The idea of designing a website for your boutique luxury brand or small business is daunting at best. What to do? Should you be designing for the ipad, iphone, a magazine platform, blog or tweet? All of this, and more. This confusing array of channels has many of you in a twirl, so, the best advise we can give to you is to take one step at a time: Don’t launch before you Leap.
That is, don’t create a web presence before you are ready to “Leap” into what should be your first order of business: Your Brand. This may just be a logo, to you, but in truth, the power of your company brand is more important than anything you’ll ever do later. The entire basis for your product or service rests in how you communicate your story. We’ve talked about that here, before, but we’ll say it again. Who are you? Why are you, and why do we care? In Hollywood, we’re really clear on scripts and stories. Let’s face it, no one can come to work with out it, good or bad. Without your Brand Story, you’ll have alot of “digital gunk” on your website that has no real meaning. Compelling stories and really great content with a spiffy way of communicating, is what matters. Sure, we love those really classy visuals and product shots, who doesn’t?
But, in the end, you’ll ideally want to create a nice piece of real estate for your company on the web that has an enduring quality that is in fact, easy to use so people will want to go there. It’s a destination, not a shop window. We also want to add something people often forget about in the process: Humans are intuitive and think in simple terms. So, we advise that you keep things very clean, easy to understand and depending on the size and strategy of the business, reach for the solution that not only tells our story in pictures, but, also through its interactions with your audience.
The basics:
- You’ll need a message to your digital audience.
- You’ll need to tell the audience what your made of, who are you?
- You’ll need to define a look, feel, atmosphere, and quality
- You’ll need a brand platform that makes sense for your target
- You’ll need content that as magic SEO, and all that jazz
- You’ll need a great “line” that calls your target to action
- You’ll need a “sales pitch” that isn’t one, really at all
- You’ll need UN-DESIGN, or UBER-DESIGN that works
ARTIFICE Atelier 