“What do you mean you don’t create websites, you’re a designer right? Don’t you all do the same thing?”  I hear this all the time when I have to explain to someone that I don’t create websites but exclusively focus on creating marketing materials. What a lot of people don’t realize is that ‘graphic design’ is a vast community with a lot of different specialties

Graphic Design as a whole is the act of strategically using pictures, art, and words to communicate in a visual way with a specific audience.  What is being created and for whom can differ based on specialty.

I thought I’d sit down and discuss a few of them with you!

Brand and Logo Design

Sometimes called Visual Identity design. These are specialists and strategists who create the visual identity of a company by translating the company’s values, position in their market, emotions, and other intangibles into a cohesive visual look. These are the people that help a company become a brand by creating their logo, choosing font styles, color palettes, and more. They also create a guideline for how these visuals should be used.

Marketing and Advertising Design

This is what I do. This what people think of and where the roots of Graphic Design are. It’s traditionally been print centric, but that is changing a bit to include more designs for online spaces like social media. These designers create the visual components of an advertising or marketing campaign that allow a company or brand to sell their goods and services to their ideal customers.

Website and App Design

This sometimes falls under the umbrella of User Interface design, which covers how a person known as a user interacts with all parts of a digital experience including tangible items like keyboards and smartphones. These designers focus on creating websites and/or mobile applications. They sometimes work with a partner who understands computer languages and can create or program the mechanics behind the scenes that make the website or app work.

Packaging Design

These designers are the ones who create the bags, bottles, boxes, and other packaging that all of our products come in. These designs are part of a brand’s overall story as their goal is to get the consumer to have a certain image of the company as well as to pick up and buy the product. This is a very print-centric form of design as the items are almost always for tangible good. These specialists frequently have knowledge of marketing, sales, industrial design (how things are made), and brand creation.

Environmental Design

These are the designers who focus on a customer’s physical experience with a brand and create large format designs such as signage, wall murals, car wraps and sometimes even create places of business. They sometimes consult with interior designers (which is a totally different type of design) and architects to complete their jobs.

Publishing Design

This is one of the oldest design disciplines and has roots in the creation of the printing press. These designers typically create book covers, user manuals, magazines, and other published items. They frequently have knowledge in not just design, but also printing and binding techniques.

Now you know about some of the specialties in graphic design! When you’re looking to create your next project, take look at what type of design you might need, and find the right specialist for the job!

If you’re ready to invest in your marketing materials and give them new look, I can help you! What I do is help small businesses create marketing materials that help them get leads and grow their business either through my done for you design service or my design consulting service. Either way, your designs not only look better, but they also communicate better and you’ll be on your way to selling more and stressing less. Curious how I can help you?  I’d love to invite you to a FREE 1:1 Branding and Design Strategy Session. Email me today and let’s chat about how design can get your business where you want it to be and see if working together makes sense!