We love it when we get this question, and honestly, it depends a lot on what you’re looking for. That said, we want to be a resource for all of you, so we’ve listed out our best advice for where you should get your business cards printed.
It’s hard to believe I haven’t had a blog post about FONTS yet! It’s basically impossible for you to go about your day without looking at fonts. They are all around you, even for those non-designers out there! Well, maybe not last week when I was literally stuck in bed with the worst flu of my life. 🤔 But even then, there was text on my medication that I was taking… so I guess even when you’re sick you’re consuming type in some way.
There’s an insane number of fonts out there. Since there’s a lot of poorly designed options, we wanted to give you a hand. We thought we’d share our go-to san serif fonts that you’ll often find us using/suggesting with our clients. These typefaces might seem simple, but there’s a lot of power in simplicity. These subtle beauties would be great paired with a display font or your brand logo.
After creating a logo, you’ll receive tons of files! It’s GREAT, but you may be wondering — what on earth do I do with all of these? Why are there so many different formats? What’s a vector file?
Follow along to see how to choose which LOGO file type to use.
Check out our quick road map below. Read more
We have been looking for things to add to this year’s Christmas list and we were struggling! Browsing the web, all the “top gift lists” seemed pretty boring and weren’t sparking any joy… We knew we had to rethink our strategy. That is when ETSY came in!
Do you remember when you were little and you circle pretty much everything in the toy advertisements? That’s how this list makes me feel! I hope you love it too. Read more
Illustration is one of our favorite things about design. As we’ve developed our skillset over the years, we’ve found that we enjoy “doodling” more and more. Not only do we love to create the graphics, but we also love how it can really transform a piece or brand. Today, we’re going to share 6 ways for you to add illustration to your brand.
To demonstrate how you can add illustrations to your branding, we are going to walk you through these 6 ideas we brought to life with a local non-profit that we love, Box of Balloons. Read more
This can be a really frustrating problem, especially if you just spent a lot of money to get your marketing materials printed. How annoying! Sadly, printing internet images incorrectly is often an amateur mistake and one we can help you avoid…
Image quality on the internet is reduced to save server space and to load your website faster. So that graphic you’re pulling from the internet (We hope legally!!!) has been reduced to web quality and won’t look good on your printed material. Just because your images look awesome on your computer or mobile does not mean this will translate once printed. Images don’t need to be a high-resolution in order to look good on your screens, which is why we reduce them to load pages faster.
Your image is printing poorly because of one thing: PIXELS.
Pixels are the teeny tiny dots of color that are arranged together to form an image. The number of pixels, or dots, within a square inch, we call the resolution. The professional standard for printed images is 300 pixels per inch while photos on the internet are often only at 72/inch. That’s almost 4 times the quality!
Here’s a graphic that shows you the difference. Look how sad our beautiful capitol looks on the right… blurry and pixelated. On the contrary, the left side is so beautiful, it would make anyone say, “Yes, I love Madison, Wisconsin!” The image looks sharp and in focus, perfect for your printers.
So we have established that the internet used images at a lower resolution for speed and file size. A web image at 72PPI is not enough to give us a sharp, professional look when printed. But why do the images we print have to be so much bigger?
Printers use a higher resolution when printing, so when a web quality photo is printed, you can really tell the difference.
Printers work by applying ink or toner onto the paper. They have nozzles that spray tiny drops of ink – so the more dots of color you have within a square inch, the sharper your image will be. If you have a low-resolution photo, your printer may try to compensate causing your image to look worse. This is why you want to avoid printing internet images. Photoshop essentials compares it to spreading too little peanut butter over too much toast. It just doesn’t work.
We see this all the time with entrepreneurs and small businesses that try to DIY their designs. Beware, if you don’t know what you’re doing you may print a handout and the images look awful. This doesn’t give the professional look you’re probably looking for. We also see this problem with organizations that work with other company’s logos, for example, an event that lists their sponsor’s logos. People will say, “Just grab the logo off our website”. The problem is that the logo is probably optimized for web, not for print. So be careful!
If you’re using stock photography, be sure you are downloading an appropriate size. Often times you can save money or get free images by getting a low-res version, but don’t let them fool you, get the highest option you can so you’re prepared. We usually recommend at least 2000px wide for standard marketing materials like brochures or postcards.
(Bonus tip: Remember to keep your high-resolution images intact. Bigger is better, you can always go down in size, but you can’t go up!)
It’s a complicated concept to wrap your head around, however, it is important to know the difference. The key lesson here is to keep your web quality photos on your website and use high-resolution images whenever you plan to print.
We hope you learned something and feel free to explore more of our blog. You might be interested in this post about Raster vs Vector Images or the differences between File Formats.
Are you organizing an event for your business or organization? Are you working with a short timeline and penny-pinching budget? Keep on reading my friend! This article will give you EIGHT (not ten, because everyone chooses ten) pro tips on how to start using social media to spread awareness for your event! To bring in some expertise, we brought in Kayla S. Clemons to give us some great tips for your event promotions.
Create ONE #hashtag for your event.
Make sure it is simple, easy to spell, scalable (#event2017, #event2018, #event2019), and original. Optimize and update all of your marketing pieces to include your event’s website and #hashtag. Also consider including the #hashtag in email signatures, bio’s, cover photos, etc. If your audience doesn’t know the specific hashtag, they may create their own causing confusion. Make it well-known so when your attendees Tweet or snap pics on Instagram, they know what to use.
Include enticing photo’s, link to purchase tickets, event details, a link to your website, sponsors, etc. After the Event page is created, “share” it to all social media platforms being sure to include the Event #hashtag. PRO TIP: Instagram/Facebook “Stories” and LIVE videos are SUPER effective. Post short clips about the event and encourage your followers to RSVP on the FB Event page.
For example, Three Bears Resort is a Northwoods themed Indoor Waterpark Resort. A complimentary business for Three Bears would include an adventure tour company, local cranberry growers, museum etc. A contest for them could be “Post a photo of your favorite summer memory and tell us about it for a chance to win a free night stay at Three Bears and an ATV Tour!” Both of the businesses would post the contest to their social networks to reach each other’s audiences. This is FREE.
Be sure to include enticing photos and keep the description short and sweet. Facebook Ad’s allow you to target specific demographics and behaviors. If your event is local, you have a great opportunity to target the audiences in your area.
For instance, Madison Mom Blogger’s has a large online community that hosts events once a month where their members bring their children and they do a variety of activities. Three Bears Resort is a family resort. Three Bears Resort should engage with the Madison Mom Blogger’s groups and pages to draw attention to the Resort.
Another option is for Three Bears Resort to donate a “Beach Basket” or even a one night stay to Madison Mom Bloggers in exchange for them to run a contest on their social media pages.
If this is a recurring event, hopefully, you have some great pictures from last year to share. You can even plan to post on a Thursday and use the hashtag #throwbackthursday!
People love to see behind the scenes look into the action. Share pictures to gain some hype such as the venue, previews of performers, main guests, prizes, décor, surrounding area, etc. This can also set the stage for attendees to know what to expect.
Be sure they have your Event’s #hashtag on them! Why? People love stickers. They WILL stick them somewhere, and depending on how cool your stickers are they will stick them somewhere important! (Not to mention, they’re totally Instaworthy.) A great place to order stickers is Sticker Mule and they have a lot of options and will even send you samples.
Ever wonder what the web design process is like? We’ll walk you through what our main steps are. Get to know how we’ll build your site.
This is some simple homework for you to get a feel for what you’re looking for. This will allow you to answer some questions for us so that we can provide you with a great website. (Some sample questions… Who is your audience? How do people typically get to your site? What are they looking for when they get there? Etc.)
There are so many websites out there, and because everyone has different wants/needs/styles, we ask for these to help us narrow in on who you are and what your goals for the website are.
Using a design program, Adobe Illustrator, we can lay out what we’ve envisioned for your site. This is where we can lay out things such as where’s the logo placed, what links are in the menu, or what’s in the footer. Sprout will design it and you will have a chance to provide feedback before we get into the development of the site. Typically we’ll do one revision before heading to WordPress.
During this time, we’ll keep your current site live until the new site is finished. We will develop the new site on our server and make changes there. As soon as we’re ready for the launch. We will migrate your new site into your domain and it will be live for the world to see.
We will take you behind the scenes and teach you how to do some basic edits to your site. During this time, we’ll also teach you some basics about SEO and keeping Wordpress up to date as well.
You should have a beautiful new site and what you’ll need to attract customers as well as sign in and make edits as needed.
Learn more on our https://sprout-studio.com/services/wordpress-web-design/
Looking for a cheap Graphic Designer in Madison, Wisconsin? Well, graphic design is probably not the area you want to skimp out on. I mean, we’re talking about your business right?! You should have a professional face to your brand. So, if you’re looking for someone working for $10/hour out of their grandma’s basement, you’ve probably stumbled upon the wrong site. We value the work we do and you may not find us “cheap”… HOWEVER, we are here to tell you a few of our best tips to save money when working with a graphic designer.
Ready to get started on your new project with your graphic designer? Hooray and good for you for investing in a professional to elevate your brand. Working with a graphic designer is a great way to create a really professional brand
Have you had to answer one of those questionnaires where there are a million questions and you’re wondering why it’s important? Well, truth be told, those questions most likely have a purpose. They’re trying to get to know more details. At the start of a project, there’re so many things we as designers need to know to create a design that serves you best. Be sure you’re clear about all the details to avoid back and forth questions, and even worse, having to redesign something that you didn’t specify at the project kickoff.
A. Know what you’re looking for ahead of time. It can be extremely beneficial to have your project going in the right direction from the start. The further you get down in the process, the more work it is to pivot or start fresh. (We know that sometimes this does happen, but we need you as the clients to understand that we can often step back and reanalysis, but this will affect the budget with additional revisions and change of scope.)
B. Do you work with a group or committee that will be reviewing the work? If you’re looking to keep your costs down and also need to a few people to review a project, be sure you’re reviewing together so you can hash out revisions at once. It adds a lot of time and revisions when clients send over a couple revisions at a time. It’s more efficient for us to make 10 revisions at once than to make 2 corrections, 5 times around.
Working with someone on a consistent basis allows you to get all “extra stuff” out of the way (contracts, emails, estimates, deposits, etc), and lets you focus on the job at hand. You’ll begin to create an impressive workflow and can get to know each other’s style and preferences when it comes to their marketing collateral. Similarly, both parties will get to know standard processes, preferred file setup, communication style, and the brand as a whole. A more effective workflow means a better price for you.
Most importantly, you will need your business’s logo in vector format which you should hopefully have! If not, you might have to have the designer recreate your logo in the format you need (click here for the logos you should have for your business). If your designer needs to recreate any logos, it’s going to cost extra money.
Additionally, some projects might have multiple logos involved, such as event branding where there will be sponsor logos. Save your designer time by having that ready for them. If your designer has to hunt down sponsor logos, this will add time to the clock. Be sure you also have the best quality you can get access to. If you provide a low-res pixeled version you snagged from there twitter account, that probably won’t work and your graphic designer will have to get involved to get something better.
We run into this a lot where clients are ready to start a project but they don’t have all their ducks in a row or their copy (the text for the website or marketing piece) finalized. It’s actually quite challenging to design a piece without knowing whether we’re working with one line of text or three paragraphs. This is really critical to efficiency… If we don’t have a basic understanding of what content will be used, we could be designing and redesigning and it can exceed your revision time. (Oh. We should probably mention, basic test edits and swapping pics here and there is not what we’re referring to, it’s the big edits that we’re referring to. That makes a large difference.)
Related topic, if you’re not at the point where you can hire a professional photographer and will be using stock photography. It’s really helpful if you have an idea of the photos you’d like and some keywords for use to search for. Sometimes as designers, we need some examples of what to look for in stock photography. For example, if you are an interior design but only work residentially, we won’t want to include anything that involved commercial spaces (…granted as your graphic designer, we should already know that, but you get my point, right?)
—-
We hope you found this helpful! Let us know what you think and if you can implement any of these tips with your graphic designer to maximize your cost and save some money. Don’t skimp our for a cheap graphic designer… If you use these tips and think smart about your project, it will help you save $$$ in the end!
If you’re in Madison, WI and are looking for design help, feel free to reach out! Otherwise, just hang on tight to stay tuned for more great tips to come.
If you’re in marketing, small business, or a creative field, you’ve probably heard the term VECTOR thrown around. You might have been totally lost by what this means. As a graphic design studio, we use vector EVERY DAY… not even exaggerating, we LOVE them.
BUT… What if you’re not a designer and you have someone telling you that you NEED a vector logo. Wel, in this case,e you might be totally confused, but rest assured you’ve come to the right spot! We’re here to help you learn what it is and why its important. It’s a tricky concept to digest, but we’ve created an infographic for you that should hopefully make it easier to understand.
I’ll run through the basics quickly before you dive into the graphic. Google Dictionary describes VECTOR as “a quantity having direction as well as magnitude, especially as determining the position of one point in space relative to another”. Similarly, in graphic design, we use the term “vector” to refer to a graphic created with anchor points, lines, and angles which work together to form shapes. The elements of the design use their relativity to one another to create the shapes of your design. Because of the geometry behind it, you can scale shapes as large as you want without losing quality. Whether your design is one inch or one mile long, these relative mathematic equations stay the same, allowing your lines and curves to stay crisp and clear.
There’s a lot of mathematics behind it, and although we loved math in high school, that knowledge has definitely diminished [probably to retain more knowledge about fonts, lol]. If you want to read the brainy details behind it, click on this link: https://www.intmath.com/vectors/math-vector-art.php.
So thanks to the fabulously smart people of the world, they figured out how to use their math skills to create vector graphics in programs like Adobe Illustrator. Praise the lord — this means we’re able to make awesome designs without thinking about math!
Let’s take a look at the graphic below.
As you may have already noticed, vectors are the type of thing that makes us giddy… yep, you can call us design-nerds, WE ARE.
What it comes down to is… A vector graphic is created with lines, curves, and points. These all combine together to make something that is completely scalable. As they grow and shrink, they don’t cause pixelation because they aren’t made of those pixels/dots. The lines, curves, and anchors create a mathematical relationship to each other, so as they scale, they maintain the same equations.
This is why we ALWAYS tell our clients and pretty much everyone we know, you need to have vector logo files. They are so important… To read more about our post on what type of logo files you need, you can read our post, 6 Logo Types You Need.
