Tag Archives: design

Its OK to Say No

Posted on September 12, 2011 by in Graphic Design, Marketing

Back at the beginning of the year Forbes ran an interesting story called The 7 Success Principles of Steve Jobs. While the focus of these seven principles is on creating innovative gizmos, many of these ideas can be applied to marketing, branding and design. In this post, I want to focus on principle five:

Say no to 1,000 things. Steve Jobs once said, “I’m as proud of what we don’t do as I am of what we do.”  He is committed to building products with simple, uncluttered design. And that commitment extends beyond products. From the design of the iPod to the iPad, from the packaging of Apple’s products, to the functionality of the Web site, in Apple’s world, innovation means eliminating the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.

I find this interesting, because I’ve always conducted my own business this way. Our focus here at Velocimedia is on marketing, design and photography. More specifically, our clients are nimble, small businesses or sole proprietorships that are willing to invest in their business, take some risks and do things differently.  We don’t work with big corporations, and we never will — they’re too slow, too disorganized, and just plain “don’t get it.”

Principle 5 can be found in everything we do for our clients as well. Whether its a brochure or a web site, we don’t fill pages with marketing bullshit or worthless information. Everything we do has a reason. And more often than not, we leave things out for a reason too.

Don’t be a yesman. Its okay to say no to crummy ideas.

Simplicity is the Key to Brilliance

Posted on August 8, 2011 by in Graphic Design

When Bruce Lee uttered these words, he may not have been referring specifically to marketing a business – and yet I can find no statement that better defines the philosophy of Velocimedia than this: Simplicity is the key to brilliance.

At Velocimedia, we believe strongly in clean, direct and efficient design. Sometimes, less really is more! That doesn’t mean your brochure or web site should be a spartan white page with black text and a a crummy picture. It should, however, be free of clutter, with a layout that helps deliver information in a creative, organized manner. White space creates breathing room for the content; freeing your reader from unnecessary distractions actually helps you get your message across. As Louis Sullivan put forth over 100 years ago, form follows function.

This is where Velocimedia comes in. Our combined 30+ years of experience in brand building, marketing and graphic design will help you build effective tools for your business that get right to the point. Our work always results in a polished, beautiful piece that manages to be both simple and sophisticated.

One of my favorite sites, Six Revisions, ran an article on this very topic, which they call “reductionism.” Though their focus is on web design and development, this philosophy can easily be applied to brochure design, branding and even everyday life. I highly recommend checking it out.