Before you begin your next DIY design adventure, make sure to familiarize yourself with these three big pitfalls — and learn how a design pro could save the day.

Fonts and Colors! Colors and Fonts!

At Ideality, we are suckers for a beautiful typeface. Capturing the tone and style of your brand and message in one gorgeous font? Swoon. And there are So. Many. Fonts. And colors! The temptation is real — but, yes, there can be too much of a good thing. A rainbow of colors and a dozen different fonts on your design only serves to muddy your message.

Why go pro? Ideality’s design team develops a style guide of specific fonts and colors to highlight your brand’s unique character in a consistent and harmonious way. No color clashes or jumble of type styles!

The Cluttered Canvas

A blank space is full of possibilities. It’s understandable to want to fill it with everything you want to share about your brand. But just as your misplaced keys seem to disappear on a cluttered countertop, a chaotic design filled with elements, images and text can make it difficult for your audience to pinpoint your message.

Why go pro? Designers know how to balance elements and create a visual hierarchy, leaving your design clean and impactful. Check out our blog on white space to learn more!

Pixel Problems

You’ve got the design down; your message is clear. Now it’s time for the perfect image. Stop! Step away from screenshots. Using screen grabs or images too small for the scale of your design will make even the snappiest layouts look unprofessional.

Why go pro? Graphic designers rely on high-resolution images (and can often work with those less-than-stellar ones) to ensure the final design is polished and professional.

At the end of the day, design is all about making a lasting impression on your audience. Avoid these graphic pitfalls, and you’re on your way to telling your brand’s story and making an impact. Or avoid the dangers of DIY design altogether — call in a pro who takes time to understand your brand and can transform your ideas into captivating visuals. Reach out to Ideality!

The post Does Your DIY Design Need Some TLC? appeared first on Ideality Communications.

That’s why Ideality is devoted to protecting yours. Your business offers something unique that draws in customers. Our primary mission is to define the spark that sets your company apart. Then, we blast your brand promise from a boombox hoisted overhead (Gen X movie reference. If you know, you know.) and defend the brand through consistent, effective communication.

We’ll help you nail the basics and devise a plan to ensure all your outreach reinforces your core values and conveys your brand’s endearing personality. How do we love thee? Let’s count the ways!

• Client Profile and Competitor Analysis: 
  We define your target audience, pinpoint the way they like to receive information and see how you stack up against their other suitors.
• Brand Platform and Style Guides:
  We help you know your own heart, developing mission, vision and value statements along with color pallets, visual standards and more to ensure your brand looks swoon-worthy.
• Online Reputation Management: 
  Ideality’s social media guidelines will help you decipher the best “love language” for your audience, boosting engagement and positive reviews. 

This proactive approach to communications not only grows and cultivates loyalty in your customer base, but also prevents missteps. No relationship is perfect; you’re bound to encounter some negative feedback along the way. But, the right plan and reliable brand messaging builds trust and minimizes the need for crisis communications. Learn more about Ideality’s vow to love and cherish your brand! Lead Strategist Susan is always ready to help you strengthen your foundation and prepare you to successfully share your brand with the world.

The post Protecting Your Brand ‘In Sickness and In Health’ appeared first on Ideality Communications.

Every project, large or small, starts the same way — with a blank page. Consider it a big empty cauldron, where design wizards deftly blend words and visuals to create the perfect potion to grab our attention, inform and inspire. 

But what you might not have noticed is the secret ingredient every graphic design pro adds to take their recipe from ordinary to extraordinary. To the untrained eye, it looks like nothing at all. But this ingredient has the power to direct your readers’ eye to what matters most in the design, to install a sense of calm, to bring harmony and balance to any project. — It’s the magic of white space.

White space, also called blank space or negative space, is just what it sounds like — those areas of a project without text, pictures or graphics. It can be as small as the space between these words … or as big as the project itself! No matter the size, a good design uses white space intentionally. In a world filled with constant information, think of white space as the breathing room allowing your visuals to shine and your message to resonate.

Less is More

Too many design elements can quickly overwhelm a viewer. White space strips away the excess, giving room for those elements to make a bold impact — without the clutter. Good design uses white space like a road map, guiding your eye across the design and establishing a visual hierarchy. It ensures crucial elements like headlines or calls to action take center stage.

Emotional Punch

Think about how you feel in a clean and uncluttered environment. Those feelings of calmness and tranquility when your surroundings are quiet and organized can apply to a design project as well. By incorporating white space, you can create an emotional connection with your viewers, evoking feelings of peace and calm and creating an air of sophistication and luxury. 

“White space is like air: it is necessary for design to breathe.” — Wojciech Zieliński

Clean design is a passion of our own design pro, Daria. Ideality is here to help you mix in the right amount of white space to take your project to higher level. From ad layouts to logo rebrands, let us help make your next project pure magic!

The post Embrace the Space: The Secret Ingredient in Graphic Design Magic appeared first on Ideality Communications.