Designing a billboard to attract attention

Billboard advertising can be a little daunting for a lot of marketers. Many brands may be put off because they think billboard advertising belongs to bigger brands. They may view it as a higher risk project than other more measurable forms of advertising, or they may think it may be outside their budget.

In fact, billboard advertising can be a lot more affordable than people think. And there remain few quite so powerful means of getting your message across.

So how do you go about designing a billboard to get the attention that you are after? Here’s our top tips;

Keep it simple

As with all marketing campaigns, the trick with billboard design is to make the complex and difficult, look simple and easy. It can be even more tempting with billboards however to fill all of that space available with as many sales messages as possible. The trick with billboard design, however, is to make your sales message both stand out and be understood instantly. Whether your audience is pedestrians walking the streets, commuters on the train or drivers, you only have a few seconds to make the impact that you are after. 

Your message, therefore, needs to be concise and to the point. It needs to encapsulate exactly what you have to offer in as few words as possible. The images you choose to use should also tell the story of what you’re selling. You need to ensure that every available piece of space is working to trigger a response amongst your audience. 

Have fun

While your billboard design needs to be functional that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be fun. Adding humour or something a little different to your design will make your advertisement stand out.  As well as having an instantly recognisable message, add a little intrigue or creativity to your message. You will engage your audience and encourage them to spend more time viewing what you have to say. 

Be bold, be different

Your audience will appreciate you taking a risk. Simply telling them that you have a sale on is a good way to attract attention.  But, by being bold with your design or message and trying something a little different you can reap the reward of the element of surprise. We’re all subjected to hundreds of different sales messages each day, many of which are almost identical in approach. By doing something different you can stand out from the crowd and dictate your own terms. 

Be targeted

When we think of billboards we might not always think of targeted advertising, but we should. When planning your media buying you can also decide the geographical areas that you’d like your billboards to occupy. Understanding the typical traffic of these areas and the kinds of people that are going to see your billboard can really help you tailor your design and your messaging. If you have a store nearby to the billboard you might even want to tell passers-by how far away they are so they can stop by. 

At Kaizen Brand Evolution we are experts at getting your brand attention. Looking for adshels, billboards or backlit lightboxes?  We know how to help you make the most of out of home advertising to drive brand engagement and sales. To find out how we can help you can visit our billboard and adshel design page or get in touch via our contact form or by calling 028 9507 2007.

Five key elements for an engaging creative annual report design

In the businesses, an annual report plays an important role in highlighting the company’s growth and other important activities throughout the year. It informs and educates the clients, partners, employees, and shareholders to see how the company has performed during a period of the year. As it is having a huge impact on the representation of your business data, its visual appearance must not be taken lightly.

The information inside an annual report must be clear enough so that the viewers can understand it properly. The content flow must be logical and backed by powerful words. Your annual report is representing your growth and even the losses, so everything inside is important for your company. 

It is always an important thing to give it a proper design and structure. The easiest way to do this is to hire annual report cover design firms. As per the industries and your business activities, the content inside an annual report may vary. But, when it comes to designing, some important rules apply to each type of report. 

So, here in this article, we are going to know five key elements to design your annual report in a much professional and interactive manner.

1. Choose the format carefully

The information inside your annual report may carry anything as per your desires. But, when it goes to anyone’s hand, it must look professional. To do this, you will have to pick a format wisely. Do not just pick a traditional and simple booklet carrying a number of pages inside it. Instead, go for a stylish and professional design that can give an impact on its readers. Its outlook is going to be like a first impression. And, you will never want the first impression to be bad. So, choose a format that can suit your industry and type of people who are going to read this report.

2. Visual data is the key

Using appropriate visuals to show the information will be a good step for interactive annual report design. Make sure to use charts, infographics, tables, and other types of things to share the data properly. 

Instead of adding thousands of words that are going to take hours to read, the visuals are going to explain the things in a much better way. Sharing any type of details and company’s statistics is easier with the infographics. In order to show your growth rate, revenues, and areas of improvement, you can easily pick any type of visual graphics to make things easier to explain and understand.

3. Use appropriate fonts

The fonts play another important role in enhancing the attractiveness of your report. Whether you are using any type of format and design for your annual report, using proper fonts is also an important part of its effectiveness. 

If you are capable to handle the typography work properly, it will give an amazing outlook to your report. Also, using proper bold fonts to highlight import points is good. Use font color combinations to make important points easy to be seen by the people. While inserting any type of paragraphs, headings, and other fonts in your annual report, do not forget the take care of the available space too. You will have to manage the available space properly depending upon the total length of your report. 

4. Take care of the space

Using infographics and proper space is an important thing. But, without a proper space management strategy, you will never be able to make your report effective for the readers. Pick images, tables, and informative charts properly at the space they are required. But, do not forget to utilize the space properly. 

Add the texts wherever they are required. It will not be good if you are adding numerous images and other visuals continuously on multiple pages and then you add texts on the next multiple pages. This is going to be frustrating for the readers too. So, make sure to add the things where they will suit them best. But, do not forget to mix up everything and give a great outlook to your report.

5. Keep the covers in your consideration

You might end up making a highly attractive and easy to understand business report after reading and understanding the steps above. But, the cover is the first thing that everyone will see. So, making it attractive is also important. Pick a good cover format and customize it as per your desires. You can add related business images and your major achievements on this page. Use attractive headlines to let the people open it as soon as they see it. Do not forget the back cover page too. It is another important aspect of a creative annual report design. The cover itself must be able to tell a story about how you did in this business year. 

Why an attractive annual report is important?

The annual report is a big business asset that can easily be used to show you what are the things you are focused on. It reflects your hard work and empowers you to give your consistent efforts towards perfection. To create an attractive and knowledgeable annual report, you must know its benefits for the business too. So, let’s reveal some of those below.

It promotes your company

We know annual reports are good to show your achievements to others. But, do you know a business annual report can also work as a great marketing tool. By promoting it to your potential customers, you can build a good reputation and relations with them. It indirectly helps your business to get more sales and hence increased business revenues.

Building confidence

When you show your achievements to others, positive confidence starts to build up among your customers, clients, partners, and shareholders. It helps you to attract new and productive customers for your products and services. Also, it will help a lot in employee retention. In a nutshell, a good annual business report will work as a great tool to enhance the sales for your next year too.

Informing Media

You can easily use your annual business report to influence and attract the media. If you are capable of highlighting your achievements, the media can give it a big boost and increase its reach among lots of people around the world. 

Show your competency

The annual business report gives your competitors an idea of how you are growing in your industry. It will let you become dominating over others. But, to do this effectively, you will have to focus mostly on the areas where you have grown. So, a good business annual report creation and development strategy become crucial for this.

Financial Information

The annual business report also helps us to confirm and highlight our annual financial transactions. Along with the profits and losses, you are going to have a brief overview of everything. This will help you to prepare better for the future. Also, you will become proficient to grab the upcoming growth opportunities too.

Final Verdict

As compared to any other business documentation asset, the annual report must be created with proper care. It shows others how you are serving in your industry and how committed you are. It will motivate your employees and give your investor a sense of relief by working with you. To get the most out of these reports, you can also connect with a good company that can help you with this.

Kaizen Brand Evolution wins creative contract for Ulster GAA

Ulster GAA, have recently appointed Kaizen Brand Evolution as their creative agency, after a competitive tendering process. Ulster GAA is the provincial council and governing body of the Gaelic Athletic Association sports of Hurling, Gaelic football, Camogie & Handball in Ulster.

The two year contract will run from November 2019 through to November 2021 and will involve the management of Ulster GAA’s brand identity, the design and planning of creative campaigns across all Ulster GAA games and initiatives, management of design and of all Ulster GAA Match Programmes and the collation and design of annual reports and presentation materials.

To achieve this contract, Kaizen Brand Evolution competed successfully against a number of other design and branding agencies including a written submission, case studies and a panel interview.

Ulster GAA Public Relations Officer, Declan Woods, commented:

‘‘ We want to continually enhance the marketing and communications activities of Ulster GAA and in Kaizen Brand Evolution we have an excellent partner to help us achieve that objective. We look forward to exciting times ahead working together.’’

The managing director of Kaizen Brand Evolution, Connor Mc Auley said;

‘We are delighted to have been chosen as the Creative & Branding agency for Ulster GAA. Their contribution to Irish life is immeasurable, and their success story is undisputed – We are excited to be a part of the future of the GAA in Ulster”.

The account win for Kaizen Brand Evolution continues an incredible year for one of the countries leading design agencies. Working with some of the most recognised and influential brands on the island of Ireland, they have become one of its most noted design studios.

Headquartered in Belfast, Kaizen Brand Evolution have grown to a team of 37 and recently moved to a new 5,000 sq ft base in Jennymount Business Park in York Road following a £250,000 investment.

Kaizen Brand Evolution focuses on brand creation, brand development and graphic design. They work with clients to develop clear company vision and strategic direction which they then support with Visually developing their brand to reflect both their vision and company culture.  Their unique approach delivers deep and meaningful change across clients’ businesses.

Belfast Live Press Release here

Belfast Telegraph Press Release here

Why your business needs a creative presentation deck design

It is very important for you to understand that, how you present is very important as what you present. So, you would never want your design to let you go down anyway. If you are not a designer, there is no need to worry as there are various online platforms who are professionals in creating the best presentation deck designs for your business.

All you have to do is investigate the printing services you are planning to hire in order to get the best results. Never choose printing services for your business without investigating them, as nowadays there are many online platforms who are actually bluffing the people. Try to get the best advice from the people who have already taken these kinds of services before. 

There are actually a few secret weapons that every business owner should use in their business. And one of them is creating a professional and creative deck design. There is no doubt, that your presentation deck design can work as your key in order to get the dollar bills in order to give life to your business. Presentation deck designs should be of high quality if you want your business to grow. 

There are various tips that you must follow if you are planning to make a professional-looking presentation deck for your business. 

Here are the certain tips that you should follow in order to make a creative presentation deck designfor your business: 

Consider your audience

If you are planning to go to the meeting with the various investors, you have to make sure that you are basically pitching the right people. For example, the people who are always ready to invest in your business plans. It is very important for you to ask yourself, whether they are into you or they will go to pick up whatever you will throw down. 

If you are having plans on focussing on changing the world for better, you will definitely be going to point out the VC firms, as their motive is to invest in the businesses that are basically looking for making a social impact. 

There is no doubt, that you will have much better luck in locking in a particular investment with a like-minded VC firm than with the one who is all about launching the latest and the most beneficial and profitable technologies. 

Keep it simple

There is no doubt, that you must never try to include the various words, graphics, colors, data as due to this you will definitely end up visually overwhelming your audience and your message will definitely going to lose in the shuffles. 

Make sure that you are not exceeding the 20 words per slide. The professional way of doing this is by adding one headline phrase, one sentence caption, and that’s it. The slides that you have prepared are not basically the scripts as they are the visual guide for your audience. 

You should have the main motive of grasping a slide the moment they glance at it. 

If you will add more information on your slide, the less information your audience will be going to process. If they are reading that means you are in trouble, because that means that they are not listening to what you are explaining to them. Which can be a huge drawback for you. So never try to add extra information on your slide at the time of your presentation.

Keep it honest

This is one of the most important points when you are putting together and presenting your pitch deck always try to make it a rule to practice full transparency. 

Because if you will try to hide anything, thinking that it will reflect very badly on your business, then trust us: that your VC’s will definitely be going to find out about it. And later on, it will actually come back to you in you know what sort of conversations. 

In order to get the professional presentation deck for your business, you have to hire the best printing services. As they will be very beneficial for you and your business needs. 

Here are some of the benefits of hiring the best printing services for your business: 

Online printing services will definitely save your time

By hiring professional online printing services for your business you can manage to save your precious time and efforts of your employees as well as the services of your desktop printer which most likely would not be able to handle the print job in bulk.

There are many things you don’t have to worry about such as: 

The details of learning the process of organising your printing job as well as the aggregate binding process. You can save your time like this and focus on other important things in your business.

You can get experts advice and suggestions

The online printing company has all the professional printing experts along with smart printing machines. All you have to do is, ask them about their ideas so that you can also use them for your business requirements. 

The commercial printing companies have the design experts to help out the clients by making sure that the designs are correct and good enough for their business projects. 

Meet our web development team

Introducing our Web Development Team

If your company is considering a website refresh, Our team brings experience and knowledge to help overcome those issues. If you are keen to improve your user experience, achieve a higher conversion rate or improve your website’s appearance, the Kaizen Web Development team are ready to tackle every issue.

Say hello to Lizi, Ryan Mc, Ryan S & Oscar…

Lizi – Our Leading Lady

We also welcome back Lizi from maternity leave, who will be on hand to ensure that all websites and designs are forward thinking and progressive.

Lizi has been with us at Kaizen Brand Evolution for 5 years, working as a web and graphic designer.

Lizi is also the team leader for our team, ensuring everything runs smoothly and that her team are working on jobs that they love and thrive on!

Ryan Mc  – Our Designer Dynamo!

Ryan Mc has a background in brand design so his eye for colours and fonts matched with his web development knowledge makes for an interesting pair and helps him to create eye catching web pages that have great functionality.

Oskar  – Our Animation Artist!

He brings his passion for animation to the web development team, helping him to create a truly dynamic and engaging website experience for all users. 

Ryan S  – Our Coding Connoisseur!

Ryan is the go to guy for all your coding issues, with a calm and collected attitude, he is ready to tackle the most perplexing coded issues! 

So if you are in need of some Website Development – We have the team for you!

Contact us today on 028 9507 2007 or visit out website.

5 essential qualities of a great logo design

It may seem unfair, but a great logo design can make or break a brand. While it might seem like such a small part in the grand scheme of what you have to offer, it is vital that it sticks in the minds of your customers. Your logo is at the heart of your branding and is attached to everything that you do. If your customers can’t remember your logo, they are unlikely to remember your brand, and they are therefore unlikely to think of you when it comes to forking out their hard-earned cash. But what makes for a great logo? Here’s our list of the 5 essential qualities of a great logo;

A great logo is simple

The best logos forego the bells and whistles. When you think of the most famous brand logos in the world, you probably think of Nike, McDonalds, or Apple, all of which are of course incredibly simple logos – a tick, the letter m and an apple. 

A great logo means something

A logo is intended not only as a means of advertising your brand but also as a means of symbolising something that it stands for. A logo should not only tell your audience who you are, it should have some kind of meaning. Whether this meaning is immediately obvious or not, is not necessarily the point, but what is more important is that the logo feels like it has a story behind it. 

A great logo is authentic

Which brings us to authenticity. A great logo feels authentic. It feels like it is inextricable from the business, as though one cannot exist without the other. While much of this is to do with audience recognition and perception, and how well the logo is used in practice, it is also to do with how authentic it feels to your audience. If your logo feels like a mismatch of corporate ideas, it’s probably because it is one. If your logo, on the other hand, feels natural and like it belongs, then you know you are doing something right. 

A great logo is relevant

A great logo is relevant. Not only relevant to what you think the brand stands for, but also for how your customers and colleagues feel about the brand. A great logo should feel at once universal and personal. It should say something, however small, about what it is that the business does (even if it is simply in the choice of colours), while at the same time saying something broader about what it is that the business stands for. 

A great logo is timeless

If a logo has been designed with current trends or fashions in mind over and above the qualities aforementioned then it is likely that it will soon look dated and forgettable. While it is always a good idea to take inspiration from what is going on around you in the market, by copying or imitating something that looks cool, purely for the sake of it, it’s likely that this lack of authenticity will come across in the final design. 

If you look at any of the most successful brands in the world, they all have these five qualities in common. And while they may have made modifications to their logo over the years, ultimately the basics behind them remain the same. And while they may look simple in their finished state these logos would have taken a huge amount of time, effort and hard work to get right. Great logos don’t happen by accident, and thinking that they can be produced in a couple of hours is a mistake. 

Kaizen Brand Evolution

At Kaizen Brand Evolution, we have worked with numerous brands on creating and developing their brand logos. As branding experts, we know what makes for a truly outstanding logo and with our guidance and help, we can help you achieve the results you are looking for. To find out more about how we can help with your logo design you can visit our logo design page, or get in touch via our contact page or by calling 028 9507 2007.