The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), developed in 1990, is meant to ensure that people with disabilities have the same opportunities as anyone else. Any business that serves the public must make sure their building accommodates people with disabilities of various kinds. Unfortunately, many businesses are not aware that ADA compliance also applies to digital store-fronts as well. Websites need to be accessible to people who have disabilities that affect their hearing, vision or physical capacities. Recently, a ruling was passed declaring the official standard of website accessibility for businesses. Read more

 

Building a reputable brand is important to instill trust in the consumer so they feel confident in their decision to use a product or service being offered. Quality, company values, customer support and public relations are all key players in achieving trust, but design plays a large role in a brand’s first impression.

 

People have an innate ability to understand design principles and it impacts the decisions they make. Elements in a design like shape and color tap into the subconscious emotions of the consumer and are incredibly important when making branding decisions. For example, green evokes a feeling of optimism, blue a feeling a security, while red can be a stress-inducer. It is important to understand the target market for a brand and make the appropriate design choices to appeal to them.

 

 

Examples of a brand utilizing a few key principles of design

Banks are brands that need to communicate trust, longevity and legitimacy. Chase is one of the most trusted banks in America and we can see the choices they have made to reinforce this visually. They chose blue for their primary color, which gives the customer a feeling a of security – very important in banking. Now let’s talk about longevity, something you hope for in a bank: their logo is a custom, bold sans serif font. This communicates that they are timeless. They have used a sans serif font for over 60 years, which tells us they aren’t a fading trend, but they are established and long-standing. What else can we feel when looking at their logo? The font and Chase symbol have a dynamic design that implies movement and activity, which translates to growth and forward thinking; two things that are very important in the longstanding of any company.

 

 

Brands build trust through a streamlined web-presence

Another huge factor in a consumer forming opinions of a brand is their website. Fun fact: it only takes 50 milliseconds for a consumer to form their opinion about a website. This is important information to have when you are trying to stand out in a highly saturated market. How can we make sure to have branding that subconsciously makes someone want to stay on your site and trust it? Make a great first impression with color, spacing, symmetry, amount of text and font choices. This is partially relying on aesthetics, but many of those design choices are also about making information easy to digest and not overwhelming.

 

Here are a few practical take-aways to optimize a website to feel trust-worthy and easy to absorb:

 

• Pictures speak a thousand words. Make sure to select a series of well thought out images that accurately represent your brand and what you’re trying to promote or sell.
• Don’t over-do it with text. Long line lengths will overwhelm people. Instead, break it down to important key information.
• Make sure all of your text and imagery is ADA compliant. This means ensuring there is enough contrast between your font and background colors throughout your site, as well as setting up the appropriate settings on your images (alt text, appropriate file naming, etc.). This will not only make the user experience easy, but it will show that your site is trustworthy and accessible for anyone that visits it.
• Use high contrasting colors, different sizes and a complementary font in your text to call out important information. This will draw the user’s attention to focus on your key points.
• One more tip to convey trust is consistency in branding and user experience across platforms and devices. Make sure you are creating that same effortless experience by making sure your site is mobile responsive and works seamlessly across browser types.

 

 

To start utilizing these concepts for your brand, you will want to start by understanding your customer, their needs and then speak to them through these strategic design principles.

 

For more tips and tricks for navigating the current marketing and branding trends, join our mailing list to hear more! Need help updating, revamping or starting your brand? Contact us.

 

A good Instagram layout is key to help you gain followers, get noticed and get more sales. An increase in followers leads to more opportunities to promote your brand with different platforms and companies. With over 1 billion active users today, having a curated Instagram feed matters for every brand out there. Take your company’s feed to new heights using these photo editing tricks designed to help with engagement. Read more

 

#Hashtags took over the early 2010s, but their purpose for professionals became higher in relevance in the significant usage of #hashtagclouds — a group of relevant or strategic hashtags which can greatly increase your current and future exposure on Instagram. Since Instagram turned into one of the most popular marketing platform today, businesses large and small carefully craft a specific, targeted group of hashtags to garner more interaction. Understanding the intricacies of clouds and creating a viable set of hashtags gives many agencies a competitive social edge. So, what’s their purpose and how can #hashtagclouds could help you expand your reach socially?

What Are Hashtag Clouds?

Instagram hashtag clouds are a different way to label and categorize your reels, posts, and stories. This method of organization helps Instagram better serve your posts to relevant audiences that are more likely to interact with posts through commenting or sharing, based on their algorithm. In their most simple function, the hashtags you use help make up the search results on the Instagram Explore page, which are different for every user and are based on what the user is interacting with.

How Do Businesses Use Clouds?

From local businesses to giant media corporations, many are implementing the usage of hashtags into their social media as a way to drive engagement. Businesses typically use anywhere from three to five targeted hashtags such as location-based (#Youngstown), branded (#McConnellMarketing), and descriptive (#WeeklyGroceryStoreAd) These help narrowly define the target market and ensure posts are showing up. Cloud sets can be as custom-tailored to posts as your time and budget allocate for creation.

How Do Hashtag Clouds Affect Reach?

McDonald’s hashtags clouds have a proven track record of success with a recent study comparing the number of hashtags used per post with average reach rates of over 18 million Instagram feed posts in late 2021. In the study, reach rate increases by 11% (from 24% to 35%) as the number of hashtags grows from one to 30. Start with a small number of targeted hashtags and slowly increase the number over time.

Interested in testing #hashtagclouds out, but don’t know where to start? Contact us today to set up a consultation with one of our content specialists!

Are you already trying out any of the above ideas, but want more creative marketing ideas? Stay up to date by following us on social media.

Pantone Color of the Year Results Are In!

Pantone, the world-leading expert in color, has announced its Color of the Year 2022 is a new shade of blue. Known as Very Peri – officially PANTONE 17-3938 Very Peri – the shade fuses a what Pantone describes as a “dynamic periwinkle blue hue with a vivifying violet red undertone.”

The Selection Process

For over 20 years, fashion designers, home furnishing curators and everyone in between look to the Pantone Color of the Year for inspiration in the following year. That being said, a lot of time and thought goes into selecting just the right color. The Pantone Color Institute combs through a variety of industries looking for trends that could inspire the year’s color. Influences might come from socio-economic conditions, upcoming sporting events, art collections, you-name-it. Overall, the color sets the tone for the year to come.

All About Very Peri

Very Peri marks the first time the company has manufactured a color instead of delving into their pre-existing archive, a decision that was a vital element of this year’s selection process. “It was really important for us to come up with a new color, because we have a very new vision of the world now,” said Pantone Color Institute’s Executive Director, Leatrice Eiseman, in a video call. In 2021, the company was inspired by a new vertical: technology. From NFTs (non-fungible tokens) and space shuttle joyrides to Mark Zuckerberg’s promise of the metaverse, the year was characterized by our increasing reliance on automation and the digital realm. It’s a relationship that partly spurred on Pantone’s decision to work with Microsoft, among other partners, for its Color of the Year launch.

Use Very Peri in Your Sales Collateral

One of our favorite jobs as a hotel marketing agency is telling a brand’s story. How? Selecting the right colors and patterns are just one piece of the puzzle. If Very Peri fits into your brand, or might work for an upcoming event, let us help you incorporate it!