Graphic designers eurydyka kata and rafał szczawiński, founders of re:design, celebrate sex and the city’s 20 anniversary with a poster featuring main character carrie bradshaw’s 69 most important looks. ‘We often celebrate things – and shows – that have been important to us with posters and we felt carrie deserves this recognition,’ the designers mention.
a few of the studio’s favorite outfits
‘During the research phase we sketched more than 90 interesting looks and then trimmed the list down a little,’ the re:designduo mentions. As this year marks the 20th anniversary of sex and the city, the studio decided to celebrate one of the cult shows of the late 90s/early 20s that changed the way people talk about sex and female friendship on TV. The poster feature outfits which were somehow connected with the show’s plot and reflect the various events that happened in carrie and her friends’ lives.
the entire poster with 69 outfits
carrie and the city poster
the messy research phase documented
last seasons had probably the most elaborate outfits
early seasons and their emotional turmoil reflected in clothes
that time when Carrie got a bird clutch purse
this was a problematic episode but a memorable look
the newspaper dress in which carrie met natasha for lunch
the dress for a playboy party in LA
that time carrie had to watch pete
the glamorous carrie with the russian
This article was originally published in designboom.
edited by: sofialekkaangelopoulou | designboom
Join at the VMA Design Conference on June 15, as part of AIGA’s SF Design Week for more thoughts about design today and tomorrow.
http://designconf.vma.bz/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/SexFB.png428800Barbara Silvermanhttp://www.metalatitude.com/designconf/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/logo2_white-1.pngBarbara Silverman2018-06-13 15:27:032018-06-13 15:27:03sex and the city anniversary poster celebrates carrie's 69 most memorable looks
Adobe has launched ‘The Hidden Treasures – Bauhaus Dessau,’ a campaign that will bring to life nearly century old original typography sketches and unpublished letter fragments from legendary Bauhaus design masters that were rediscovered and completed to inspire the next generation of creatives. Bauhaus Dessau, the world famous school of design, was closed in 1932 by the National Socialist Party leaving behind unfinished masterpieces, created by legendary design masters: Xanti Schawinsky, Joost Schmidt, Carl Marx, Alfred Arndt and Reinhold Rossig.
World-renowned typeface designer Erik Spiekermann led the effort to turn the lost letter fragments and sketches from the Bauhaus archives into complete and fully functional fonts. Working with experts at the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation, he supervised an international team of typography professionals and design students to digitally create five font sets from Bauhaus Dessau designs, with the first two fonts – Xants and Joschmi – based on artwork from Bauhaus designers Xanti Schawinsky and Joost Schmidt, available for immediate download via Adobe Typekit today. The Hidden Treasures – Bauhaus Dessau “Adobe had the great idea to reinterpret type designs,” commented Dr. Claudia Perren – Director Bauhaus Dessau. “Actions such as the ‘Hidden Treasures’ campaign show very specifically how current and fascinating the Bauhaus heritage still is today. Especially for the younger generation of designers.”
The arrow markings found on athletic tracks form the basis of Studio Build’s updated visual identity for Nike‘s Track + Field clothing line. The rebrand’s “fresh and punchy” visuals feature a succession of arrows, which resemble the acceleration graphics used on athletic fields.
Leeds-based creative agency Studio Build wanted to create an updated version of the original branding that it created for the Track + Field line in 2016, which took design cues from track-line markings.
Featuring a black, white and red colour scheme, the previous campaign included bold typographic elements and numerals inspired by the curved shape of the familiar white spray-painted markings.
The new identity retains many of the visuals found in the 2016 campaign, but centres instead on the arrow graphic, which is presented in a blue and white colour palette.
“All of the compositions are created in a grid format,” said Michael C Place, creative director of Studio Build.
“By creating these in a strict grid, the spirit and precision of the Track and Field is accurately represented.”
“This new element can be used to create compositions in its more complex form, a simplified form or just used as a single graphic,” he explained.
“It was really interesting and challenging to make something as simple as the acceleration graphic (which is essentially just a triangle) to not only convey speed and dynamism but also building a graphics system that can be used for all manner of applications without looking tired.”
Join at the VMA Design Conference on June 15, as part of AIGA’s SF Design Week for more thoughts about design today and tomorrow.
http://designconf.vma.bz/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/NikeFB.png428800Barbara Silvermanhttp://www.metalatitude.com/designconf/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/logo2_white-1.pngBarbara Silverman2018-06-11 21:18:152018-06-11 21:18:15Nike's updated Track + Field branding is based on acceleration arrows
We don’t know much about these designs other than they appear to be created by AVGUST DESIGN of Minsk, Belarus. We just had to share. No matter your politics, these are elegant.
http://designconf.vma.bz/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/TwentyFB.png428800Barbara Silvermanhttp://www.metalatitude.com/designconf/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/logo2_white-1.pngBarbara Silverman2018-06-05 16:17:242018-06-05 16:17:24The New US Dollar
Like many things, the notion of the gentleman who knows his Gin Gimlets from his Cosmopolitans may be a thing of the past. But ladies AND gentlemen both will find something to savor in this set of elegant cocktail recipe cards produced exclusively for Ellicott & Co.
Inspired by maker communities across the USA, Ellicott & Co.’s mission is to provide uncommon, heritage inspired goods for the modern man. How interesting, then, that something that is digitally printed can also be considered a product of the “maker” movement.
Printed by Anstadt Communications on 80 lb. Verso Blazer Digital Satin Cover, these 16 cards are works of art all their own thanks to a fun retro design by Infantree, and creative use of Scodix digital enhancement technology.
There’s a lot of information to unpack in that sentence.
Yes, 150 sets of cards were printed CMYK on an HP Indigo 7900 in just three days. The sheets were then run through the Scodix Ultra Pro off-line unit, which added an inviting tactile quality to the pieces.
The “Scodix Sense” effect was used in various ways. Think of it as clear raised ink that can be applied all in one pass, ultimately creating a more tactile element.
The illustrations of the cocktails on each card are highlighted with a simple spot gloss. The “Classic Cocktails” title sports a spot gloss look and raised feel. All of the fine, decorative line work you see – front and back – was created using digital foil with some clear polymer on top.
The result: cards that feel more like a royal summons from Buckingham Palace than recipes for your favorite gin or vodka concoction. The 16 cards – 15 recipes and one cover – were then enclosed in a bellyband.
What is most exciting is that this is an example of Scodix – an enhancement system you normally see mostly in marketing materials – being used for a consumer product. The more that designers come across these types of projects “in the wild” where they can see – and feel – them up close, the more likely they are to dabble in Scodix, MGI, and “sleeking” in general for their own projects – and that’s worth toasting, whatever your cocktail of choice.
You can purchase “A Gentlemen’s Guide to Classic Cocktails” here.
Project Details
TitleA Gentlemen’s Guide to Classic CocktailsClientEllicott & Co.DesignInfantreePrintAnstadt CommunicationsYork, PAPaper80 lb. and 130 lb. Verso Blazer Digital Satin Cover
Production Details
Dimensions4” x 6”Page Count16 (2-sided) cardsPrint Quantity150 setsProduction Cost$1,755Production Time2-3 daysPrinting MethodDigitalNumber of ColorsCMYKFinishing and BindingScodix foil, round cornering, collating, and inserting into belly band
Throughout the years graphic designers have tried to dispel the myths surrounding graphic design and working as a graphic designer.
While some myths are hilarious and particularly harmless, there are other myths that are annoying and generally unhelpful in the understanding of clients to graphic design and graphic designers. In a quest to demystify these myths UCreative made a cool infographic to share that will help people understand what graphic design and being a graphic designer really is.
This originally appeared on youthedesigner.
Join at the VMA Design Conference on June 15, as part of AIGA’s SF Design Week for more thoughts about design today and tomorrow.
http://designconf.vma.bz/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Truth-or-Tale_.png428800Barbara Silvermanhttp://www.metalatitude.com/designconf/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/logo2_white-1.pngBarbara Silverman2018-06-05 15:43:382018-06-14 17:41:3010 Myths About Graphic Design
Let’s be honest, art prizes are ten a penny. But back in January, a new prize launched that caught my eye among the, ahem, competition: one that only accepted entries via an app. It’s an intriguing prospect, and became even more so when I saw the shortlisted work: much of it was conceptual, a lot of it site-specific. None of it was the pastel-y, art-directed-to-within-an-inch-of-its-life fodder that’s so usually the art darling of Instagram. The four shortlisted artists were ideas-driven, making complex work that frankly you’d be likely to scroll past if interacting with them in the usual way we consume art through image-led apps.
The competition in question was the ArteVue prize, orchestrated by the app of the same name—billed as “the first social media platform for art”—which launched in summer 2017 and has just unveiled its Android edition. The premise of the app is as a non-profit platform for collectors, galleries, and artists to interact with one another and buy and sell work. Algorithms show content according to users’ likes and interests to curate what they’ll find on their “discovery” page.
ArteVue app
“The idea of the app and the prize was to democratize art,” says ArteVue founder (and funder) Shohidul Ahad-Choudhury. The entry process was simple and required no particular pedigree: the artist uploaded their images, a brief description of their work, and a PDF, if they wished, and used the #arteprize hashtag to be considered. The difference between ArteVue and a platform like Artsy, one of the more successful online art and gallery databases, is that ArteVue isn’t curated, it’s completely user-generated. Artists can put their work up for sale with no restrictions, tapping into an interesting trend that Ahad-Choudhury, stating that 80% of sales in the the art world are for art below $2,000.
Ahad-Choudhury is far from the first to use the phrase “democratize art” to describe a recent web or mobile-based platform for art. There’s been a wave of similar products recently, including Artvisor, Curatious, and Mangus, the self-described “Shazam for Art.” And then, of course, there’s Instagram, perhaps the original art world “disruptor,” to use an awful phrase, even if not the app’s original intention. So what’s the difference between artists using these new platforms to connect with potential galleries, fans, collectors and so on, and how they’ve been using Instagram for quite some time now?
Instagram, says Ahad-Choudhury, always offers only one format for displaying and viewing images and videos—it’s the same for a complex, conceptually based installation as it is for a picture of a cake (or a dog, your shoes, a bunch of drunk people, and so on). With ArteVue, on the other hand, the artists can create their own gallery page, curate works, and write about what they’re making in a certain detail that existing platforms aren’t cut out for. “Instagram is about half a billion people and 20 billion posts, and less than 1% of those are are art-related,” Ahad-Choudhury points out. “We wanted to go one level further, and say, ‘if you like that, how about seeing another 20 [related works]? It gets that person hooked on art, it’s a form of escapism.”
Developed and designed by Ahad-Choudhury, Ben Dobson, and Peter Goodwin, the app uses image recognition software and metadata to guide the users towards other works and automatically generate hashtags from images uploaded. The focus at the moment is merely on getting artists to upload their work to the app, but it makes me wonder: will artists start to modify their work to make it friendlier for such platforms? Are they already? And if so, is art playing the algorithms, or are the algorithms playing the artists?
Access and Insta-Recognition: A Brave New Art World
Even if platforms like ArtVue are actively working to provide a different, and better, platform for displaying artwork than on Instagram, it’s safe to say that the rise in these types of art-sharing platforms can be traced back to that very app. The most visual of our social media platforms has spawned a whole new category of work that’s “Insta-friendly,” for want of a better term. It’s a cliche for a reason that people today—especially online, i.e most of the time—have very short attention spans, so any piece of art they see on such platforms has around three seconds to engage. Otherwise, on we scroll, for the most part.
While it’s meant he’s sold a hell of a lot more work (poor lamb!) and garnered him a ton more solo and group shows and a hardcover book “published by a reputable English art book imprint,” one of his gripes is that none of the sales or steps up his career ladder were facilitated by his New York gallery. Thus, he concludes, “The art world right now is a youth-fetishizing cannibalistic death cult of speculation and interior design masked as progressive painting.”
Brad Phillips’ Instagram
Hyperbolic? Perhaps. But it’s no exaggeration to say that Instagram can truly make a creative’s career. When I spoke to illustrator Polly Nor for Creative Review last year (one million followers and counting), she told me,“I don’t know where I’d be without Instagram.” For Phillips, Instagram has meant the increasingly obsolescence of galleries, but this isn’t necessarily a bad thing for artists starting out, since they often take 50% of the money from art sold. But the flipside of easy access—a world where, as the Phillips puts it, “a jpeg has almost as much value as the physical object”—is easy copying. As we’ve explored on the site before, designers and artists are frequently seeing their work ripped off by both big brands and individuals using on-demand services.
This has been a massive problem for Nor, too, who has seen her own work turned into memes, traveling the internet uncredited. She felt that dissemination “devalued” her work at the time; but since, that proliferation of her own work through others has meant she’s gotten to the point she can make a living from her art alone: “I have my shop but I don’t really do much commissioned work.”
Polly Nor’s Instagram
As Phillips points out, sales-wise, digital cuts out middle men, provides a direct conduit from collector to artist, and offers a supposedly democratic chance for work from anyone and everyone bubble to the surface according to what makes it in the online mass-popularity stakes. In my view, that inherently makes it undemocratic: some creatives are simply better at playing the social game than others.
A New System of Haves and Have-Nots
Online platforms and the digital realm in general have provided a lower barrier to entry for showing work, and put agency into the hands of the artist over gallery or press—but the web has also turned the artist into marketer and self-promoter. Some very brilliant artists make incredible work but couldn’t write a pithy artist statement or build a hip website if their life depended on it. Perhaps because of my ink-stained, weary, Victorian peasant heart, I’m a bit of a Luddite, and this is where I find that the utopian democracy of the “anyone can make it!” online world crumbles. Some of the best artists—those making work that’s perhaps inherently ephemeral or performative; or even just those who have little time for, interest in, or understanding of website-building—are inherently at a disadvantage if they’re being judged, in part, by the quality of their website. Some people are just better at that—and more interested in it—than others.
Charles Broskoski, co-founder of the online platform Are.na—“an open-ended space where you can organize your thoughts, projects, or research with anyone else”—has a different opinion on this. He firmly believes that everyone, and particularly artists, should learn how to make their own website. “It’s the one place you can contextualize your work in the way you want to,” he says. “You can frame things, set out a narrative, or have no narrative at all. It’s the place you can set yourself up as an artist.”
Perhaps it’s this build-it-yourself mentality that makes Are.na feel different to platforms like ArtVue and Instagram. While image-led platforms like Instagram could be said to put artists in the position of modifying or curating the work they upload to be more instantaneously eye-catching—fit for square frame, ripe for visual click bait—Are.na is designed more to facilitate the process of art-making, rather than displaying the end result.
Are.na, screenshot
Other platforms for artwork occupy other places on the spectrum that ranges from self-coded artists websites to the rigid format of Instagram. Just as digital has meant vast new horizons for artists in terms of media they use, it’s also meant vast new opportunities for disseminating their work. The gallery system is slowly but surely being tipped on its head as traditional representation and hushed white walls are crumbling, and as we increasingly engage with art outside of its physicality.
Yet with this online democratization of art also comes a new system of have and have-nots, particularly if we ignore the analog. Some art won’t catch the eyes and algorithms of users on the likes of ArteVue or any of the self-proclaimed art Shazams; many artists are frankly terrified of things like coding, site building, and even using social media. Does that make it less worthy or interesting? No. Use these new platforms wisely, use them sparingly, and use them alongside a healthy diet of art IRL. And please, artists, don’t go trying to fit all your work in square boxes.
Join at the VMA Design Conference on June 15, as part of AIGA’s SF Design Week for more thoughts about design today and tomorrow.
http://designconf.vma.bz/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/art.jpg1000667Barbara Silvermanhttp://www.metalatitude.com/designconf/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/logo2_white-1.pngBarbara Silverman2018-06-04 12:57:242018-06-04 12:57:24Art Apps, Instagram, and the “Democratization” of Creativity
Guest Blogpost by Laura Wallace, Owner and Creative Director, Worx Graphic Design, based in Hagerstown MD. Laura is a branding expert, author and speaker.
I’ve been seeing a lot of memes that say, “Build a life that you don’t need a vacation from.” At first, this makes a lot of sense. There are far too many people that loath Mondays and are always counting the clock to get out of their jobs. Sometimes you have to do what you need to do before you can invest in what you want to do.
But what happens when you have made that transition and love what you do every day? Maybe you’ve taken the plunge and started a business and are FINALLY doing that thing that’s been calling you. Or perhaps you’ve turned your side-hustle into your full-time hustle! You’ve been through the motions, done your time doing what you “had” to and are now living your dream job! What an incredible feeling!
This is where that meme pops into my head. What if you’ve created a life that you love but are still tired? What if you still need a break from it? Is this weird because you love what you do but still want to step away from it from time to time? Heck no! This concept creates an unrealistic expectation that you should never be tired or overworked or in need of some simple down-time to celebrate a recent success. Just because you’re doing what you love doesn’t mean you never need to take a hot second to regroup yourself.
Let’s face it, investing time and energy into creating a life you love takes effort! You may absolutely adore what you do for a living, and for that I give you a high five. But that doesn’t exclude you from needing a break. What if we changed the concept? What if instead of feeling like you have to escape from your life we change the mindset to taking a break to refresh and celebrate? You’re not running away from a life that you dislike, rather investing time in your body and your mind to reconnect and energize your thoughts and ideas.
Taking a break – be it a vacation or a day sinking into your couch watching movies – is a valuable part in any major change, project or scenario. Let’s say you’ve just invested a lot of time in creating and planning a new podcast. You’ve invested countless hours into the concept and execution, and have created a podcast channel that you’re proud of. That takes an intense amount of mental and physical dedication. To want to “get away” after this level of project is a natural human desire and is not a reflection of your passion for it. Just because you love it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t want to break from it.
Consider the next time you do something big – a project, a new adventure or something that has occupied a lot of your time – taking time off after it’s completed. And here’s the kicker, don’t feel guilty for doing it. When you step out of your daily routine to rest, and I mean leaving the laptop, phone, and email at home, you’re investing in your personal and professional growth. When you return, you’ll be sharper, rested and ready to tackle the next great idea that contributes to your ongoing success.
Join at the VMA Design Conference on June 15, as part of AIGA’s SF Design Week for more thoughts about design today and tomorrow.
http://designconf.vma.bz/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/BreakFB.png428800Barbara Silvermanhttp://www.metalatitude.com/designconf/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/logo2_white-1.pngBarbara Silverman2018-05-30 13:22:152018-05-30 13:22:15You Still Need A Break (And Don’t Feel Guilty!)
Andy Josuweit is the Austin, TX-based CEO you’re more likely to catch in a coffee shop than a corner office. The founder of Student Loan Hero, a solution for managing and repaying student loans, works remotely. And so do the 70 employees of his six-year-old company.
Josuweit graduated from college in 2009 during the recession and was unable to find work. Instead of heading down the classic cubicle-bound 9-to-5 career path, he found himself off to an internship in Africa, then Asia, to chase his entrepreneurial pursuits on a budget, followed by South America for an accelerator. “[Remote work] is all I know,” says Josuweit.
To keep everyone on the same page, Josuweit advises, “You really have to overemphasize the importance of communication. You need to figure out how you can create a safe environment to communicate and how you can allow for constructive confrontation and have healthy debates.”
He feels like this needs to be a priority because remote work diminishes access to nonverbal communication and provides limited opportunities to build rapport and trust with colleagues. “You don’t have the opportunities to sit down to lunch together or go out for happy hour with people.”
While Student Loan Hero does do two annual retreats to get their employees face-to-face, they’ve found an easy daily workaround for body language by using emojis and gifs “to share how we’re feeling on a deeper level.”
Jacy Cruz, who joined the company four months ago as their Customer Experience Manager, says sometimes she feels like she doesn’t use enough emojis. Cruz, who’d lobbied hard at her last company for more flexibility around working from home, did have some concern about going fully remote, “Because I’m shy and I thought that it was going to be even more difficult for people to get to know me.”
Fortunately, Student Loan Hero has several initiatives in place to foster connectedness. They have two all-company meetings each week. The Monday meeting is more business focused, but the Friday afternoon meeting is more laidback and functions as a “happy hour.” Colleagues can chat about their wins from the week and their plans for the weekend, just like they would on a Friday afternoon in the office.
Cruz also has her first Slack Donut bot chat coming up. The bot will do the work of pairing her with someone at random within her company for a 15 to 20-minute chat. Cruz likes this setup because she’s “not naturally inclined to reach out to people” she’s not working with directly.
But her favorite community building effort is the “Learning Rewards” program. The company has a pre-approved list of books they recommend employees read. Employees are encouraged to block out at least one hour on their calendar during the workweek to read and are rewarded with $15 for each hour they spend reading. “I love it because they recognize it’s a small amount of money for them to pay for their employees to do two things: One is to immediately begin applying whatever they’re learning to their jobs, but the second thing, that I think is actually more important, is to develop this habit, this thirst for learning.” Cruz continues, “And so many people are burnt out at work, what’s their incentive to go out and learn things unless it’s about trying to find a new job and get paid more.”
And what Student Loan Hero is doing is working. Shaun Moten, the HR Coordinator at Student Loan Hero who helps develop and manage employee culture, says, “Up until December of last year, we had a non-existent turnover rate. Then present day, we’ve had three employees to leave the company, so it’s still ridiculously low to have been around since 2012.”
Moten assists new hires in establishing a daily routine and conducts “stay interviews” to unearth and address any employee grievances early. For her, Student Loan Hero is “HR heaven.”
Josuweit, the CEO, predicts a more remote workforce will become the norm. “We’re going to see this demand in the workplace to create more work-life balance, or work-life integration. And I think remote work is somewhat inevitable. I think it’s kind of like fighting gravity.” But that doesn’t mean the future of work is without issue, says Josuweit. “It comes with its own unique challenges.” But for him and the entire team at Student Loan Hero, the extra effort is worth the reward.
Minda Honey hasn’t worked in a cubicle in a decade and consequently never worries her favorite stapler is going to go missing.
This article was originally posted by SlackHQ.
Join at the VMA Design Conference on June 15, as part of AIGA’s SF Design Week for more thoughts about design today and tomorrow.
http://designconf.vma.bz/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/remoteTeamFB.png428800Barbara Silvermanhttp://www.metalatitude.com/designconf/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/logo2_white-1.pngBarbara Silverman2018-05-30 12:51:352018-05-30 12:51:35Creating a strong ‘office’ culture for remote workers
It’s hard to remember a time before they were everywhere, but long ago in Internet time, there was only one name associated with disappearing video: Snapchat.
In 2016 (five years after Snapchat), Instagram got in on the game, adding Stories to their platform with filters, stickers, and text overlay. And in 2017, their parent company Facebook rolled out Stories of its own, with unique filters and the option to crosspost between platforms.
The videos may disappear, but the format is now everywhere, offering rapid-fire cycles of possibility. The only question that remains is, which platforms make the most sense for your brand?
Part of the appeal of Snapchat is its secret-handshake nature—it can be deliberately confusing, but that’s why users love it. It also offers a lot of features, though they’re not always easy to find. But that means brands who can navigate the app acquire an instant cool factor. It’s kind of like getting your motorcycle license, but for social media.
It’s all about spontaneity
Snapchat’s ethos is authenticity and openness – compared to other platforms, it’s more spontaneous and raw. That’s what draws users in, especially younger audiences, who are resistant to traditional advertising methods.
As a result, brands who use Snapchat to go behind-the-scenes can build loyal followings from users who are as interested in people and process as they are in the finished product.
Everlane, an apparel startup committed to “radical transparency”, grew their audience through a conversational, candid Snap series called #TransparencyTuesdays, where they answered questions and shared product insights and previews.
And playfulness
Geofilters are custom frames that show up for users who take a Snap in a certain location—this can be an entire country, for major campaigns. They’re a major investment, with a price tag in the six figures, but country-wide Geofilters typically reach 40-60% of all daily Snapchat users, offering massive exposure.
Sponsored Lenses are face-altering filters that users can add to their Snaps, to share your branded content with their following. Taco Bell smashed records last year when they released a Cinco de Mayo filter that turned users into tacos, which was viewed 224 million times in a single day.
Brands that stand out on Snapchat find a way to harness the platform’s spirit of playfulness to capture users’ attention. I mean, who wouldn’t want to look like a taco? That’s part of the genius of Snapchat: to stand out, you just need a great idea that no one can resist.
Ads perform well
Snap Ads are sponsored, 10-second videos that appear in between Snaps—entice users to swipe up and view longer content or visit a website. Ads perform well on Snapchat, pulling in more visual attention than any other social media platform.
The timeline prioritizes friends over brands
In January 2018, Snapchat rolled out a major update that radically transformed the app.
And the reception has not always been warm. A tweet begging for its reversal has been retweeted more than 1.4 million times, and a petition to scrap it has a million signatures and counting. Despite the backlash, Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel insists that the update is here to stay—so there’s no time like the present to leap in and learn to swim.
The biggest change for users: splitting Snaps into two feeds. Prior to the update, users could watch Snaps in one stream. Now, feeds are split into “Friends” (for users who follow you back) and “Discover” (for everyone else—including publishers, celebrities, and content creators).
What this means for companies is their Snaps will no longer appear in the same feed as their followers’ personal friends, likely resulting in less exposure. One way around this is to follow your audience back, but even then your Snaps will likely sink to the bottom of their feeds. The new Snapchat timeline is also algorithmic, pushing friends who interact frequently with a user to the top of their feed.
However, the update also came with a new opportunity for companies to share sponsored content, with Promoted Stories. These allow companies to push their Stories to more users and appear on the Discover screen, reaching new audiences beyond their followers.
Oh, and don’t worry about missing the opportunity to captivate audiences with your take on the taco filter. The update didn’t impact branded content like Geofilters and Sponsored Lenses, which will still reach users exactly the same way.
Instagram Stories
Contrary to stereotypes about middle children, the middle child of the disappearing stories family gets plenty of attention.
Instagram already had a massive user base in 2016, but Stories were like the Nos in The Fast & the Furious. When they launched, they gave users an incentive to check the platform daily and catch all those disappearing videos, increasing time spent on the app to around half an hour each day.
Users skew young, but not as young as Snapchat
More than 500 million Instagram users open the app every day, and 300 million of them are watching Stories daily. Like Snapchat, Instagram skews young—60 percent of users are under 30—but it also includes more older users as well, with one-third of 30-49 year olds using the app.
Instagram Stories share a lot in common with Snapchat Stories
After unveiling Stories, users and brands who had previously used Snapchat for candid videos and Instagram for curated content had both in one place. And brands had the same opportunity. Remember Everlane’s #TransparencyTuesdays? Those can now be found on their Instagram Stories.
Outdoor Voices, which makes workout clothes that fashionable people love, use their Stories to share videos of brand ambassadors #DoingThings outdoors, and approachable fitness tutorials that showcase products while inspiring followers to get active.
Instagram Stories have a lot in common with Snapchat. They also offer face filters that can flatter you with Photoshop-like effects, or make you look like a sea witch or a bunny rabbit (to name a few). Users can also add stickers, text, and recently (to the great delight of the meme-loving masses) GIFs to their stories.
If you thought that a Story was good before, just wait until you add a dancing cat GIF to it.
They are sorted according to an algorithm
Stories from people and brands that users follow show up in a row at the top of the Home feed, sorted algorithmically. A “Discover” tab includes branded content and promoted stories, featuring trending content and videos tailored to users’ interests. As with Snapchat, brands can promote their stories or create ads to reach more users, as well as share all their Stories with their followers.
They can drive direct traffic
Instagram Stories also offer a few special features that set it apart. For instance, brands have the option of adding links to their Stories, which direct users to an external URL after they swipe up and provides a ton of opportunity to drive traffic and engagement. Prior to adding this feature, brands could only have one link in their bio, and couldn’t include functional links in the photos and videos posted to their feed.
They get engagement
Creating a Story is not only easy, but effective: one in five Stories generate a direct message from followers.
Stories also have the uniquely engaging “Polls” feature, which lets viewers vote between two options.
Brands who excel at Stories know how to use these engaging features to keep users coming back – not just to watch, but to join in the conversation and feel like they’re part of an insider community.
The beauty startup Glossier built their following on Instagram by creating a mood board of images, each garnering thousands of likes, before they had even released their first product (they also raised $24 million dollars). They use Stories to engage with their followers, by offering sneak previews of new products, customer Q&As, and introducing the people behind the brand. But they also maintain their dreamy aesthetic, with Stories that are as Millennial-pink and Pinterest-worthy as their main feed, reinforcing their brand values of accessible beauty and casual luxury.
They have a non-disappearing option
“Story Highlights” allow users to pin Stories to the top of their feed. Unlike regular Stories, which disappear after a day as expected, these ones stick around for as long as they’re pinned.
Story Highlights are perfect for showing off your top performing Stories, latest products, biggest announcements, and the spirit of your brand.
They can be viewed on desktop
Even though Instagram is designed for mobile use, users who are looking you up on their computers instead of their phones can now also watch your stories, effectively increasing visibility. You still can’t upload from the desktop version, but given Instagram’s track record of giving the people what they want, that may not be the case forever.
Facebook Stories
Facebook is the blue whale of social media platforms, with a staggering 1.4 billion (!) daily active users, and 2 billion monthly users. In the U.S., the number of adults on Facebook (68 percent) is about the same as Instagram (35 percent) and Snapchat (27 percent) combined.
Facebook launched their Stories in March 2017, replacing a similar feature called Messenger Day with a more obvious parallel to their Instagram offering.
The two platforms share more in common than just the name. Facebook Stories also mirrors the placement of Stories (above the main newsfeed) and the camera to record them (top-left corner). It’s instantly familiar for anyone who’s used Instagram. So it’s a bit surprising that it hasn’t quite taken off—yet.
Facebook has the largest audience
Facebook hasn’t yet released numbers for how many users are sharing and viewing Stories, but anyone who looks to see how many of their own friends are posting them will likely arrive at the same conclusion: it’s not nearly as popular as Instagram Stories.
For older users, who are less likely to be on Instagram and Snapchat, the Stories format isn’t second nature. They may just not be creating and engaging with this form of content yet.
It’s a blank slate of potential for brands
Stories may be slower to take off on Facebook than they were on Instagram, but this platform has nothing but potential. It’s a blank slate with great opportunities – and Facebook has been clear that they’re committed to the success of Stories, so we can expect they’ll keep rolling out features to improve ease of use and visibility. And Company Pages only got access to Stories in October 2017, so it’s still a brand new field of dreams.
It’s not limited to one platform
Why should you be posting to Stories? For starters, Facebook has the best ROI of any social media platform, according to 96% of social marketers. Facebook Stories can be integrated with other high-performing ad opportunities on Facebook, like promoted videos and posts in the Newsfeed.
And since you can cross-post your Instagram Stories directly to Facebook Stories without any extra effort, why wouldn’t you? Cross-posting isn’t always a good idea, but given that your Stories will translate perfectly to each platform, it’s worth testing.
It’s an opportunity to bypass the algorithm
Facebook Stories also presents a new opportunity to bring users to your Page.
Many brands have noticed declining engagement since Facebook prioritized personal connections in their algorithm. But the Stories feed could be a way to reconnect with users who aren’t seeing your content in their Newsfeed the same way.
Your friends may not be posting there yet, but some companies are already using Facebook Stories with great results. Paddington 2, the surprisingly popular sequel to a movie about a bear in London, launched a Facebook Stories campaign with a Paddington filter that let viewers try on his stylish outfit (listen, a duffle coat and floppy hat counts as stylish for a bear, okay?)
Viewers also saw Stories of other Paddington characters, as well as iconic sets. This was a perfect fit for Facebook: a family-friendly movie on a multi-generational platform, showing off the most fun features in the app. The result: a three-point increase in awareness of the movie, and intention to watch.
Another example is Japan’s Kao beauty company, which used Stories as well as other Facebook ad placements to launch their Pyuan haircare line. Targeted to women in their 20s (the largest demographic on Facebook), Kao focused on short, high-quality videos tailored to the short attention spans and discerning tastes of their demographic. The strategy resulted in a 10-point increase in brand awareness.
There are opportunities for user-generated content
Facebook is determined to make their Stories more than just a clone of Instagram, and recently unveiled their first truly unique opportunity for brands to take advantage of the platform: Group Stories.
Group Stories allow anyone attending an event on Facebook to contribute to a Story roll, hosted on the Event page and visible in the Stories feed. Event administrators can moderate Stories and approve them. For companies concerned about the wild-west nature of other platforms, this is a reassuring mechanism. If your company hosts events, whether in person or virtually, Group Stories is a new opportunity to promote them and engage with your followers.
Which platform is right for you?
Keep your brand values and goals in mind: are you willing to be casual, informal, and offer candid insights? Do you prefer to keep things polished? Do you want to reach people of all ages? These questions can help you narrow down which Stories platform makes the most sense for you.
Also think about which features excite you most and fit the best with your content strategy. Do you want your audience to weigh in on new products? Try a poll in Instagram Stories. Hosting a launch party? Use Facebook’s Group Stories to engage attendees. Want to gain awareness among younger audiences? Try a Snapchat Sponsored Filter.
The important thing is to take advantage of the full menu of options when you try out a platform. Users get excited about new features as much as you do, so don’t leave them out when considering your strategy.
v Test out an idea on all three, and see where it performs best. Compare engagement rates and views. Many brands had success by rolling their Snapchat strategy over to Instagram, and others will find that cross-posting on Instagram and Facebook yields results.
Whatever you try, there’s one thing you should always keep in mind: users are savvy. If you make content that’s not true to your brand voice and identity, your followers will unfollow. Filters and stickers aside, videos let you build real connections with viewers and keep them engaged with authentic, insightful content.
Show off what makes your brand special and unique (you might surprise people!). That’s what your audience wants to see. Throwing a dancing cat GIF in the mix? That’s just the icing on the cake.
About the Author
Michelle Cyca is a writer, editor, and digital content strategist. Offline, she likes hefty magazines, public libraries, all-day breakfasts, and bike rides.
Join at the VMA Design Conference on June 15, as part of AIGA’s SF Design Week for more thoughts about design today and tomorrow.
http://designconf.vma.bz/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/planes.png470940Barbara Silvermanhttp://www.metalatitude.com/designconf/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/logo2_white-1.pngBarbara Silverman2018-05-30 10:20:382018-05-30 10:24:04Snapchat, Instagram Stories, or Facebook Stories—Which is Right For You?
