Are you ready to rebrand? We did! (Part Two)
A Day of Personal Branding Photography
What you can expect when you hire a professional stylist, photographer, hair stylist and makeup artist.
Part one of our rebrand highlighted the Design Powers home-based office transformation that snowballed into WHENR! WHENR you ask? Read about part one here. In part two, Ev n’ Em transform into Supah Models!
The backstory…
We’d been wanting to redo our website ever since Squarespace (the website builder we use) upgraded its platform in late 2019 from version 7 to version 7.1. Our website had only been online for six months so it was much too soon to redo it. Then the worldwide pandemic took hold and rebranding was the least of our concerns.
Post vax and pre-delta variant in the summer of 2021 provided a glorious three-month window of mask-free optimism. Since we’re redoing the website why not do what we always recommend to our clients? Get custom brand photography!
For our first website, we had taken professional headshots with the talented portrait photographer Lisa Damico BUT this time we wanted to go ALL-IN for our brand photos—hire a fashion stylist, get our hair and makeup done, and do multiple shoots in the newly refreshed Design Powers office space, on location and in a professional photography studio.
It’s been a helluva year and we were ready to invest in a set of quality on-brand images that reflect who we are!
Visual brand identity strategy
Being a graphic designer, my first thoughts for rebranding immediately are “Logo, colors, type!” But then I took a deep breath and said “Hold on there Ev, don’t get ahead of yourself. Why do you really want to redo your website?” Yes, the aforementioned 7.1 issues but actually, it went deeper than that.
Emily and I have been working together since 2015 and have had the opportunity to work with many types of clients and organizations.
Through our experience, we realized that we really love working with industry leaders who have a deeply-held belief, one singular value that is more important than anything else and either want to start their own business or rebrand the successful business they started.
Once we identified our ideal client, our brand and messaging no longer represented us. We needed our visual and written content to be laser-focused to develop a strong brand identity.
The main components of visual branding include logo, color, typography, graphics, and imagery.
Okay, now let’s talk color!
Color is so important because in the sequence of visual perception the brain interprets color first.
Our previous website homepage header
The colors in our previous website were golden yellow, fuschia and vermilion red and were based on our brand value of “approachable.”
Our target market of service-based small businesses is the same but much more defined in terms of positioning and beliefs. Now that we’re talking to leaders, experts and action-takers and adding more strategic value, we desired a more sophisticated palette.
Top: Old brand colors
Bottom: New brand colors
We switched out the yellow and fuschia for a deep teal and warm coral, added bronze but kept the charcoal gray. Our primary brand color, used for over 15 years, was tweaked from vermilion red to vermilion orange. We wanted some cross-over as we didn’t want to redo all our blog graphics.
What colors look best on us?
Top: Winter palette
Bottom: Autumn palette
A couple of years ago, Emily won a color analysis from Melany Carlos of The House of Colour. Emily thought it would be fun if we did it together so I booked an appointment too.
After Melany’s extensive color analysis process we learned that Emily is a Winter and I’m an Autumn. We both bought appropriately colored lipsticks and Melany gave us each a wallet of color swatches that we could take shopping for clothes, makeup, accessories, etc.
We laid the swatches out to compare and contrast what we both looked good in and sent them to our stylist.
Hiring a fashion stylist
We’ve known Tee Wright for several years. She’s delightful and becoming an accomplished stylist. She recently went from making it a side hustle to her full-time business. I’m really impressed with her professionalism and was eager to support her.
The boots!
First, we met via Zoom and discussed our style goals and timeline. We gave her our measurements and put together a mood board guide (download the pdf) that had our colors, screenshots of fashion styles we each liked and disliked, and potential poses.
I included jackets I already owned should Tee think any of them could work. She did not. I also included a pair of boots that I had worn only once before and thought might work too. Tee said “Yes!”
Shopping w/Tee
Tee has relationships with several local stores. She can borrow the clothes and accessories or they can be purchased—we did a combination of both.
After she got three looks together for both Em and me, she came over to my house for a fitting and we tried all the clothes on (that is the first clip from the video above). Emily liked all three outfits and I liked two of the ensembles.
Later that week, Tee and I met downtown for that last look and that’s when I purchased the Tahari bronze-colored suit which fit me perfectly! How often does that happen?!
After lots of visual strategizing, both of our three outfits were complete. Tee was not only a huge help with wardrobe styling but also greatly assisted in posing and positioning for every single image the photographer shot.
The photographer, hair stylist and makeup artist
Tee, Nicole and Phrenchie in the DP office.
A nice perk with hiring Tee is she works with a team of pros. First off, photographer Phelan Marc whose work I got to know when I was involved in AWE, the networking organization I co-founded (AWE has transitioned into the Women In Business program within the Arlington Chamber of Commerce).
Phelan would occasionally photograph the DC Chapter meetings (Tee was the leader) and always managed to make us look good which isn’t easy with a group of talkative, gesticulating women business owners drinking wine and laughing after hours!
Since then, I’ve followed his work on Facebook and think he is one of DC's finest photographers. I recommended him to a client and Phelan totally rocked it. Both he and Tee have easy-going personalities—calming and reassuring.
Tee brought in Phrenchie of PHRENCHmade Hair Services and Nicole of Steele Beautiful, a make-up artist. Both Phrenchie and Nicole were good listeners, patient and did a phenomenal job.
They showed up at my house before 5 am with a smile, even though both live across the Potomac River, and then helped out in Georgetown on a 90° July day to make sure that Emily and I didn’t look like we were melting... that’s dedication!
Without them, we would’ve had to spend many more hours on post-processing. With them, we barely had to touch up in Photoshop!
It takes a village and a big clip on the back of my jeans.
Getting “the shots” is a lot of work and stretching.
Three photoshoot locations
Originally, we were only going to shoot in my office here in Arlington, VA and then go to a professional photography studio in Alexandria, VA. But the more I thought about it, the more I wanted shots of us with the Arlington skyline behind us and the Key Bridge. I also wanted shots of us in Georgetown. Fortunately, Tee, et al. were game—thank goodness.
It was hot outside and although we’d started shooting early (7:30 am), by the time we got to Gtown, it was after 11 am and getting hotter by the minute. We used the sunlight strategically but sought the shade often. Nicole and Phrenchie were on it. Dabbing, spraying and applying—whatever it took to beat back the sheen!
Despite the heat, the outdoor location lifestyle photos were some of our favorites. Not that we didn’t love the office shots too, but there is a lot of value in having a diverse suite of professional images that represent your business visually.
Last location for the day: professional photography studio in Alexandria, VA.
For our final shots, we said goodbye to Phrenchie and Nicole and headed to an air-conditioned studio. Em put on an ethereal dance playlist which set the relaxed tone.
We got some really good shots of each of us alone and together. By this time, our energies were definitely fading. It had been a long day. There is only so much smiling one can do before your face starts hurting! There also wasn’t time to break for breakfast or lunch, which we mentally prepared for, but still got hungry!
In hindsight, I wish I would have been a little bit more thorough with what I wanted to do in the studio but between conceptualizing and cleaning out my office space and house, the website, the written content, client work, etc. there were inevitable loose ends.
Is brand photography worth it?
Final Photos of the Day
It was a wonderful and productive day and totally worthwhile. Having quality professional images for your website and marketing is valuable to your business and brand.
Brand photos not only tell your story but they communicate your value and personalize your marketing which leads potential clients to take you and your services more seriously and trust you to make them look just as good and that’s important.
After the shooting day, Phelan shared his SmugMug and we had 850 photos to choose from. We got it down to twenty definites, many of which are on our new website.
The Georgetown idea was a good one, as these photos are at the top of our home page and services page. We also chose an additional fifteen images to purchase for social media marketing.
Overall, I’m incredibly pleased we did this. It was a lot of coordination, not to mention the expense. But now that our new website is live, I can really see the difference in having custom photography throughout.
Branded Photography is the Future
We’re all so inundated with imagery now that stock photography and illustration just don’t get comprehended anymore, and can feel overused. Potential clients NEED to see who you are, what you’re about, and what you believe…owning your conviction.
Check back next month for part three in our rebrand series where we’ll talk about redesigning our logo and website. We hope you're enjoying our rebranding journey and that it spurs ideas about your own online presence, what you’re putting out into the world personally and business-wise and why. We’re all works in progress.
Please leave comments or ask questions... would love your feedback!
