Jo is a personal brand consultant. Ironically, when we met, she was feeling she couldn’t move forward and grow her business, not due to her personal style, but her corporate one.
Her current cards and handouts (below) were very ‘girlie’, dated and amateur-looking. There was too much going on and the contact details (on the back) were lost. The script typeface, soft-focus photography, random fashion illustration and paint splashes/flowers were also totally at odds with Jo’s desired target market of “innovative & ambitious entrepreneurs”.
Before
Jo’s One-day Branding Workshop
Jo booked our One Day Branding Workshop. This is an intense done-with-you service exclusively for start-ups under the VAT threshold.
You do need your business name sorted already, (we can help with naming in a separate session if not), know the direction you want to take your business and want to get there fast.
Jo qualified perfectly. Her company name is her own name and she wanted to build her own personal brand and be known as the expert in her field, in the UK and the US.
We spent the morning discussing her aspirational brands, which included Vivienne Westwood and Stella McCartney. Jo had a clear desire to align her values alongside these cool, strong, vocal, high-fashion London icons.
Stylistically, we were drawn to the simplicity of Stella’s brand with its clean, strong, and distinctive typography.
Jo’s other favoured brands included Virgin (a disruptor, rebellious, changing things up, owning one colour) and Oprah (loud, proud, honest, bold, unapologetic). All these brands have a strong personal brand heading the company.
Jo needed something to lift her from her peers, competitors and stand out. It needed to reflect the true her – a bit of a rock chick (she writes songs and sings in a band too!), strong, bold, opinionated, not afraid to stand out or make an impact.
Having discussed her brands, business aspirations, company direction, brand values and strapline, the afternoon was dedicated to design…
designing Jo’s Branding
We used a cool, minimalistic typeface for her name/logo, in stark contrast to her previous look. The typeface has attitude, edge and is inspired by the neon lettering used in shop signage.
Her old strapline (Express your Success) was too vague. She was also expanding her business from styling to personal branding, so we needed to tell people what she did in a succinct, punchy way.
‘Rock your personal brand’ alludes to her ‘cool London’ origins, her rock-chick, rebellious nature and clearly states what she helps you do. We set the new strapline off-centre from her name to make it more dynamic.
The finished logo
One of Jo’s ‘things’ is getting her clients into colour, so we needed to feature colour in her new brand. We chose this teal green (which she wears all the time) to make it truly ‘her’. The logo can also appear in white on the green colour. Quite a transformation, right? But there’s more!
Social Media icon
Onto Jo’s business cards. What contact details did she want on it? Facebook, Twitter, Insta, website, email, phone... we were running the same risk of too much clutter again. Too much noise.
Inspiration hit.
“There is no other Jo Baldwin Trott in the world is there? We could just go with your name!”
Jo looked astounded. Wasn’t that a bit of a crazy idea?!
Not really! I explained the history of calling cards. Since the 1800s, esteemed visitors would hand a printed or handwritten card with just their name on to the doorman, for him to announce their arrival.
Nowadays, most people will Google you anyway once you hand them your business card and before they contact you – so why not go back to tradition? And with that unique name, Jo could exactly do that.
The results
Press ‘play’ to see the final cards, and the luxurious touch of glamour…
Jo was delighted with her new branding, especially her business cards.
“They are a real conversation starter! “They love that it’s such a bold, confident statement. Memorable. Makes an impact. I was so embarrassed before to hand over my old cards and now I feel so proud! They are just so ME! It’s given me the confidence to really get out there, even change other things in my life – and I finally feel I can really drive the business forward.”
So basically, we did for Jo in her corporate branding, what she does for her clients in their personal branding.
Time for a new look…for me!How a re-brand with Sapna Pieroux from Inner-visions ID (www.innervisions-id.com) has helped me step into my new evolved business identity and as she said – she's done for my brand of what I do for my clients in image ? So re-juvenating and really exciting – creating briliant conversations!? what we've come up with. (And forgot to mention/show you the silver edging, got to gave some glam ?)#brandingagency #branddesign #brand #london #entrepreneur #rebrand
Posted by Jo Baldwin Trott on Thursday, 13 September 2018
If you need a complete image transformation for your business, then get in touch!
