When it comes to search engine optimisation and content marketing, graphic design is perhaps one of the most important elements to consider. As the world moves towards a more ‘visual’ approach to its content – signified by companies like Facebook, Pinterest, YouTube and, of course, Instagram – graphic design is beginning to play a much more meaningful part in various content marketing strategies.

In an industry once dominated by office computers, design has become increasingly important for consumers who purchase devices for use during leisure time and sport them like fashion accessories, says Steve Kaneko, one of Microsoft’s long running designers. This is made all the more evident by the new realm of ‘apps’ for tablets and smart phones, which are becoming more and more visual, and by the fact that large corporations like Microsoft, Facebook and Google are all now placing a strong focus on visual content and graphic design.

As users and consumers begin to break away from the old world of computers and focus more on portable, computerised devices, graphic design and web design are both starting to step up their level of expertise to meet consumer expectations.

There’s a simplicity and yet a sense of embellishment with the graphic design of the future with designs required to be viewed on a variety of platforms like computers, smart phones, tablets and televisions. Mobile versions of particular websites and web viewing on TVs are both becoming more popular, calling for a wider range of graphic design needs.

“Users continue to spend more time on tablets and smartphones, leaving behind the archaic desktop navigation paradigms of the early 2000s,” says Chuck Longanecker of Mashable. “This shift has led to a new crop of slick web designs that feature more complex interactions and visual effects, thanks to technologies such as HTML5 and CSS3. For example, we’re seeing more interactive buttons, sliding and fading visual elements, parallax experiences on scrolling sites, and even elements of augmented reality.” 

In this visual realm, animations are also becoming hugely important. While images, graphs and charts remain as valuable as ever, moving graphics, animations and ‘special effects’ are growing in demand. Just think of the fluidity of the iPhone, for instance, and it becomes evident that users are no longer interested in simple, static web experiences.

Infographics are paving the way for future graphic design, too, and are now trending as a strong content marketing strategy, especially since they offer a visual way of delivering important information. A point can be made, a history can be given or a story can be told easily and visually for the user, without forcing them to have to read through an entire page of text (which, of course, they probably wouldn’t do). 

Simplicity is also becoming an attractive factor moving forward. Basic, single-page images are being used to get focused messages across to the user and are eclipsing the old days of flourishing, fancy designs and complex layouts. The future of effective graphic design is all about minimalism, about presenting things clearly and succinctly, without having to ask the user to get involved in complicated navigation and ‘information’ hunting. It’s a stark yet incredible change to online user experiences and one that is especially reliant on good, graphic design. And companies with great, graphic design that meets users’ needs in a simplistic, engaging and intuitive way are likely to stand out in today’s competitive online market and be rewarded with years of growth.

If you haven’t looked at your home page or your landing page recently, perhaps it’s time re-examine how effective your graphic design is.

When it comes to websites, one of the golden rules – and one that some designers often fail to remember – is that less is more. With the struggle for business owners to keep up with social media techniques and get on top of SEO, can you really afford to have a landing page that’s sloppy in design?

A good website graphic designer will always do their best to make your site look fabulous, but a great website graphic designer will actually focus more on creating a simple and easy user experience, rather than on adding a wealth of elaborate designs to your landing page. These might look great, but they won’t reward you with conversions.

So what’s the secret?

To have the most effective landing page possible, you need to consider everything from the viewpoint of your users. A fancy design might matter to you, but to users, it’s rarely noticed.

Instead, create and design landing pages (and websites as a whole) that offer one thing: clarity. Users aren’t looking for a visual wonderland when they sift through websites. They don’t want to encounter a barrage of boxes, colours and fonts all demanding their attention. What’s more, a user will easily get lost in a site like this – they don’t know where to click, what’s important or where to find the information they want.

Rather, visitors to your website simply want one thing: an answer. Can this website and company provide me with the service that I want?  

If it’s not clear what your business is, what it does or where it’s located, users will most likely click away from it and move on to one of your competitors. A customer shouldn’t have to spend mountains of time trawling through your website to try and figure out the answer to their question. If it’s not in front of them, you’ll lose a conversion – and therefore a chance to make money.

In terms of graphic design, a messy website (even if its messy with lots of pretty designs) is not a website that promotes clarity. So what are some of the things you should steer away from?

•  Intense Colour Schemes Creating a landing page with bright background colours or intense colour schemes can throw your user off. A savvy graphic designer will use only web safe colours and a colour theme that matches with your service or product.

•  Bad Font Choices & Font Sizes Like colours, web standard fonts are key in contributing to the clarity of your page. If your font is hard to read or too big or small, users won’t bother with your site. Similarly, using more than one or two fonts is often a big graphic design no-no. And using animated fonts or flashy font designs is practically website suicide.

•  Lack of Structure & Organisation Does your page design organise information clearly and logically? Or have you got stuff floating all over the place? A user’s eye is naturally drawn to the top left-hand corner of your page. If your key information is elsewhere, you’ll need to rethink your design.

•  Animations, Images & Other Decorations – unless you’re an animation company, animations and other decorations often distract users from your purpose, so stay away from these. Simple and minimal images are great, but ensure that they contribute to the user experience rather than exist to make your site look pretty.

From social media to great brand design to YouTube, you can market your business in a variety of fun ways that will still work to increase your traffic.

Learn to Love Social Media
The marketing world of today is defined by social media: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Orkut and more. And if you’re not marketing your business in the social sphere, you’re missing out  on a major opportunity to  promote your brand and drive traffic to your site. Don’t forget about Google+ too, since it’s driving top rankings on Google at the moment. To engage users, include useful articles, photos, images, videos, podcasts, user polls and links on your social media sites, which will all help increase awareness of your brand identity.

Branding Blitz
Behind every strong marketing campaign is also a strong brand. Your brand identity is an important part of your marketing – it’s the face of your company and it represents your underlying values. If you’ve got a range of products or services, you can also get creative with your brand design: hire a graphic designer to help design your website, social media pages, your blogs and even your emails. Brand everything! The key is to get users familiar with your brand, so they’re more likely to remember it.

Encourage Rave Reviews
While it’s great to have client testimonials on your website, reviews about your business and service can develop much more credence on forums and social media sites. Share your feedback on your blog and on Facebook, Twitter and Google+ or encourage your clients to leave feedback directly on your social media pages. If you’re super keen, consider using a public feedback forum like ‘UserVoice,’ ‘Womo’ or ‘Get Satisfaction’ which can help boost your traffic and sales too.

‘You’ on YouTube  
Another great way to promote your business is via YouTube. YouTube is the home of all things video and millions of people worldwide visit this site every day. Just imagine how many could be watching your video! Consider putting together a short clip that showcases your business or a particular service or product that you offer. It might be as easy as a TV-styled interview or a review or perhaps just a simple animation of your services.

Paying For Fun
Paid advertisements on sites like Google, Yahoo, YouTube and Facebook are also an excellent way of showcasing your business – but why not make the ads fun? You can give away a freebie or turn your ad into a competition or even use your ad to donate to a chosen charity. Whatever your ad is, make sure there’s some value in it for the user! And make sure your ad includes your logo and brand design, too. 

Paint Your Porsche
Okay, so you might not own a Porsche. But whatever car you drive, consider using it as part of your marketing. Why not brand your car with your logo or brand design? (Again, get your graphic designer to help with this). A car will help promote your brand ‘on the street’ and most of all, it’ll help get the word out about your business without having to rely solely on online strategies. Remember to include your website and contact details with your logo too – and perhaps a tag line explaining what your business does.

If you could describe in three words what your business is about, what would you say? What’s your company mission and what are your core values? And most importantly – can we see all of this in your BRAND?

What is a Brand?
Developing a brand for your company is one of the fundamental secrets of success for any new business and yet it’s something that new businesses often overlook or undervalue. A good brand will reflect your true values, promote your company and ultimately, drive your success.

But brand is not just about ‘logo branding.’ It’s everything associated with your image, from the principal foundations of your company to the philosophies that drive you and the colours and fonts you choose to use.

Start with the Heart
The key to great branding is knowing what’s in your heart – and having clear and succinct ideas about your company beliefs. What are the main values that hold up your company? What do you want to accomplish?

If you’re coming up with answers like “make money” or “sell something” then you’re not digging deep enough. While “making money” is obviously the goal of all businesses, it’s not what they’re really about!

Case in Point
Let’s take the company Crayola, for instance. Crayola’s goal is not to just “sell crayons.” Their mission is to bring out the ‘colourful originality’ in children everywhere, to nurture their creativity and their dreams and turn the impossible into the possible. This goal is at the core of all of their products and their visual branding.

Your beliefs and your central mission will define how your visual identity, your logo branding and your overall branding design is developed. So, dig deeper, think bigger and figure out what lies at the heart of your business.

Sort Out Your Audience
Knowing your target market is crucial in the creation of your brand. Are you aiming your services at men, women? Adults or kids? And at what age?   

A good way to determine your audience is to imagine your ideal customer – if he/she walked into your store or engaged your services, what would he/she be like? Do they laugh and smile a lot? Or are they serious and business focused?

What qualities do they value? How do they think? And what are their goals as a customer?

Look in the Mirror
Sorting out your audience also means deciding how you want your audience to see you – and how you see yourself. What does your company “see” when it looks in the mirror?

Does your reflection show a business that is smart, sophisticated and global? Fun-loving, adventurous and determined? Child-like and carefree?

Decide what you want your branding design to say about you, both on the inside (your heart) and on the outside (your reflection, your audience).

Work with a Graphic Designer
The people who run companies know that while they might be flourishing CEOs and expert business managers, they aren’t necessarily great designers. Instead, they have huge teams of marketers, graphic designers and artists who help bring their beliefs to life – and you should too.

A good graphic designer is not just about making something look good! They will want to dig deep into the heart of your company and understand what you believe in – and how you want to be seen. A graphic designer can work with you to help decide on your overall approach to your logo branding and branding design. If you’ve got some ideas already, that’s great, but a designer can help you refine these into something appealing and eye-catching that will stand out in the visual, online world.

How many logos do you recognise in a fleeting glance? Could you draw the Commonwealth Bank logo from memory? How about the Apple or Nike logo? Chances are you easily could. These companies have their branding elements successfully working together in the competitive world of product saturation.

Perception power
If you were looking to buy the latest iphone, would you consider a similar product which is $100 cheaper? Probably not. What if it was $200 cheaper, which brand would you choose? Probably still the iphone. What about $400 cheaper? Would you consider purchasing the lesser known brand even though it has all the same features as the iphone? Most likely your answer would be yes. Initially you might have been content paying more for the iphone because of your perception of the product. When we are faced with a value for money decision, often we are torn between our perception of the product or service and our account balance.

Many companies like Apple have mastered the art of brand perception using ingenious marketing strategies to convince the consumer they must have a certain product or use a particular service. Hours of research and development and often an element of failure, goes into developing successful strategies.

Building trust and repeat business
Without spending copious amount of time and money on research,  one key way to build trust and receive repeat business for years to come is to keep the visual brand of your business consistent. Branding your business goes beyond your logo or trademark. It's about making sure the visual elements relating to the identity of your business remain constant across all collateral used for promotion. These may be images associated with your brand which don't look like your logo but are perhaps similar in colour. It is vital to remain consistent across your stationery, advertising, signage and even the way you talk about your business. Visual perception of your brand is as important as the service or product you offer. Without one there is no other.

If you're planning on starting a new business you will no doubt require a new logo. If you're keen to get up and running and only have a small amount of capital, then it's understandable to opt for the quickest and cheapest way to have your logo designed. Many turn to crowdsourcing. For $250 or even less, you can receive zero to infinity logo designs in your inbox from all over the world. Then take your pick and award the winner! It sounds impressive. It sounds mind boggling if you ask me, and although you may think you'll be getting great value for money, think again. Cheap may not always be better in the long run.

Not real designers
People who choose to participate in crowdsourcing are not real designers. Designs are created to please the client on a visual level, bypassing the strategic process of design and eliminating valuable team work between client and designer. Apart from email banter, there is no genuine engagement with the client and a true interpretation of the client's business is often a blur. Many designs are done offshore, which can make overcoming cultural and language barriers difficult. In fact, most of the logos are way off the mark and sorting out the good from the bad can be time wasting.

So does the client really get value for money? Is the designer who wins the contest truly passionate about their client's business? Is the client paying for designers who participate in crowdsourcing for the thrill of the challenge? It's important to find a designer who becomes a partner in your business. Crowdsourcing may provide you with lots of designs to choose from, but a real designer will provide you with one or two because they understand your business the best. The process in which a real designer goes through often involves mind-mapping, pencil sketching and most importantly, face-to-face client contact. Your designer should have all these skills and have dealt with all sorts of design jobs.

Beyond the logo
Logo design is just the start of your business journey. As your business develops you're likely to need a stationary pack, marketing collateral, a website, possibly advertising and other marketing tools that require strong graphic design to ensure your branding is consistent. Engaging with a designer who has taken the time to understand your business means they will be well placed to help you in extending your brand consistently across all future material.

Final thought
If you're anything like me, you're rarely phased by scare tactics and rely on gut instinct when it comes to deciding what's best for your business. Just remember to keep in mind what Red Adair once said: "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur."