Global Brand Creative

22:59 1st Jul 2011

Notes: 1

Political logos define campaigns

Candidates can only be in one place at one time, but their logos can be anywhere.

The carefully-crafted designs represent a candidate’s brand, attempting to capture a multi-million dollar campaign in a symbol simple enough to fit on a button.

“Logos are that first handshake with a voter,” said Ty Fujimura, a graphic designer who blogs about design, including political art. “They provide an initial touch point, so they should express exactly what the candidate wants to be seen as, whether that’s reliable, loyal, honest or perhaps ‘maverick.’”

But how do campaigns come up with these designs?

20:35

Notes: 2

Reblogged from gentlepurespace

image: Download

gentlepurespace:

Velcro Suit poster design

via Yewknee

20:33

Notes: 2

Tags: Brand Strategy Social Media Brand

Who are your brand evangelists? by Kerris Bloss

Great post on the impact social media has on brands.

================================

Kerrie Bloss writes: Let me preface this by saying I am by no means a blogger or writer of any kind, but I am a social media fan, so when asked to write this blog – I said YES!

When Facebook was first becoming popular I absolutely could not see the draw where people were on it hours a day! Then I became that girl…..connecting with anyone I could remember – from my best friend in kindergarten to the person I met at a function that day – I was addicted.

I have always been a very outgoing and positive person and if I have a great experience, I like to let others know. I enjoy supporting local businesses and

17:19 17th Jun 2011

Tags: Design

How to Build a Designer

Great breakdown by @michael_ditullo

21:53 28th Apr 2011

Tags: Design

Workplace Propaganda | PUBLIC SCHOOL

Steve Thomas has a great set of propaganda posters aimed at solving the common modern workplace problems. Go buy some and blanket your office with them.

(Source: gotopublicschool.com)

09:24 25th Apr 2011

Tags: Process

Measure Meetings With Action :: Tips :: The 99 Percent

Love this…

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We all have a love-hate relationship with meetings. While some of the greatest ideas and solutions come up in brainstorm meetings, we also lose most of our time in discussion without action. Ideally, meetings lead to realizations that result as action steps assigned to individuals with deadlines. Realistically, most meetings are fruitless.

As we measure the value of meetings, we must realize just how costly it is to interrupt the workflow of each team member, literally stop all progress, and consume all brainpower with one topic. Clearly, meetings must be planned sparingly. But most teams plan meetings as liberally as they buy coffee.

Behance has come across a few habits of especially productive creative teams (from across industries) that we should all consider in our day-to-day work.

Beware of “Posting Meetings.” A meeting to “share updates” should actually be a voice-mail or an e-mail. Rule of thumb: if you leave a meeting without action steps, then question the value of the meeting (especially if it is recurring).
Abolish Monday Meetings. Gathering people for no other reason than “it’s Monday!” makes little-to-know sense, especially when trying to filter through the bloated post-weekend inbox. Automatic meetings end up becoming “posting” meetings.
End With A Review of Actions Captured. At the end of a meeting, go around and review the action steps each person has captured. The exercise takes less than 30 seconds per person, and it almost always reveals a few action steps that were missed. The exercise also breeds a sense of accountability. If you state YOUR action steps in front of YOUR colleagues, then YOU are likely to follow through.

And when meetings end without any action steps, it is your responsibility to speak up and question their value. Just don’t plan a meeting to discuss it.

—
This tip was written by Scott Belsky, Behance Team. Explore more tips, and check out Behance’s guest postings for small businesses trying to make ideas happen, hosted at American Express’ OpenForum.

09:22

Tags: Marketing

AIDA (marketing) - Do you know it?

AIDA is an acronym used in marketing that describes a common list of events that may be undergone when a person is selling a product or service. The term and approach are attributed to American advertising and sales pioneer, E. St. Elmo Lewis. In 1898 Lewis created his AIDA funnel model on customer studies in the US life insurance market to explain the mechanisms of personal selling. Lewis held that the most successful salespeople followed a hierarchical, four layer process using the four cognitive phases that buyers follow when accepting a new idea or purchasing a new product.

A - Attention (Awareness): attract the attention of the customer.
I - Interest: raise customer interest by focusing on and demonstrating advantages and benefits (instead of focusing on features, as in traditional advertising).
D - Desire: convince customers that they want and desire the product or service and that it will satisfy their needs.
A - Action: lead customers towards taking action and/or purchasing.

Using a system like this gives one a general understanding of how to target a market effectively. Moving from step to step one loses some percent of prospects.

09:21

Notes: 1

Tags: Process

RAPID: "Who has the D? How clear decision roles enhance organizational performance"

PEOPLE WHO ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR…
Recommend

Making a proposal on a key decision, gathering input, and providing data and analysis to make a sensible choice in a timely fashion
Consulting with input providers-hearing and incorporating their views, and winning their buy-in

Agree

Negotiating a modified proposal with the recommender if they have concerns about the original proposal
Escalating unresolved issues to the decider if the “A” and “R” can’t resolve differences
If necessary, exercising veto power over the recommendation

Perform

Executing a decision once it’s made
Seeing that the decision is implemented promptly and effectively

Input

Providing relevant facts to the recommender that shed light on the proposal’sfeasibility and practical implications

Decide

Serving as the single point of accountability
Bringing the decision to closure by resolving any impasse in the decision-making process
Committing the organization to implementing the decision

Decision-Role Pitfalls
In assigning decision roles:

Ensure that only one person “has the D.” If two or more people think they’re in charge of a particular decision, a tug-of-war results.
Watch for a proliferation of “A’s.” Too many people with veto power can paralyze recommenders. If many people must agree, you probably haven’t pushed decisions down far enough in your organization.
Avoid assigning too many “I’s.” When many people give input, at least some of them aren’t making meaningful contributions.

(Source: http)

09:21

Tags: Process

Action Method III: Make Time for Processing Your Next Steps :: Tips :: The 99 Percent

As you move through your day of meetings, brainstorms, and other occasions of creativity, you will start to accumulate Action Steps, References, and Backburner Items. Handouts, random pages of notes, emails, and social network messages will build up all around you. Often these items will get buried in notebooks, pockets, online inboxes, and computer files almost as soon as they are created or received. Ideally, in your written notes you will have kept your Action Steps separate from everything else. However, you will still need time for processing – going through all of your day’s notes and communications, and distilling them all down to the primary elements. For those who still take paper notes and appreciate tangible project management, you will want to use a tangible inbox—a general pile of stuff that has yet to be classified. Most productivity frameworks—like David Allen’s Getting Things Done—suggest such a central clearinghouse for all of the stuff that you accumulate but can’t immediately execute or file. This inbox is not a final destination, but rather a transit terminal where items await processing. During a busy day of meetings, you will not have time to start taking action or filing things away.

How about all of the digital stuff that flows in every day? Your email inbox is the primary landing spot, but information also flows into other online applications. While your tangible inbox, sitting on your desk, is singular, the digital equivalent is becoming more of a collective. Ideally, you should set your social network profiles to forward messages to your email inbox for the sake of aggregation. When you commit time for processing, you’ll want to limit the number of places you need to visit.

Ideally, you should set your social network profiles to forward messages to your email inbox for the sake of aggregation.

If you can’t aggregate the flow of emails and other digital communications in the same place, then you need to define the various pieces of your collective digital inbox. For example, my collective digital inbox includes my email program (which receives messages from all other networks), a Twitter aggregator, and the inbox in my task management application (where I accept/reject stuff sent from my colleagues who use the same application – and then manage this information by project). When the time comes for processing, these are the three digital places I need to visit, along with the tangible inbox full of papers on my desk.

As you can see, the “inbox” of the 21^st century varies for everyone. You must concretely define your collective inbox before you start processing. Peace of mind and productivity starts when you know where everything is. The combined inbox says, “Don’t worry, all of your stuff (and the Action Steps, Backburner Items, and References contained within) are in a defined place, waiting for you and ready to be sorted.”

Peace of mind and productivity starts when you know where everything is.

If you live a digital lifestyle, your ability to process your inbox may be at particular risk without some sense of discipline. The reason: in the era of mobile devices and constant connectivity, it has become all too easy for others to send us messages. As such, our ability to control our focus is often crippled by the never-ending flow of incoming phone calls, emails, text messages, and in-person interruptions—not to mention messages from other online services. Thus it is important that you avoid the trap of what I have come to call “reactionary workflow.”

The state of reactionary workflow occurs when you get stuck simply reacting to whatever flows into the top of an inbox. Instead of focusing on what is most important and actionable, you spend too much time just trying to stay afloat. Reactionary workflow prevents you from being more proactive with your energy. The act of processing requires discipline and imposing some blockades around your focus. For this reason, many leaders perform their processing at night or at a time when the flow dies down.

Time spent processing is arguably the most valuable and productive time of your day. While processing, you will sort everything and distinguish Action Steps, Backburner Items, and References. With Action Steps, you will decide what can be done quickly and what must be tracked over time by project—and possibly delegated. With other materials, you will make judgments about what can be thrown away and what must be filed.

As you start to tackle your collective inbox, you will realize that any inbox, on its own, is a pretty bad action management tool. It is difficult to keep your Action Steps separate from References and other noise. The constant stream of email certainly doesn’t help. In addition to email, you may also receive other types of incoming communications in the form of Tweets, Facebook messages, etc. Some are actionable, or contain actionable elements, while others are simply for reference (or for fun).

Time spent processing is arguably the most valuable and productive time of your day.

Given the unyielding flow of communications, you will want to capture and manage your Action Steps separately. Despite the many tricks involving “action subfolders” and other ways to manage and prioritize Action Steps within an email system, there is nothing better than giving Action Steps their own sacred space to be managed by project.

The Action Method suggests that Action Steps should be managed separately from communications. The solution can be as simple as a spreadsheet or to-do list where all Action Steps are tracked (and can be sorted by project name or due date). You can also make use of more advanced project management applications that manage Action Steps and support delegation and collaboration. What you want to avoid is a mishmash of actionable items amidst hundreds of verbose emails and other messages scattered in various places.

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This Action Method tip series is excerpted from Behance founder Scott Belsky’s national bestseller, “Making Ideas Happen.” You can learn more about the book here, or explore Behance’s Action Method-related products here.

17:08 22nd Apr 2011

Tags: Photography

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