, but his latest interest has been this japanese tradition of wall hangings that are often abstract or simple shapes with a hole or two for displaying objects from nature. i was intrigued at how quickly this thing turned from something i couldn’t figure out into something i’d enjoy using every day. i go on walks every morning, and i regularly collect pink pepper and eucalyptus from the neighborhood, so now i have the perfect place for it. what a nice surprise!
the design giants at pentagram created this hilarious 4-question interview in the style of a psychoanalysis appointment, in which they divine which typeface matches your personality, called what type are you? just enter your name and the password “character” to do the quiz and get your results.
creative review reported that was originally designed as a holiday card, but people have been buzzing about it in the design community, and it seems to have gone viral. enjoy!
paperfoldables.com is a super-fun site dedicated to engineering cute, funny figurines that can be folded from a flat sheet of paper, cut to spec. click on any of the samples on the site and you’ll download a pdf that can be printed, cut and assembled. looking at some of these makes me want to start creating my own.
need some inspiration on how you can really grab your target audience’s attention with something as simple as a business card? the web designer depot blog has released a great selection of 100 (really) creative business cards for your perusal. check out how different designers solved the visceral communication of so many different fields and industries with simple yet direct solutions. sure, some of these cost a good deal more than your average business card, but in many cases, the concept can be scaled down into several iterations. do you really need a meatcard printed on jerky? probably not, but now that it’s been done, you can come up with something just as original that drives the point home.
this labor day, jason and i attended an eat-in event organized by the LA chapter of slow food and my friend emily ho among many other people & organizations. this was a great opportunity to sit down with friends, neighbors, and some who drove in from other areas of LA to share manifestations of our favorite recipes, talk, enjoy food, and write letters urging our politicians of choice to support the child nutrition act—because kids deserve healthy food in schools.
being a big diy-er, cook & local food supporter, this event appealed to me on a few levels. i made a butternut squash au gratin, which was salted & peppered cubed squashed baked with homemade yogurt and some great hard portuguese cheese i got from the farmer’s market. i got to taste some amazing dishes, such as a red cabbage & fruit slaw, a mustard seed potato salad, some amazing spiced apple iced tea, some spicy fruit & cucumber salad, and some of the favorites from the whole foods fresh prepared foods [whole foods was a sponsor]. i had a great time offering & explaining my own dish, and getting some great offers in return [hey, try my lentil salad! we have zucchini marmalade! did you have the fig jam?].
i love community events like this. we had a great time, met some really awesome people, and got fantastic ideas for spins on our own dishes. do a potluck when you can and share your family recipes and fun food traditions!
before i ran my own practice, i probably would have laughed at anyone who told me how much networking i’d be doing, and how much i’d enjoy it. i used to think of it as something i had to make time for, or something i regretted not doing when it came time to move from one job to another. sure, it’s something i do for business, but if you do it right you make a lot of friends. and then you have margaritas!
the creative freelancer conference stressed to us that we’re not competitors, but co-workers. even in leaner times like these, there is enough work for everyone. i prefer to see us all as choices, a client could choose me, or one of my colleagues, and they do so for a reason that is not about us competing because we don’t offer the same thing. addressing this upfront brought the level of camaraderie way up, and allowed a lot of us to talk in-depth about our experiences in business, with clients, in times of challenge and success.
once we all got honest and brave and started asking the revealing questions, this theme emerged that i hadn’t noticed before: creatives are highly empathic people. we can take on your stories, information and motivations, consider them carefully, and spin them into communication vehicles that become far more than the sum of their parts. but there’s this fine line between being empathetic with communication efforts, and taking on client concerns to the degree that we compromise the quality of our work with compromised time & budgetary resources. my overall takeaway about creative personality disorder is that we have to put our abilities to wrap our heads around our clients in check when it comes to business negotiations and set realistic limits so we don’t end up over-committed & under-compensated.
on the upside though, creative personality disorder leaves you with a room full of really awesome, funny, quirky, highly social people who aren’t around this many other people like us nearly often enough. i was networking before i got there, rooming with beth goldfarb which has turned out a great new friendship with a fantastically talented colleague. i think we met our first conference buddies in the hallway on the way in. everyone was itching to say hi & see each other’s business cards and connect, it was so exciting to meet everyone, share laughs & design hugs. this lunch, pictured above, was a group of 12 people who had to split into 3 tables. the 3 designers i sat with all have uniquely beautiful work [go see for yourself], but more than that, they’re super nice people [and their clients have a lot to say about how much they love working with them].
which brings me to the session on networking—socially & online, that is:
the astoundingly simple secrets to making social media work for you with colleen wainwright
i’ll admit right off the bat that i’ve seen this talk twice and i didn’t take notes this time around. wainwright is a veritable portal to so many fantastic sources of information, i honestly preferred to watch her talk than write things about it. i’m lucky and i see her often enough that many of these things have become conversation topics rather than bullets in a talk, so i encourage you do to the same. reach out to her, talk to her—hire her to help you figure out your marketing strategy! in the meantime, i’ll do my best to give you the goods:
– social media online is a new way to network with a much bigger pool of people than would be sustainable without the internet.
– online networking is all in how you use it. choose your voice first, then create a consistent presence online.
– be useful, be specific, be nice: talk about relevant things directly to your audience in a supportive, helpful way.
– create a manageable list of networking sites you can commit to regularly maintaining.
– don’t be afraid that it’s a time-suck: you determine your level of involvement.
– if you feel overwhelmed, lurk awhile before jumping in. when you feel comfortable, start participating.
– approach participation from a place of support. post helpful info, offer to connect people you think would like to meet.
– speaking of awesome, go read these free reports by chris guillebeau and consider his call to “be awesome.”
– and check out chris brogan and his book, trust agents.
if you need some cold-hard facts about social media and the effect & reach it has, this video sums it up nicely:
probably the main reason a lot of us came to the creative freelancer conference last week was to talk about clients! for solopreneurs, every client is different and a big part of our job is reading them and interacting with a variety of personalities. the sessions on presentations and client-wrangling had me taking lots of notes and laughing in acknowledgment.
effective presentations for creative solopreneurs with darryl salerno
above and beyond the givens about speaking clearly and making eye-contact [though those are no less important], salerno approached his talk from the position of knowing the personality types of your decision-makers and tailoring your presentations to work with how they best deal with information. he breaks them down thusly:
– the thinker: content-driven, logical, likes facts & data. give them organized information with references.
– the feeler: interactive, perceptive, experience-driven. talk about impact, context, build rapport with them.
– the intuitor: theoretical, conceptual, likes the big picture. focus on uniqueness, global & future impact.
– the sensor: perfectionist, impatient, likes actionable steps. start with conclusions first, be the problem-solver, keep it brief.
once you have your audience figured out, keep these things in mind when creating your presentations:
– your presentation is about them, their concerns, needs, company & situation.
– it’s not what you say, it’s what they hear: choose your words carefully.
– use storytelling that is relevant, authentic, and connective.
– use humor as a bonding agent between you and your audience.
– ask questions periodically to keep your audience engaged; offer Q&A to relate to individuals directly.
– order your topical progression: an inital situation > business objectives that address the situation > communications objectives that support the business objectives > and strategies of how these objectives will address the initial situation—bring it back around.
– follow the 3 P’s of presenting: prepare, practice, perform!
dealing with nightmare clients with michelle goodman
after taking time to collectively commiserate about some of our less-favored past clients, goodman took the anti-victim stance that working with difficult clients isn’t about them—it’s about you! people are who they are, but it’s up to us to know ourselves, clearly define our policies, and make conscious choices about working with the best clients for us. in the meantime, there are strategies for dealing with some of the more challenging personalities out there before anything truly unfortunate happens:
– add a “how i work” page to your web site [i have a process outline here]
– set up an in-depth discovery meeting before a project starts to explore good fit and identify specific goals.
– set limits on preliminary time and travel before projects start.
– set expectations by defining scope, naming a project manager, and checking in at regular milestones.
– separate the serious clients from those who are less committed by instituting a non-refundable deposit or a cancellation policy so you can concentrate on those who are ready to work.
– address your policy on revisions and provide info on how to keep them to a minimum before the project starts.
– research potential clients ahead of time, conduct a credit check if it’s a particularly big project with a new client.
– make friends with someone in accounting [this can get you a lot farther than you think!].
if you do find yourself at odds with a client that comes to a financial disconnect, and you know you’re in the right, use the resources available to you:
– stop & withhold unfinished work
– look into collections & small claims and decide which is best for the situation in question.
– report them to the better business bureau or industry-specific watchdog association.
parlato design studio 