Cute stationery

Last week we enjoyed a day out at the Japanese department store where we had some delish ramen and browsed the bookstore which was filled with lots of fun stuff for people who like stationery. Everything in a Japanese stationery store is cute! It was our first time there - they had lots of origami paper, cute cute cute little stationery items, lots of nice pens, notebooks/composition books that are ruled/lined for writing in Japanese, trinkets, cool Japanese magazines. Many of the Japanese magazines came with swag - here, all I ever see packaged with magazines are CDs or DVDs. They had cool tote bags, purse/bags and more in the women's fashion and beauty mags. The kids magazines came with various toys - kind of like our Happy Meals do, but with better stuff.

I've never picked up a graphic novel, but they had tons of them there - big thick books full of anime/manga. There was a group of non-Asian (read: white) teens there admiring the manga titles - apparently they were longtime fans. Being that the novels were in Japanese, I had to ask them if they were able to read Japanese. The anwer...was no. Apparently you can get the gist of the story simply by looking at the pictures...no reading necessary! :) I thought that was amusing.

I bought a super cute Japanese Hello Kitty diary (agenda/planner) which I'll take a pic of and share. I also got a couple of folders (for lack of a better word) that have cute graphics on them...oh! and a cute pencil case that I gave to my daughter.

Custom senior yearbook ads

My daughter is now a senior in high school and I'm excited because I am going to purchase a senior yearbook ad to tell her how proud we are of her. Of course I am going to design something totally cool for her since we think she's totally amazing so I thought I'd also do this for anyone else who wants a really nice senior yearbook ad. I mean, why not? If you are going to spend the money for the ad, it's nice that the ad looks good to, right? I am busy with quite a few projects, but I've managed to squeeze in some designs that I just uploaded to my store at ClaraWallace.com. Right now I have 10 designs that are more geared towards girls, but I'm working on some that are for the guys too, so check back soon. All the graphics were made by me and I can further customize the layouts with additional photos, quotes, etc.

Deadlines for our school yearbook's 'early bird' pricing is October 5 and we just got a letter home from the yearbook company with details on purchasing a senior ad so now is the time to order! Please pass this along to your friends who have graduating seniors! I'll post on my Facebook fan page too...

See the designs/layouts I have done in my store

Eye-popping email blasts

It's been awhile since I've felt like I had anything worthy to blog about - my friend mentioned that I hadn't been posting and that made me think about things that I should be blogging about so I've posted a few posts already this week - yay me!

So...I like to get email blasts that have eye-popping visuals - images that are well-designed that sell product/s. I'm on Sephora's email list and I have to say that they do an amazing job at making their products shine in each and every email they do. While not everyone can afford to have professional product shots of their merchandise, there are things that you can do to create your own email eye-candy.

Many times you can find product pictures on the manufacturer's websites and sometimes they even will provide downloads of their products for their distributors and retailers to use. Take advantage! Your graphic designer can take those images and collage them together. Then, come up with just a few phrases that are calls-to-action and you got yourself a visual email blast. If you can't get images online, and have to take photos, you should invest in a camera that will take good pictures. Part of making that happen means familiarizing yourself with some basic photo-taking techniques. (In a future post I'll share some sites and tutorials on this topic.) Then, if you don't know how to use Photoshop or an image-editing program, find yourself a graphic designer who does (or contact me!) who you can work with to put together your graphics. You really will feel more confident about your products and selling them knowing that you have a pro on your team to help with marketing like this.

If you are going to do the email blasts regularly (and it's good practice to do so) then come up with a header design that will be consistent with each blast. You can change the colors and even the style of the collage/image and as long as you have use the same header you will be branding yourself or your company each time you send out your blasts.

If you want to start collecting inspiration from sites that do a good job with their marketing, start with signing up for email newsletters from companies/websites that you personally shop. Fashion and beauty industry sites are inherently good ones to follow. Study the emails when they come to you and save the ones you like. You can give them to your graphic designer as inspiration and reference, or use it yourself if you DIY.

I enjoy comments - let me know what you think!

My eco-conscious friends - need cute reusable grocery bags?

I designed a set of reusable grocery bags last year. The designs I put on them are girly and cute. Please check them out - my website is Fortune True Reusable Bags. They have a side pocket, long handles, a plastic insert in the bottom and are useful for a lot more than just groceries!

• Use them for any shopping - the mall, Target, Walmart, etc.
• Use them when I grocery shop (some stores even give you a credit for bringing your own bag)
• Hang one on your laundry room doorknob to collect recyclable trash/cans/packaging - when it's full make it one of your kids' chores to empty it in the big recycling can
• Take it on playdates to the park, beach, friend's house - it's great for packing up toys, snacks, blanket, waterbottles
• Take it to the gym to carry your towel, change of clothes, etc.

Most important thing to remember when you have reusable bags is to bring them to the store when you shop! I keep a stack of them in my trunk so I always have them. These bags always get compliments at the store! 

Got my new business cards!

Time to hand out new business cards! I just got these in a few days ago. I love them! When was the last time you got new business cards? Are you due for a new one? I only ordered 250 this time so that I wouldn't have a bunch left over by the time I felt like I needed a new design. I'm going through the local coupon mailers and am going to send my new marketing postcard (in the process of being designed) to new prospective clients. Since I draw cute caricature/characters I am targeting women business owners, especially hairstylists and others in the beauty industry to see if they need my services. I want to get some new clients for ad design. I'll send them my new business card along with the postcard!