Design

Jun 03

Websites and typography

By Scrundwell Design, Web No Comments

In the days when all marketing materials were off-line, one of the fundamental questions when starting a new project was the use of typography. Did the client/brand have an existing font or fonts, what was the hierarchy etc etc?

In an era of digital marketing, where the concerns are all about web safe fonts, should typography still play such an important role in graphic and web design? At DLK Partners we believe the answer to this question absolutely yes – 100%.

So why do we believe this?

With 96% of the internet being made up of written content, it is hardly surprising how that written content is portrayed plays a vital role in the success of your digital presence.

Clarity

It is widely acknowledged that it takes seven seconds for someone visiting a website, for the first time, to make a decision whether to stay or move. If your website has poor typography and the viewer sees a mass of confused information, you are probably going to lose them. However, if your site has excellent typography, then the visitor will be able to engage with your site, as the typography will have created a hierarchy of information by gathering relevant pieces of information together in their appropriate hierarchy.

Good typography will allow your potential client to find the information they are looking for quickly and efficiently.

Engagement

As we have already mentioned, bad typography can affect web traffic, so there is no point in spending time and effort on SEO in order to drive traffic to your site, only to turn viewers off the moment they land on your site. If content on a web site is king, then typography should be the next in line to the throne. A well-composed typographic page engages your audience, and will encourage visitors to read what is being said. A mixture of headings, highlighted text and emboldened sentences can help lift your website off the page – in a way that a good actor can read a few lines and it comes alive, whereas someone reading the same few lines in a monotone voice is a great cure for insomnia.

Guiding the visitor

It is possible through good typography to influence how a visitor reacts and reads your website. A talented designer can use their skills to direct the reader through a website in a controlled manner and hence allow the message being conveyed to be understood and assimilated with ease. If everything on the page has the same impact the reader will be confused and not know where to look; likewise if too many techniques are involved then the page turns into ‘visual noise’ with everything screaming at the reader.

Should you think your website is in need of some excellent typography, please contact David Liney on 020 7394 3785

Nov 14

Promoting luxury – selling interior deisgn

By Scrundwell Copywriting, Design, Marketing No Comments

From a marketing and design point of view working with clients in the luxury services industry, such as interior design, throws up a number of issues. Interior design companies, usually come to us with a wonderful selection of images of the work but don’t know what to do with them – as even though they are obviously talented and creative people they usually, but not always, have a problem marketing themselves beyond an on and off-line portfolio of past work.

DLK Partners, by no means has all the answers to help our creative clients, but we have found over the past few years, asking the right question in the right way, usually helps. Most recently we have worked with Pod Interior Style to re-design their web site, www.podinteriorstyle.com, previously the owner had run the interior design service as an add-on service to her luxury lifestyle shop in Lymington, but had decided that due to the success of that side of the business to focus her efforts purely on interior design. On our first meeting, our client was rather taken aback that we did not want to spend the first meeting looking at samples of her work, but actually talk about her instead.

Creating a personality

We asked questions that helped create a business personality, so the website would reflect Pod Interior Style and not her own clients. Amongst the many questions we asked were:

Why do people come to you?
Why would people not come to you?
What type of client would you dream of having?
What type of client is of no interest to you?
How would you describe your interior design?
What is your approach to customer service?

The last question on this list is crucial as when dealing with high net worth clients, your service standards need to be above average, and this is something that Pod Interior Style really excelled at, but was not even mentioned on their old website.

Our client also had a refreshingly open attitude to interior design, and felt it was not Pod’s place to impose a house style on her clients; her job was to make their dreams a reality. Rather like her attitude to customer service, she had never thought of putting this approach at the forefront of her marketing materials.

Selling – the dirty word?

In the world of luxury services – how do you sell without appearing downmarket? Our client was not alone in wanting to maximise her fees and profits, but did not want to appear like a second-hand car salesman. We asked her what aspects of her service offering, apart from the pure interior design, made her the most money – the answer was getting involved with any design and production of bespoke furniture.

We therefore made sure that this aspect of her business was mentioned on the ‘About Us’ page of the new website, so any new or existing client would pick-up on this additional service.

How to make your portfolio a marketing tool

All the above comments withstanding, an Interior Designer’s off and on-line portfolio is a key element in their marketing tool kit. However it could and should be more than just a series of photographs – however beautiful. It is important to stamp your own personality on your portfolio – one way in which we advise our clients to do this is to write a short paragraph/case study alongside each project explaining how their approach made the project successful. Rather than just describe what is in the picture, explain why your interior design company’s unique approach might have helped the project come in under budget, or maybe how you overcame a tricky technical problem. Whatever you write make sure it reflects your skills and approach.

To conclude….

Ensure all your marketing materials reflect your company and not just your clients
Highlight your approach – remember that you are offering a service
Be subtle, but don’t be afraid to sell
Make your portfolio a marketing tool and not just a collection of images
Ensure there is a consistent brand personality across all your marketing items.

Jun 18

Small is beautiful

By David Design, Inspiration, News, Uncategorized No Comments

… or so the Queen thinks.

Whilst many of the performers at the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee concert got mixed reviews, the animated projections on Buckingham Palace received unanimous praise.Being a small creative agency based in Bermondsey ourselves, we are probably biased, but it came as no surprise to DLK Partners, that the company responsible for these projections was a small creative agency in Bermondsey.

DLK Partners has always passionately believed that keeping a creative agency small and compact ensures that clients get exceptional creative service as they talk directly to the people who are designing, building and writing. Unlike larger agencies a client’s vision is not lost amid the usual Chinese whispers of multi-level account management teams.

As well as our core staff, we also surround ourselves with specialist creative and technical freelancers, whose skills we employ when we need them. We find this approach means we always have the right person for the job, as well as helping keep our costs down – so our clients are always in a win/win situation.

In the end, DLK Partners believes that in a world where everything seems to be turning virtual, by keeping the agency personal and focused our clients enjoy real working relationships founded on trust and expertise, where, to quote a famous American sit-com, everyone knows your name.

Apr 11

Luxury yachts and marketing – a difficult mix?

By Scrundwell Design, Luxury, Print No Comments

You would think a yacht as beautiful as Twizzle would charter itself, but in reality like any other product, however stunning, super yachts need carefully designed materials to help them stand out in a crowded, however elite, marketplace.

DLK Partners describe themselves as ‘A fusion of creativity & commerce’ and this describes exactly how we approached designing the charter brochure for this luxury sailing yacht. We were very lucky that the owners bought into this concept so were always open to ideas and suggestions on how we could ‘sell’ Twizzle to its best advantage. For example, whilst the first set of photographs the owners commissioned were stunning, some important features that would help charter the yacht were missing, so the owners kindly agreed to arrange another photo shoot. It also helped that one of the owners is also a fantastic photographer!

The concept behind the brochure was to take the reader on a virtual journey, as if they were being led on a personal guided tour. This helped give the brochure pace and intrigue – as believe it or not there are only so many photos of a luxury yacht sailing on the oceans you can look at before you get bored.

Getting the right balance between images and the written word was vital. Obviously the photographic element took precedence over the copy, but the copy had an important dual role as well. Firstly to provide factual information and secondly to highlight key selling points, so if the reader only skimmed through the brochure they would still get a good impression of what made Twizzle so special.

Finally the brochure had to sell the nautical lifestyle and that basically Twizzle is a floating hotel, so yet another level of information to be carefully placed in this jigsaw of a brochure.

No one ever said selling a luxury product is easy – we believe it requires a balance between delicate taste and cold hard commerce.

Apr 11

Moving from IndependentZ to Chainz

By Scrundwell Design, Hotels, Print No Comments

How should a hotel change its branding and design strategy when it changes from having one hotel in its portfolio to two or more? Or indeed should it change at all?

DLK Partners’ client Sleeperz Hotels have recently added a hotel in Newcastle to its portfolio to sit alongside its original hotel in Cardiff. Sleeperz launched its first hotel on the brand statement: ‘ Stay in style for less’ as the hotel’s rates were definitely in the budget sector, but the offering was not.

One of the key selling points of the original hotel was whilst it never pretended to be something it wasn’t, i.e. a five star luxury hotel, it did offer guests a level of style, comfort and service that one normally associated with a more expensive hotel. The personal service level was very important, and was something that the owners were keen to continue when the second hotel opened. The architecture of the hotels, whilst not miles apart, was not identical and this too summed up the Sleeperz approach to running a hotel.

So how could the design of all the new literature help with this conundrum?

Obviously the most important factor was to keep the Sleeperz brand identity and message consistent throughout both hotels, but the owners were adamant that like their approach to architecture, they did not want a ‘one size fits all’ take on all the new marketing and hotel collateral. DLK’s approach to design was to utilize all the formats, colour ways etc that had been used previously, but to add the appropriate hotel location to differentiate the pieces. This subtle addition of either Cardiff or Newcastle added the personal touch that the client required – you might be staying in a chain of hotels now, but this hotel whilst it adheres to the Sleeperz principles – is still run as an individual hotel and treats its guests likewise.

It seems you can now stay in a truly independent chain of hotels.