all about the brand:

MAXIMUM IMPACT with SKAVLEM DESIGNS

WORDS : ALICIA UNDERLEE NELSON PHOTOGRAPHY : Provided by SKAVLEM DESIGNS

what's your design process?

How? Start in person: I take notes to listen to each client. What audience do you want this message to reach?

What's the best way to do that?

Take it to paper: Then I draw/sketch it out.

What are the actions you want to get in response to your message?

Moodboards or Mockups: ueSkavlem creates clarity and connections. Her company, Skavlem Designs, is a one-stop shop for writing, design and branding services. Clients come to Skavlem with notes scrawled on napkins and scratch paper and a collection of screenshots, vision boards, words, colors and images as inspiration. They leave with tools that are custom designed to help them connect with their customers in concise and dynamic ways.

Pre-work still - look and feel. Some projects need a bit more groundwork. Moodboards show the photography style and art direction that can then be easily applied to a project or product. Think of it as a map.

Design Layouts, Edits and Wow: For large projects, getting from How to Wow is not for the faint of heart. But with a well organized designer on your side, the end result can really grab people's attention.

Some opt for complete packages, like a branding strategy session or a brand refresh that provides new press releases and updates the company’s “About Us” literature and media kit. A comprehensive approach helps a scrappy startup hit the ground running and enables an established company to launch a new program, product or mission quickly.

“I love to be able to co-create those ideas with people,” says Skavlem. “I really like working with small businesses and helping established businesses expand, to be able to not only be the starting point for people, but also to be able to say, ‘Where do you want to be in five years?’ — and to help them justify that, whether they’re getting a small business loan or just putting together a business plan.”

Other clients opt for a more à la carte approach. They hire Skavlem to revamp a logo, to create an ad campaign or infographic, to generate an email template, an attention-getting social media strategy or a knockout annual report. It’s an efficient way to delegate those pesky tasks that don’t match anyone’s job description or skill set to a professional and get them off the to-do list.

For clients that fall somewhere in between the comprehensive and the pay-as-you-go models, Skavlem offers her services on retainer. It’s a solution for businesses that may not need (or be able to afford) a full-time graphic designer or marketing coordinator, but still want to work with a creative consultant who understands the company’s mission and goals.

Skavlem has no interest in dictating to her clients. The goal is a collaborative process from start to finish.

“Whenever you’re speaking to somebody, the most important thing is how you listen,” she says. “I listen to what they want and need. I try to leave my ego and my personal style out of it. And it’s really fun to see the light come into their eyes when they say, ‘Yeah, that’s who I am.’”

As a business owner herself, Skavlem knows her customers want to get the most out of their time and money. She empowers them with a few tricks of the trade that they can implement inhouse, along with a few words of caution about when to call the pros.

“I like to help people figure out if they want to try things on their own, or figure out where they want to make an investment,” Skavlem explains. “I give them other options they can try themselves, the things that they can do for free, the things that they can do for cheap.”

While she’s happy to help her clients learn new skills, Skavlem advises going with a trusted, established professional when creating an entirely new graphic design project, especially an image that will be reproduced in multiple formats. This is especially true for logos, since some designers (including friends and family who offer free labor and designers that can be hired online for ultra low rates) may not understand (or be bound by) U.S. copyright or usage licenses, or might alter the same design for several clients in different markets. Saving a few bucks just isn’t worth it.

“No matter who you are, whether you’re just starting out as a business or you’re a Fortune 500 company, your logo is synonymous with who you are,” Skavlem says empathetically. “And not only your trust, but your reliability. So if you start out your business by using a logo that’s not yours, or by tweaking a logo that is clearly someone else’s, you start out that relationship on a bad foot.”

Every image, marketing tool and social media campaign created by Skavlem Designs is crafted to communicate with a client’s customers in the most efficient and aesthetically pleasing way possible. Whether Sue Skavlem designs the entire campaign or just an element, consistency is key. It’s all about the brand.

“If you know what your brand is, it’s like expanding your vocabulary,” says Skavlem. “It helps you speak to more people in more ways.”