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Have you considered what strategy and messaging could do in your brand design? In this episode of So, Here’s the Thing, Amanda Shuman joins us to chat about how you could marry these concepts to create a brand that works for you.

Amanda is an award-winning designer and Founder of Carrylove Designs. They help take clients’ brands to the next level.

Meet Amanda (1:20)

What’s in a Brand? (5:27)

Questions to Ask Yourself During the Branding Process: (8:51)
Who do you want to be working with?
What makes your business different?
What is your signature experience?

Marrying Brand Strategy & Brand Design (16:34)

Pitfalls in Website, Copy, or Branding (17:59)

Unpopular Opinion (21:33)

Links
@carrylovedesigns
Carrylovedesigns.com
Carrylovedesigns.com/brand

Review the transcript for this episode below>>

Laylee Emadi 0:05
Welcome to so here’s the thing where we share candid conversations that lift the veil on what it takes to find success, even if that means sharing a few unpopular opinions. I’m your host Laylee, grab some coffee or cocktail. And let’s get real. Hello friends welcome back to the show, I am so excited to finally have made this interview happen, Amanda and I have had to reschedule a couple of times. We had that crazy apocalyptic ice freeze here in Texas because she’s in Austin, and I’m in Dallas. So anyway, all that to say I’m so excited to bring Amanda’s message over to you guys. Amanda is an award winning website designer and brand strategist, and she is the founder of Carrie love designs. So I’m really excited to talk to her all about branding and what that actually means and what an actual brand strategy entails. And you guys know that we’ve talked about this several times on the podcast already, I will probably talk about it a lot more. Because I just really think that it can make or break a company and an entrepreneurs business. So without further ado, I’m going to kick it over to Amanda. Amanda, tell us about yourself. Like how you got started how this has become such an important topic for you.

Amanda 1:20
Oh, thank you so much for having me. Okay, so Okay, where do I start? I originally did go to college, because I watched 13 going on 30. And I wanted to work for a magazine and do layout spreads. And then I had to take a class over creating a brand. So what we did was take old company like a company that was existing, and we didn’t think their branding was very good. In over 12 weeks, we had to rebrand them. I absolutely fell in love with the process. And this is funny, this is back probably in like 2012 or so. And so I posted some of these mock ups to Twitter, in the brand actually reached out to me and wanted to like talk about this further. And I was still in college. So I thought that was super cool. It did end up working out I think the business is non existent now probably because of their brand. But that’s how I that’s how I originally got into into this And over the years, I’ve just noticed that there’s so much that goes into branding that even a lot of designers overlook, they just immediately jump into designing a brand because you know, that’s what we get taught in college a visual brand like logos. But there’s so much more that goes into a brand that starts even before a visual design. Like, honestly, in my opinion, I think your logo is like one of the least important things of your brand. And people put so much focus on it.

Laylee Emadi 2:51
Yeah, I love that. Thanks for sharing that too. I also love like the little 13 going on 30 anecdote because I can relate for he loved that movie, who didn’t want to work for poise magazine when we watch that. But anyway, I’m so excited to dive into this because I totally agree. And I’ve talked about this here on the show a few times about how how much pressure people put on the perfect logo. And really, I mean, now in my business, I don’t even I don’t know, the last time I actually use actually my logo is really just like a clean font at this point. Like it’s just my name. So, you know, a lot has evolved. But I remember when I first started my business, I was so conflicted. I was like, there has to be the perfect like, you know, descriptive image that goes along with my, with my name and there needs to be like beautiful hand khaligraph like, you know, letters that like tie everything together in a really pretty bow. I actually think my first logo had my letters create an actual bow. I didn’t want to talk about it. I don’t know why I brought that up. Don’t Google it, you guys. Um, but anyway, okay, Amanda, tell us like when people come to you, and they’re like, Hey, I really want a really awesome logo like one What do you say to them? Like, how do you how do you clear up and reset people’s mind frame around the whole logo brand confusion

Amanda 4:13
This kind of this is kind of funny. Because within our own branding and our own, you know, brand message for carry love designs. I talked about this so much like on social media and you know, Podcast Series wherever I go that the people that come to us know that your brand is so much more than a logo. So fortunately for me, we don’t get a lot of people that are looking for that because I’ve kind of taught them before they’ve come to me and that’s part of your brand strategy and your brand messaging how I positioned myself. And so it’s kind of ironic, I guess you could say that people, they don’t come and ask for that because of the education that we’ve done up front which you know, other people can do in their brand. If you want to attract a certain type of client then you can If you can persuade them that way, you can educate them that way. So that way, you’re getting more of an ideal client whenever they come to book a consultation with you.

Laylee Emadi 5:10
Yeah, absolutely. I feel like I would love to hear more about like, okay, so the people who come in kind of know that the brand is so much more than logo. So what is it? Like if you had to kind of condense everything down and be like, this is what a brand truly is? What does that mean to you?

Amanda 5:27
So we actually separate our process out into four different phases. So the first thing that we work on with our clients is brand strategy and brand messaging. So what does that look like in terms of your competitors? How can we stand out and be different? What makes working with you unique, like, what are your differentiators? Who do you want to be working with, you know, who’s the best fit for your services, then phase two, that’s whenever we get into the actual design of the brand. So I like to say that that brand, strategy and brand messaging really is the foundational piece to your brand. Everything that we do from here on out, we are leaning on that brand strategy and brand messaging, because at the end of the day, you want everything to be super cohesive, I like to explain it as a puzzle. So you have a 500 bucks at puzzle, your logo is one piece to that your your brand message is another piece to that your website is another piece, they all have to collectively come and fit together to create that 500 piece puzzle. You can’t take you know, a puzzle piece from this puzzle and a puzzle piece from another puzzle and try to fit them all together. But that’s what a lot of people try to do. And especially whenever they try to work with, okay, I need a I need a business coach, I need a copywriter, I need a website designer, I need somebody to work on SEO, you get a puzzle piece from here a puzzle piece from their puzzle piece from everywhere. And nobody’s on the same page. Nobody has all the all the other pieces to the puzzle. They’re only working on their specific piece. And so what we try to do, and the reason why I created the signature experience in our agency is because I make sure that we’re there from beginning to end, our team collectively has all the pieces to your puzzle. So that way, at the end of the day, whenever we go to launch your brand, and you have all the all the pieces, that’s why our clients are so successful is because they’re not just working on a logo or the copy or one singular piece that you may give you an initial pop. But it’s not going to be something that that builds your business and your income long term.

Laylee Emadi 7:48
I love the idea of making sure that you have all those puzzle pieces coming from the same place. Because I do think that I saw a really big shift in my business when I stopped trying to piece things together on my own. And I brought in an expert who could really create a full coverage kind of viewpoint and a full coverage service to really like make sure that everything was in alignment with each other. And I think since then, just having like that really clear cut pathway for our team as we grew, and our business as it grew was so helpful. So I love that you brought that up. So for our listeners who are tuning in and who are like, okay, that’s all well and good like to, you know, like have it all together, but I’m not quite there yet, or I’m not sure. I don’t even know what my brand messaging is like, what some firt What are like the first few steps that somebody can take when they’re trying to like, decide on what which way to go, making sure that everything is really cohesive and really comprehensive.

Amanda 8:51
Yeah, so there’s a couple of different questions that I asked people to kind of figure out before they get started with us. So the first one is, who do you Who do you want to be working with? Like, what fires you up? What type of if you are a wedding photographer, like what type of weddings what type of clients because we all like we love all of our clients. But there there are some favorites like that just light us up more creatively. And so that’s one of the first questions now what what makes your business different? Why would somebody choose to work with you over somebody else that can’t be taken away? So whenever it comes to the end of the day, if you are once again a wedding photographer, so Mike can have the same editing style, the same pricing, a similar portfolio, why would somebody choose to work with you over Sally down the street? What’s that differentiating factor? We like to kind of have you don’t have to know everything up front but to have some sort of basis to start off with you know as good. And the final the final piece is your packaging your your process having what I call We call it our signature experience, what is your signature experience? I cannot tell you how many times people have come to us. And they’re like, okay, for my packaging and pricing, I have package, one, two, and three. And within that they have the gold, silver and bronze. I’m like, So overall, you’re telling me that there’s nine different choices for people to make. And like, whenever you you niche down, we only offer the signature experience, that’s the only thing that we offer. Whenever you niche down and you have that that signature experience of your own. You can talk about it more clearly on social media, you can also get better results for people or better experiences because you’re melding that one process, you’re refining it over and over, until it makes an easier decision. For for the prospect. What’s it’s like a 10 tab rule that most people whenever they’re searching for four people, they have 10 other tabs up, but people that are in the same similar business. So if you can make that decision a lot easier, and then be like, Okay, well, you know, Sally has a, b and c and bronze and gold and I need to leave which one’s best for me. And they end up talking themselves out of it or talking themselves to a lower level for our clients is like, hey, do you want the signature experience or not? Like it’s either for you or it’s, it’s not? It makes it an easier buying decision for them?

Laylee Emadi 11:26
Oh, my gosh, that concept is gold. I totally agree with it. I think that there’s very few things that can hinder you from booking your, your clients, more than confusing them. Like that is just one of the I feel one of the biggest mistakes that somebody can make is just like making people really work to figure out how they want to work with you.

Amanda 11:49
And we’ve actually we’ve had clients that have so one of our one of our clients beforehand, whenever they started working with us, they offered a photo. And then they had different packages within their photo, they offer video, they had different packages within their video, and then they had a photo and video combo together. That’s Carhart photography, if you’d like to look them up. So whenever we spoke about, you know, what does the process look like, you know, who do you want to be working with? And they told us it’s a husband and wife team, Kayla and David, they told us they’re like, Hey, we want to be working with photo and video together, like the people that book us together. You know, we know that we’re a great team. You know, David does the video, I do the photography. We’re a great team. So we want to be booking that. And so whenever we relaunched I was like, push that out, like you only do photo and video, if somebody wants only photo or somebody wants only video, they’ll ask you. And since launching, this is some of the results that they have gotten back, but now that they get people that book, photo and video more often, that whenever people come to them, they already know that they want to work with them, because their brand like message in their in their website does a good job at telling about it. And she told me that one time that a couple raised their budget by 40 $500, just to book them. Like that’s some of the great things that you can do, just by having a great brand message in and only selling one thing, your book your people that really want to work with you. That’s amazing.

Laylee Emadi 13:29
I know we talked a little bit about how to start finding that brand messaging and how to start thinking through like what fires you up and those awesome questions that you posed for our audience. So let’s say they have kind of thought through that they know what they want. What are some things that they can start implementing into their website or their brand strategy? Now while they’re like bridging the gap between maybe doing like a full overhaul or if they’ve already recently done a full overhaul like, Are there things they should be looking out for in terms of like implementation of that amazing brand messaging?

Amanda 14:03
Yeah. So I always tell like prospective clients on the phone that if they want really good results, that the people that get the best results after working with us are the ones that continually say their brand message, they are continually talking about it on like Instagram stories, Instagram posts, like if you go to Carhartt photography, you’re going to see them continually talking about this brand message and this in their brand strategy. I think a lot of people have this idea that okay, I invested in my brand now like build it and they will come in. That’s not really the case, like build it and you will have all the necessary pieces and it will make it easier for them to come. But the brand doesn’t do all the work for you like you have to continue. So for those clients, I would say like find that brand message, make it super clear what it is like, I think a lot of people they just have a lot of like, Oh, I think this or I believe this or I want my clients do this It’s not clear, it’s not concise. Whenever you are doing it correctly, what you will notice is on social media and whenever other people are tagging you, like say they’re like, Oh, well, yeah, I need a Does anybody know a wedding photographer, you will notice people tagging you. And they will be saying exactly what you want them to say. So for an example, for our own business, we focus more on strategy than we do design. Like we’re strategy first, design second. And I will see people tagging us on posts and all that you have to work with Kerry love designs, like they are strategy based. They know their stuff like that, if you are looking for somebody to grow your income, go to Carolyn designs, because it’s strategy over design. And I’m like, you don’t know this. But I taught you to say that. And now you’re telling other people exactly what my own brand message is. It’s like the coolest thing.

Laylee Emadi 15:53
I love that you’re just like implanting copy into people’s brains and like seeing it actually take root. That’s amazing. I Oh, that makes me so happy. I love that idea. So okay, so what are a few other things that people maybe have missteps on when they’re thinking through that strategy versus design? Because I do I love that you mentioned that you guys are more strategy first, design second, and I think most people who are just, you know, creative entrepreneurs, they come in, and they’re like, I want something beautiful. I want something that feels like me, I want that. And they’re they’re thinking visual, they’re thinking aesthetics, they’re not necessarily thinking strategy right off the bat.

Amanda 16:34
Yeah, I think if you the biggest piece of the puzzle, or the biggest part to this is going to be your website. So if you can’t hire somebody to do something like everything and do like an entire overhaul or rebrand, I think the best place to start is with your website and in copy for a couple of different reasons. The copywriter, they know what questions to ask to kind of get you started, they’ll ask kind of those primer questions similar to ones that we talked about a little bit earlier. In your, your website, this is a, I could create a whole nother episode about this. But your website really is your biggest marketing piece. Like it isn’t marketing for you, whenever you’re sleeping, the best feeling is whenever you wake up, and you have leads, like literally sitting in your inbox, wanting to work with you because your website was doing the work. And so a lot of that has to do with I know as visuals, we think it’s all about the photos and picking out the best images. But that’s going to be your copy. Because within your copy, you have to write that brand message you have to tell people why they should work with you rather than other people. So that would be the first place that I would start.

Laylee Emadi 17:43
That’s so great. And what are some common pitfalls that you see people taking on when they’re working through? Like their their website? Or their copy? Or their brand messaging? Like, do you do you feel like you see a common theme in places that people stumble?

Amanda 17:59
Yeah. Wanting to be like their competition, like wanting to be exactly like their competition. I have people that literally Okay, so one of our own, like brand messaging, like who we want to work with, are people who want to stand out. Like, if you asked me my biggest accomplishment, it would be that our portfolio is so diverse that nobody’s branding website looks similar to anybody else’s. And I’ll get people out saying that on the call. They’re like, yeah, we want to do something different. We want to stand out. And then whenever we present the brand to them, they’re like, well, it doesn’t look like such and I’m like, yeah, it doesn’t. Because they start, they start second guessing themselves. You know, by nature, we don’t want to stand out, you know, we want to blend in. But in business, you want the exact opposite. And so that’s definitely a common pitfall is that they look at the competition, and especially people who are new or just starting out. They’re like, Oh, she, she’s killing it. They’re doing so good. Like I want I want to recreate that success. And so they literally start trying to recreate that brand in that business instead of harnessing what makes them different, and trying to meld their own path. And so don’t look at the competition, you want to do the exact opposite, because that’s what’s going to make you stand out and people want to book you for you. Okay, I’m

Laylee Emadi 19:19
so glad that you brought that up. Because I just think that that is something that is so difficult for us to all do is we always hear about comparison, we always hear about like, you know, stay in your lane, keep your blinders on, but it is so hard. Those are like some of the easiest words that we can speak but some of the most difficult things to actually put into action is really leaning into having like a different unique look. And I i think that that’s such a testament to working with professional designers is that they will the good designers in my opinion, will push back if you’re like I want it to look like so and so or I really think that this person is really successful what they’re doing. So I feel like it’s should look more similar. And I have had like, my, my own personal designer has been like, Nope, that’s not you, we’re gonna make this completely unique to your offerings to your genius. Like, let’s lean into that. And, and I love that I do you have to do that a lot?

Amanda 20:14
Yes. And it’s so funny because starting out, this was a conversation I’ve had with my husband so many times because I’d be I would, you know, I would, of course events him and I’d be like, no, this person should, you know, I’m, I feel really strongly about this, like this person is saying that they want this and I’m like, I really don’t want this for them, I think that they should, you know, go this direction. And for a long time, I didn’t want to, I mean, I run a business, I didn’t want to step on people’s toes in, in, you know, give them like, you know, quote, unquote, like negative feedback. But my husband was like, in the background, you know, you’re, you’re the expert, they hire you for a reason that if they are the right type of client that they should, you know, respect and trust your opinion. And so I’ve gotten better about it over, you know, the past year or two. But that’s definitely, I think a lot of designers they want to there’s an internal conflict where you want to hold back and not step on people’s toes. But inside, you’re like dying. I think so many

Laylee Emadi 21:12
of us can relate just in terms of like, whenever we do get hired as experts in whatever field we’re in, it is hard to do that push back. So if you guys are listening, and you hire a designer, let them do their job, people. I love that. Okay, so as we wrap up this episode, of course, you know, I have to ask you, what’s your unpopular opinion on brand strategy, brand messaging and brand design?

Amanda 21:34
Okay, so I have so my unpopular opinion has already been said about like, your, your logo is, you know, I think quite honestly, the least important part of your brand. So I’ll give you an additional one. Another one that is outside of brand strategy and brand design is I don’t like the term self made millionaire. Whenever people say that it like it, it makes me you know, cringe because I’m like, there’s so many people that helped you to get to where you are, you know, all the way from like your your parents or whoever raised you, to your team to mentors, that there’s no self made millionaires, you know, a lot of people helped you to get where you are. So that’s an additional one. Love it.

Laylee Emadi 22:19
Oh, my goodness, yes. I think a lot of that actually is kind of, I love that you brought that up as an unpopular opinion, because I’ve heard both sides of the coin on that one. And people get super passionate about their opinion on self made versus non self made. So that’s awesome. I actually really want to hear y’all if you’re listening, I want you to like post on Instagram and tell me what you think about that. Please tag me and Amanda because I want to know, like chime in on this one. Because every time this comes up in a conversation people, people have something to say,

Amanda 22:51
Oh yeah, this is one of those like you either agree or disagree. Okay, so where are you at on this? You agree or honestly, okay, I

Laylee Emadi 22:58
don’t know if it’s hosting the show or what but like, I think hearing so many people’s perspectives on things like this has made me such a middle ground kind of person. No, no, I’m really not but in this in this I think in this topic. I’m like, No, I mean, you really didn’t get there by yourself like I guess if it was me I would never say that because I have a team and I’m like we’re not anywhere nowhere near a million dollars but the day we hit a million I would never be like I’m a self made millionaire because I have a team of people literally holding my hands like I

Amanda 23:29
also like if you are a mother or a wife and you have like your husband who’s been there supporting you the whole time and like you know making sure that other stuff around the house gets done like even little things like that or like your parents how they raised you with your mindset that self made millionaire is a crock

Laylee Emadi 23:51
I love it. Oh my gosh, I’m cracking up over here because I can like see I could see the fire of love that want to hear what everyone else thinks too. But anyway, I really appreciate all of your time and all of your expertise and I would love for you to share with all of our listeners where they can find you.

Amanda 24:06
Yeah so you can find me at Carry Love Designs. Instagram is my main place to be but I do have so everybody like wants to know what are all these pieces to you know the brand like you have your brand messaging your brand that like what are I need all the PII like what pieces do I need? You can go to carry love designs.com slash brand. And I have a map to kind of help you put together all of the pieces and of course it’s Carrie love designs.com where you can find me but slash brand is where you can get that freebie.

Laylee Emadi 24:39
That is awesome. And if you’re driving or something you can’t remember it. Don’t worry, we will hook it up in the show notes. So you can click over directly from wherever you’re at and and get over to Amanda’s website.

Amanda 24:48
Thank you so much. This was awesome. I can’t wait to see what people implement with all of your awesome advice. Yes, thank you so much and be sure to tag me I want to hear all about it like drop into the DMs, any questions that you have an open book. So thank you for having me.

Laylee Emadi 25:04
Thank you For show notes and resources mentioned on today’s episode head to soheresthethingpodcast.com and if you’re enjoying the podcast, I’d love to read your review on iTunes. Thanks so much for listening and I’ll catch you in the next episode.