Branding
13 Photoshop Tips for Marketing Design
What are your marketing design options if you want a more professional and customizable end product but can’t afford to hire an in-house designer? If you rule Photoshop out as a tool for professionals only, think again. A few simple, easy-to-learn tools go a long way, allowing you to produce marketing materials that look professional [...]
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6 Design Hacks to Make Your Life Easier
No one wants to reinvent the wheel, or worse, spend hours and hours on something only to find out no one plans on using it. As such, any time-saving tips or design hacks to help the beleaguered, overworked creative would be welcomed. There are simply too many design requests made by too many different departments [...]
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Is It Time To Rebrand or Make Brand Updates?
Your brand identity is arguably your company’s most valuable asset. Your brand encapsulates the trust you have with your customers, it communicates your identity and values, and with any luck, it’s recognizable and memorable to continue growing your audience. Perhaps you feel like your brand is in need of a face-lift, though. Is it time [...]
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How To Scale for Growth With a Brand Guide
A brand style guide is a document that compiles rules for the use of creative assets and messaging across all media and channels, providing consistency and clarity to the visual components of marketing. It is an internal document that makes sure everyone represents the brand visuals well, so that you have a consistent and recognizable [...]
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How Third-Party Shipping Software Can Help Shopify Merchants Grow on New Selling Channels
This is a guest post by the editorial team at Hawke Media partner, ShipStation. Shipping may seem like the final step in an order lifecycle, but shipping touches so many other areas of your business that you need to be able to centralize fulfillment. Platforms like UPS Worldship or Shopify Shipping are great platforms. But [...]
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5 Ways To Use Valentine’s Day Marketing Campaigns To Engage and Excite Customers
February 14th is right around the corner. What you need is a little creativity and inspiration for your Valentine’s Day marketing campaign. V-Day is the perfect opportunity to inject a bit of irony, humor, goodwill, warmth, and fun into your marketing. Everyone can enjoy the feel-good spirit of this holiday. And as a business, it’s [...]
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How To Build Customer Loyalty After the Initial Purchase
You got a customer to click “Check Out.” Congratulations! Your customer acquisition efforts paid off. Now what? This is the tricky part. Many e-commerce companies display a thank-you message, send a shipping confirmation email, and that’s it. However, if you go above and beyond with personalization, or provide additional communications to deliver a more memorable [...]
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What Is a Brand Style Guide and Why Do You Need One?
You have a business plan. You have a product strategy. Your company has a name. But do you have a brand style guide? Sometimes called a brand guide, your brand style guide explores and defines the critical elements of your brand, how they work together, and how to implement them for business growth. What Is [...]
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Getting the Foundation Right: How to Craft Impactful Brand Pillars
Brand pillars are a crucial part of digital marketing strategies today. They convey what your brand is, who it appeals to, and what makes it unique — all things you need to be hyper-clear on in order to create marketing campaigns that are cohesive and effectively promote your brand across audiences and channels. But beyond [...]
Read MoreWhat to Expect when Undergoing a Brand Strategy Project
Human beings are hardwired to respond to brands just as they are hardwired to respond to people. Some brands we adore, get protective over and even argue about with people if they are dismissive of it. Some brands just turn us off, usually because we aren’t the brand’s target audience. For the vast majority of [...]
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