Happy Mother’s Day
May 8, 2011 1 Comment
Have you called your mother today?
Here are some print ads that our clients are using for their Mother’s Day promotions (with a little help from us). Tell me which you like best!
Happy World Graphic Design Day!
April 27, 2011 Leave a comment
We live and breathe graphic design at Affinity Express, so today is something to celebrate!
We wanted to take this occasion to share some of our best designs and design expertise from the past year.
Designs Created by Our Teams
Here are some of our best designs from 2010 and from 2011 so far. And some print ads and online ads we created, and some holiday cards created in embroidery.
Tips on Design
Celebrating Easter: Retail Advertising, Religious Advertising and Egg Hunts
April 25, 2011 3 Comments
Easter Sunday has just come and gone; what a weekend it was!
The last month to two weeks prior to the April 24, 2011, was a very busy time at work. The four-day compressed work week was due to the Easter Holiday, and meant having either Good Friday or Monday the 25th off. The advertising peak for Easter meant brisk business, but Easter also a pleasant weekend for people engaged in social activities such as Easter egg hunts, chocolate gift exchanges and mini-vacations for spring (U.S. and Canada) or summer (Philippines). For many, the Easter weekend marked a central religious observance: the culmination of Holy Week.
As designers, around Easter we have to exercise cultural and religious sensitivity when we chose elements for advertising. Art falls mainly into two categories: retail and religious advertising. Read more of this post
Designing a Print Ad for an Outdoor Furnishings Company
April 20, 2011 2 Comments
Like all of us who strive to be successful today, designers have to adapt to the ever-changing way consumers process advertising. Designing print ads, collateral pieces and, of course, online advertising requires attention not only to the message but to the way the viewer processes that information.
Recently, I was asked to create a print ad for an outdoor furnishings company. The purpose of the ad was to drive consumers to a new website Affinity Express had designed previously. Here potential customers would get inspiration for creating the backyard of their dreams. I knew I wanted to use the same fonts, colors and overall look and feel of the website in my design—that was a given. Having worked closely with the client, I knew they liked simple, uncluttered layouts that focus consumers in one direction with laser-like accuracy. In this case, the objective was to highlight the website URL.
My thought process was to take the point of view of the consumer. I wanted to evoke and tap into the feeling when someone realizes they need help visualizing the full potential of their backyard. Then I wanted to do what the website does: inspire the viewer. By showing an unfinished yard with the simple addition of a few products, I believed the viewer could begin to imagine the possibilities and get excited. That’s why my first thought was to use a photograph (illustrated in the ad to the right).
Designs of the Quarter: Q1 2011
April 4, 2011 2 Comments
This year’s first Designs of the Quarter are here! The categories this time around were pre-media, online ads and embroidery digitizing.
Pre-Media
I love this first design. The clean grey-on-white text, the pop of red, those luscious-looking strawberries . . . It just holds your attention and makes you want to read it.
Happy St. Patrick’s Day!
March 17, 2011 Leave a comment
Erin go Bragh and happy St. Patrick’s Day. As we enjoy some corned beef and cabbage and exchange our favorite recipes for Irish soda bread, we wanted to share some designs in the spirit of the holiday. What is the craziest green food or drink you’ve had on this occasion—green beer, green cookies, green bagels?
(And here are some designs from our embroidery digitizing, vector artwork and print advertising teams.) Read more of this post
10 Tips for Newspapers Who Outsource Ad Production
February 23, 2011 3 Comments
The outsourcing of print ad production, interactive services and editorial services is increasingly common among North American newspapers. The benefits have been proven over time and many publishers have achieved significant savings they have channeled into new product and content development.
When asked about a cost-effective way to create and deliver content, Journal Register Company CEO John Paton answered: “It’s a two-part strategy. The first is outsourcing . . . why is outsourcing a $4 billion a year industry? Because outsourcers can do their jobs better than we do. . . . in fact, 66 percent of our cost structure is devoted to things we don’t want to do. Only one-third is content creation.”
If your newspaper is considering outsourcing any of these functions, here are ten tips specific to ad production (but which apply to a variety of services) that can make your transition smoother and allow you to see results more quickly. Read more of this post
Agencies, Call in the Surgeon
February 17, 2011 Leave a comment
Agencies have completely lost their way. I don’t think time needs to be spent debating that point. What I haven’t seen yet is a cohesive plan to restore the true agency business model.
Let’s take a look at history. Ad agencies were started by newspaper executives, who realized that by “priming the pump” and delivering better ad creative, publishers would ultimately sell more ad inventory.
At their peak, agencies were hired for their ability to create big ideas—business-building ideas. I’m not saying you don’t need execution, process, traffic, operations and the rest. But I am saying I’ve never met a client who wants to give an agency a substantial account because of any of these things.
Agencies win on million dollar ideas (I do realize there are specialized agencies that focus on SEO, SEM, etc., but I’m talking about the truly big agencies here). You can’t pitch a Fortune 50 account and say “I have great process, I compensate my people correctly, my production is pristine” and so on. You have to go to them and say “I won client XYZ and they were floundering. With our help, they advanced from #6 in the category to #2, and are seriously competing to be #1″ (or something similar). Everything else you might say is a rabbit hole. You can spend all the time you want in it, but you won’t significantly advance your business.
How do you get to this point? Read more of this post
100th Blog Post
February 4, 2011 4 Comments
We started this blog back in May somewhat tentatively, wondering what we would ever write about. Turns out we are much more voluble than we thought: this is the 100th post on the blog!
Thank you all who have been reading. If you are a regular reader, or if you just dropped in today, do comment and tell us why you come here. Or just say hi. We want to know you better.
And here are some of the posts I like best on this blog. Have you read them yet? Read more of this post
Designs of the Year: 2010
December 28, 2010 3 Comments
We asked our designers to submit their best work this year and awarded the winning entries. Let me tell you, the judges did not have an easy job!
Embroidery Digitizing
4 Tips on Typography in Ad Design
December 20, 2010 6 Comments
I work with ads all the time, and want to highlight an aspect of good ad design that is sometimes overlooked. Apart from the copy and the image, the type also dictates the personality, tone and overall effectiveness of the design. Here are a few simple tips to get started.
Selecting the Font
With literally thousands of fonts to choose from, how do you know which one is best? Read more of this post
Like this:
3 Reasons Why Display Ads Are Catching Up
December 13, 2010 2 Comments
eMarketer says display ads are growing faster than search ads. While search ads are often extolled by marketers because they are targeted specifically to users who are searching for information about those product/service, the rapid growth in display ads makes sense to me. Here’s why:
Display ads are vastly more customizable.
Search ads offer you so little space for your message, no way to design your ad to stand out from others (and remember I wrote about how important design is for advertising). You can use rich media or videos. eMarketer’s article mentions that video ads are predicted to grow at least 34% every year through 2014, driving the growth in display ads. Read more of this post
Summing Up 2010
December 1, 2010 Leave a comment
As we enter the last month of 2010, I have been thinking about what we have achieved this year and how we can do better next year. 2010 was particularly good for Affinity Express. I’d like to share with you some of what we have accomplished.
- We celebrated our ten-year anniversary. We have grown from a 125-person embroidery digitizing company to an 800-person advertising and marketing production company. This year, we celebrated our success, but also set our sights on what we want to achieve next.
- We added several of the largest clients in our history in the category of multi-media publishers and on-boarded them in record time. Read more of this post
Print Ad Samples: Food
November 29, 2010 2 Comments
Have you recovered from your Thanksgiving feast yet?
Carrying on the food theme, let me share with you more print ads from our team.
Working with Newspapers: A Success Story
November 17, 2010 Leave a comment
Back in 2007, when the publisher of a daily newspaper owned by a large publishing company considered outsourcing ad production, the idea was greeted with surprise.
At the time, much of the newspaper industry was talking about and testing outsourcing. The publisher sent an employee to another newspaper’s office to learn about their outsourcing project–and that other newspaper was (and still is) an Affinity Express client.
The employee recognized the benefits of outsourcing and recommended moving forward with Affinity Express. So the newspaper became the first property from that publishing company to move forward with outsourced ad production.
Outsourcing gave the client an opportunity to eliminate unproductive staff. They were amazed at how much more efficient they became. The client went live with outsourced production in late November 2008 and, after several weeks of long hours working on the transition, Affinity Express was performing well by the first week of 2009. Read more of this post
Sample Designs: Online Ads
November 2, 2010 1 Comment
What is this man looking up at? Click on the image to find out.
Why You Should Outsource Production of Your Marketing Materials and Ads
October 20, 2010 3 Comments
I have written earlier on reasons for outsourcing the creation of vector artwork. This time, I’m tackling a different animal: the production of ads and marketing materials.
I work closely with clients and partners in the promotional products industry, so this post is largely geared to their situation, and things might be somewhat different in other industries. But for promotional product suppliers, distributors and decorators, the reasons for outsourcing may never have been this compelling. Read more of this post
Marketing ROI: The Least Advised (but Most Obvious) Factor
October 7, 2010 2 Comments
Here is a challenge. Search Google for articles giving advice on how to improve return on investment (ROI) for your marketing programs–use Google Instant of course! Not surprisingly, hundreds of articles can be readily found. Now list out the core recommendations of the first 20 articles you find. Or, just take my word for it. I get the following basic themes:
- Target better–quite obviously, if you get the most relevant message to the most relevant seeker, you will get better results.
- Track better–-also obvious, if you understand what does well and what does not, stop what doesn’t work in favor of what does, you will do better.
- Provide relevant messages and promote better–-self-explanatory.
- Plan better–-touted by many consultant types who love to insist your marketing is really doomed from the start by faulty planning. Read more of this post
Designs of the Quarter: Email Design, Image Editing and Menu Design
September 15, 2010 8 Comments
Designs of the Quarter is a regular contest that celebrates the best work within our company in various categories of products. Last quarter’s categories were HTML emails, image editing, and menus. Take a look at the winning designs.
