how-i-built-myself-as-a-brand-roberto-blake

Many people have asked me lately how I achieved some of my goals and popularity as a designer so quickly. In all honest I’m forced to admit that it has more to do with my understanding of 2 things rather than some tremendous talent I supposedly have (I still have a ways to go to be the designer I want to be), and those 2 things are: Marketing and Technology, and the fact that applied them to Brand Development.

Of all the reasons to go to college as a designer, learning about the principles of marketing and branding are certainly up there. We are all in age where technology has taken over our lives, yet many people don’t know how to use there technology or time effectively, or to for that matter to any constructive purpose.

In my article How Designers Should Use Twitter to Succeed, I addressed the nature of twitter and how designers and artist can benefit from using twitter “purposefully”. Twitter presents individuals and businesses are rare opportunity to display their value, communicate with an audience and meet their needs while establishing presence and creditability.You also have to keep up the momentum once you start this process.

This is key factor (among others)  many people overlook. You also need to have a message and tone when communicating with your audience, and be consistent about it. Using current technology I built a site to give me an online presence, utilized social media to build a community and an audience, and then proceeded to demonstrate my value in the form of my talent, my experiences, and my insight into the creative world and profession. And here is how I did it:

Brand Name:

I decided that rather than brand myself under an alias that I wanted to be more transparent, and brand myself as an individual and receive all the credit for my work, but myself at the forefront. There are some advantages and risk associated with this.

Once you make this decision you have to be sure that you protect your reputation and that you separate your personal life both online, and in the real world. You have to properly maintain your online identities and avoid overlap.

Brand Position and Message:

This was very straight forward. I’m a graphic designer and visual artist. This is the niche/skill that I wanted to promote and attach to myself as a brand and individual. It meant that I would be communicating with a very diverse audience as it would include the online design and artist community, as well as the advertising industry and its client base.

To that end I chose my brand message and tone; the stance of promoting, demonstrating, and encouraging a high quality of work, communication, and fair practices.

Brand Management:

The route I chose in terms of marketing techniques was combination of social media marketing, publication, and search engine marketing. The social media platforms I chose to utilize were mostly niche blogs, youtube, and twitter. With regard to search engine marketing I put a complete emphasis on natural results, and penetration. I developed a blog and website to promote myself, my skills, and my accomplishments, while at the same time cross promoting other individuals within the design and art community, providing resources, information and critiques.

As a result I built a following and built strong relationships which I used to further expand my reach and audience. I took online interviews with other designers that promoted me through their blogs, featured me on their sites, and promoted my articles. Eventually I also was published in niche magazines that are widely recognized in the design and art community internationally (Advanced Photoshop and Photoshop Creative).

As an additional marketing tool I self published an art book through a print on demand company (blurb.com), and I’m currently in the process of promoting it.

Through my youtube channel I address issues in the design community, offer advice to new designers, and provide occasional tutorials.

Brand Equity:

As a result of my efforts I currently am a first result in Google in particular for my name, and also appear as a suggested result, whereas a year ago this was not the case. I have a great deal of penetration within Google and return consistent results more than 10 pages deep. I have achieved similar results across all the major search engines. I have over 1,000 followers on twitter and twitter grade of 97. I have received over 20,000 views on Youtube for my 9 current videos, and average roughly 80 views a day. My site currently holds a Google Page Rank of 3. I have been featured to date in Advanced Photoshop Magazine and Photoshop Creative Magazine, and have won the award for Design of the Week from IloveDesign.com

Brand Definition:

I use as my logo my initials and a stylized crop mark. I chose not make color a feature of the logo allowing me versatility. The purpose is for the consistency of emphasizing my identity and declaring via the crop mark symbol fact that I’m an artist. The crop mark is an object that is universally associated with artist and designers, and most people recognize it. I also make sure that I’m consistent, in using wherever possible and when associated with my name.

Brand Image:

Perception is reality, and how you are or your brand is perceived will determine your reality in terms of your clients and relationships. Things that contribute to a strong brand image are a high quality of work, creditability, presence, and appearance. As a designer and an artist I try to make sure that my online portfolios display the best work that I produce, and that my online presence in terms of my web site is professional and thoughtful.

On a personal note I also stylize myself as a creative professional and approach people as such. My clothes, language and the tools that I use are all a part of maintaining that image and reinforcing my brand and what I want it to convey. There is something to be said for looking the part, any designer and artist should know that most of communication is non-verbal and should be applying their good design sense to themselves as well as their work.

Roberto Blake

Roberto Blake is a Professional Graphics Designer and Photographer, living in Fayetteville NC, has work been working with Photoshop® for over 8 years now, and Flash® for the past 5 years.

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