Forget Marketing: Why Design Is The Way To Make Your Business Thrive
By Business Desk
Wednesday, August 30, 2016.
Business owners give a lot of their time and effort in pursuit of the perfect marketing strategy. But could all that effort be misplaced? Take for instance the report of the Design Council. They noted that businesses were making 100 percent returns on their design investments. Yet they only made a fraction of that through traditional marketing methods. The question, therefore, is why? Why is graphic design so important to business? And how can your company make the most of it? Let’s find out.
Brand Recognition
What’s the secret to a great brand? It turns out that it’s recognition. But it’s not just recognition for recognition’s sake. It’s about a recognition that builds trust.
What’s interesting about the science of branding is how little it has to do with products. What’s more important is the look, appeal, and exposure to a brand. Science has discovered that people only spend around 50 milliseconds deciding whether they want to buy a certain brand. That’s about a twentieth of a second, which isn’t very long. It all means that design is incredibly important for attracting new business to your company.
Apple is a demonstration of this phenomenon in action. Apple doesn’t have the best phone or computer on the market from a raw performance standpoint. In fact, recently, it was the subject of a bitter comment from rival Microsoft. Microsoft told Apple to stop selling people cheap parts. But here’s the thing. It doesn’t seem to matter that Apple sells low-performance parts to consumers at a premium. All they know is that they want an Apple because of the beautiful branding and design philosophy of the company. Fewer people want Microsoft products because they’re far less focused on design. Apple managed to turn consumer electronics into fashion accessories in an era when everybody else was making bricks. Now they’re the second most valuable company in the world. And they’ve done it without doing anything truly innovative in tech since the iPhone ten years ago.
Company Unity
Great companies are defined by iconic images. We’re all familiar with the golden arches of McDonalds or the curly font on the front of a Coca-Cola bottle. But go into these companies, and you’ll find branding everywhere. It’s on the uniforms, websites, business documents and stationery. But why?
En.wikipedia.org
The idea behind ubiquitous branding is to create a sense of unity. Unity helps to bring companies together in the minds of colleagues and customers. And, in this way, contribute to making them more recognizable. There’s also some evidence that this sense of unity helps to bring together the workplace. And, ultimately, that can make employees happier.
Professionalism
Historically, small businesses used to struggle with professionalism. It was hard to get high-quality finishes on things like brochures, flyers, and newsletters. But thanks to a whole suite of new applications, like InDesign and Photoshop, it’s never been easier. Of course, these programs aren’t the easiest to learn. But sites like https://www.trainingconnection.com/photoshop-training.php have resources and training materials businesses can use.
Making a great first impression the first time around is important. So it’s crucial that they have presentable content that customers can enjoy. Beautiful design creates a sense of professionalism and generally improves the image of the business. It’s especially important for startups who need to give printed materials to clients. A simple word document often isn’t enough.
Market Share
According to adobe.com, design-led companies gain market share compared to regular companies. It turns out that they have roughly 1.5 times the market share of other businesses in their industry. But what’s the reason for this? According to science, good design is what helps grab customer’s attention and keeps them coming back.
Companies Are Designing More Than Ever Before
Right now, consumers want up to the minute content on practically every topic imaginable. But actually creating design tools to facilitate that content is tricky. 71 percent of companies now say they are creating ten times more content than they were just a few year ago.
The increase is being driven by the rise of the global consumer. There are now around 3.1 billion people with disposable incomes browsing goods and services online. Each of those people wants a personalized experience. They want pictures, videos, and excellent writing to greet them whenever they shop.
All this is creating massive demand for new, creative assets. And that, in turn, is affecting how companies perform. Great companies are getting the design language right and putting money into rich content. Bad companies are ignoring the trend and going out of business.
