"People really like it when you send them something nice..."

Graham Jones- Self Promotion  

Today has been such a long day- found myself sat in the studio at 9am!! Although I was sat there for a while I didn't seem to make much progress hence why I am still working now. Anyway in the afternoon Graham came to talk to us about self-promotion, "self-promotion is one aspect of graphic design which cannot be taught." I really enjoyed this lecture, self-promotion is basically all about marketing yourself within the industry and getting yourself noticed. It seems a little daunting at first but rather exciting regarding the routes good self-promotion can take you down. Graham began by discussing the primary tools of communication needed within the industry, which include an identity, a portfolio, a website and printed literature. Graham then talked about the early stages of his career at VIA before going freelance about 5 years ago. I tried to take some pictures of the identity for VIA but they turned out really blurred. So after discussing the basic points of self promotion we had a look at Grahams work including his identity and the typographic work he produces for many clients. Below are his buisness cards, printed on a variety of stock as clients tend to like something they can see and also touch. I need to think TACTILE!

"Finding clients will be the main battle of your whole career: not only to find clients to start you going, but constantly finding clients to keep you going" It was made very clear to us that attention to detail is very important, Graham's work above is a very good example if this choosing the correct stock to print on, a personal touch to the design and even the odd gifts you could send out to people because "People really like it when you send them something nice." It's very important for us to get established within the industry very early on in our career, to catch clients attention and maintain it further into our career to keep getting jobs. "You have to tell your clients that you are available and willing for more work."

Graham gave a very inspirational lecture, it all seemed a little daunting at first and I must admit I am still felling rather nervous towards the subject of self-promotion and making myself known to complete strangers. I know though its something I have to do and a fear I must overcome in order to become established. Graham made it clear to us each individual point we had to consider when creating our own identites and was definitely really helpful, and a nice break from the ever ongoing silence brief! He rounded off the lecture by showing us some of the work he has done such as logos and the work done for his freelance group 'LooseCollective.' Here are some images of his work