Branding

Digital letterheads for a paperless office

Branding, Business Administration, Templates

I know paperless offices are becoming more of a trend. To be honest, my office has always been paperless. But there are new ways of doing things now with electronic/digital publication of things like letters, invoices, contracts and any other paperwork. You might have a printed letterhead and use it sometimes but how often do you send Word docs or exported PDFs to people these days? Make sure your company still looks good when sending PDFs from Word.

A really simple way you can incorporate digital-ism is to have hyperlinked company logos in all documents pointing back to the website. If you chose to have the whole email address written out anywhere, make sure you can click it. Where possible, even edit what the subject is so your customers will simply click it and their email is mostly already done for them. Don’t make your customers copy and paste, or worst, type it themselves. Make links!

digital letterhead made in Microsoft Word to easily make the page look more professional easy template for a paperless office all digital with hyperlinks and social media icons

People are not necessarily connecting with you in the old methods. They may never call you. Instead they might Tweet, or Facebook or Email you. If you are a professional they might find you on something like LinkedIn or Behance. This is the way now. So my digital letterhead has these icons which are so instantly recognisable that everyone knows what to do with their one they are familiar with. I have given my customers options. And see what I did there? I didn’t make anybody hunt for these contact details, or type them or copy and paste them. These are all clickable hyperlinks because I value my customers time and this makes life easier for them.

letterhead

My digital letterhead is made in Microsoft Word. Simple reason why: it is easiest to type there, export a PDF and send. The spell check and everything are all available. But I don’t want my Word doc to look like a standard Word doc. So there is my “letterhead” stuff — logo at the top, social media icons at the bottom. The document is all set up with my fonts, colours, headers (three levels of course). Page two looks different to page one. All those things that save time and make all my documents consistent are all set up in a template. When I want to type a letter. All I do is open a blank template and it is ready to go. I just type. All my formatting options are available one click away.

If you want a digital letterhead in Word so all you have to do is open your template and type and always get a good looking letter, contact me today about your specifics. Let’s make you more efficient and professional looking. Prices starting at $200.

Evolution of avatars

Branding, photography, Real life

View from right to left.

Seeing how my own internet avatar has not only changed because of my change in personal branding but also with age I ponder.

As a child the only people who had these types of images of themselves were actors, scientists, authors or CEOs. These were people who relied on their face for work or their authority.

Ever since social media, everyone now has an avatar. They might change them frequently for personal profiles but if you looked at their career based image you will see a professional, hopefully. Now these people are not actors or authors. In the most case, they are just everyday people, like me. Yet here they are with professional head shots. I am a graphic designer who never would have had this type of image of myself in the past. There would never have been a need.

Now I see that over the years this image of me has transformed and evolved. In the past on the internet we all wanted a bit of anonymity. I hid behind a random image. That image evolved as my design sensibilities and personal branding grew. Then after some time it was perfectly normal to have a photo of myself on the internet. I took a self portrait of myself, feeling vulnerable. I liked how the picture turned out. I was having a good hair day. Then this image becomes my avatar, an image of myself that others then identify with. Even as my hair grew long and I grew older, this image was the image that represented me.

Once I was no longer in my early twenties I knew I needed to update that image. I was no longer a university student working the musical festivals circuit. I am now a grown up with a career trying to reinforce my professional image as a freelancer. I need people to take me seriously. I wore a nice shirt on a good hair day and took yet another self-portrait. This time there was no vulnerability, I knew my skills and now needed an image that showed I the professional that I am. I remember that day telling my mum about how I have now officially grown older on the internet.

Continuing on with professional development and branding changes, and the need for a more personal, warm photo. The same image from last year is now zoomed in. It is encased in a diamond, the main if only element of my personal branding. When all the other avatars are in boxes or circles I am still trying to be outside the box.