Outdated Graphic Design Concepts, New Social Media Updates And More - Ep. 53

In this episode of the Digital Wrap-Up, Kaylee joins the show to talk about outdated graphic design concepts that should have been left in the past awhile ago. Riley also talks about the new show format and breaks down some of the latest social media platform updates currently being tested.

Support the show: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1525549/supporters/new

0:00-1:43 - Introduction: Riley introduces the show and talks about the cold weather that arrived out of nowhere.

1:44-12:15 - Social Media Updates: Riley highlights some of the biggest social media platform updates currently in testing, including: Instagram feed polls, Instagram nearby stories, Meta Verified only feeds, 15 minute TikTok videos and more.

12:16-13:30 - New Digital Show Format: Riley talks about the new format to the show that will feature social media updates, followed by a more in-depth discussion or interview on a specific topic each week.

13:31-15:29 - Kaylee Is Back on the Show: Kaylee is welcomed back to the show after a few weeks off. The two provide an overview of what the types of graphic design concepts they'll be discussing in the interview.

15:30-18:57 - Double Spacing After a Period: Do you double space after your sentences? This concept is so outdated (it started with typewriters people...). Stop double spacing.

18:58-24:54 - Filling Every Inch of Space and Leaving No White Space: The need to fill every inch of white space is a very outdated design concept. White space is your friend in most designs (and websites too!). Too much text/content in a graphic or design makes it feel too congested.

24:55-30:50 - Script Fonts: Script fonts don't make your designs look fancy. It doesn't increase the "value" of your design if you use script fonts. A lot of times, it actually makes it harder to read, instead of making it look better. Kaylee also talks about designing full wedding packages for clients.

30:51-37:56 - Literal Logo Designs: Logos do not need to be super literal to get their point across. The two talk about a very popular logo design for construction companies with the same type of roof/window logo. The two give some examples of some of the most well-known brands with non-literal logos.

37:57-43:19 - Circular Logos: Kaylee talks about how over-used logos with circle outlines and the name of the business in the middle are. Logos with only the name of the of the business in the middle aren't true logos in that sense. They are very limiting in what you can use them on/with.

43:20-50:00 - Outlining Text: This is Kaylee's rant session of the podcast. Outlining text makes it so much harder to read the text most times. Kaylee strongly thinks that you should never, ever use outlined text. Riley challenges her on one example of outlining text he uses with one of his clients.

50:01-55:08 Interview Wrap-Up: Riley asks Kaylee about one more font that really drives him crazy. The two also talk about some other outdated trends for websites and discuss an upcoming podcast topic that Kaylee will be on the show for soon.

55:09-57:23 - Final Thoughts: Riley thanks Kaylee one last time and re-visits the new show format before wrapping up.

Transcript

Riley Harden: 0:00

On today's episode, Kaley joins us to talk about some outdated graphic design concepts that you should be aware of when you're creating your next design. And I go over some of the latest social media platform updates, and how those might impact you, whether you're a social media manager or just an average everyday user. So let's go ahead and jump into the digital wrap up. Welcome back to the digital wrap up, today is Thursday, November 2, and it is officially cold outside. That's right. You know, Halloween came and decided to be the coldest day of the year, I think so far, we got a lot of snow up here in gold tipped in Indiana, while we were supposed to be you know, trigger treating, and having outdoor events for Halloween kind of cold came out of nowhere, and I'm not happy about it. But today's episode is gonna be a good one, I have some updates that you should be on the lookout for in the near future, a lot of them actually coming for or to Instagram, there's quite a few things in testing right now that could make a big update for you know, personal use and for social media managers down the road. And then I know there's a couple of things for tick tock and Facebook and LinkedIn as well. So before we get into the interview with Kaylee, let's go ahead and, you know, talk about some of those updates for you. And we'll start with Instagram, because there's a few of them that are kind of all in testing right now. And we'll start with the ability to add polls and real polls to infeed posts, and even Instagram reels. You know, it's something that has been talked about, oh, for the past week or two, but their Instagram was looking for ways to kind of add more engagement to post. You know, polls are a thing on LinkedIn, that are technically a thing on Facebook still, but only in groups. And obviously polls are big on Twitter or x as it is now known. But it's I'm not sure exactly how this one will work out. Because you know, it's always been more visual. And I don't know if it'll be in the caption or in the actual post itself, how that'll work out there's polls and Instagram Stories, obviously too forgot to mention that one. But adding it to infeed post and reels. Obviously, they're able to do it because they do it in stories, but it might just be a little different in the actual post itself, not sure how I feel about that one, and how it'll exactly work. But I know they're just trying to drive ways to get more engagement on in feed stuff. And kind of on the same topic of the feed, they are now looking to introduce a meta verified feed only so a separate Instagram feed for only accounts that are verified through the meta verified system. And that would be I think, Elon Musk has talked about this for x in the past. It's hard to say because he's been talking about so much other stuff all the time, but I think this would just be a way to I don't really see the need for it yet. I mean I don't think there's that many people that are actually verified on Instagram through the verification the new verification process that like I would want to separate into a separate feed at this point, but maybe for bigger accounts or more popular creators that might be beneficial I'm not really sure I don't see as much spam and unwanted content from random accounts in on my Instagram feed right now. So don't really know how that will really change the experience for a lot of people. This is coming for me I only have you know 100 Or so followers on Instagram, I think so again, it's could be a big one down the road something to keep your eye out on especially as they continue to try and get more and more people to the meta verified status but yeah, we'll just have to keep our eye on that one and see if it's really beneficial for people or not or, you know, are they just adding this to try and get more people to get over there and then everybody's gonna be on verified and then I'm just going to turn into one feed again in a matter of six months or a year. Who knows, but one that I am kind of more excited about staying with Instagram is they are working on a nearby stories option. Not exactly sure how this will play out. But I see a lot of potential in this for discovery of your account. Obviously, you'll your account will probably have to be on public for this though to work for you. You might be able to see nearby nearby stories from other people, but you won't be able to post and have it show up in nearby stories. I don't know if they're going to make it where you have to opt in with each story to get it pushed to the nearby stories feed I guess. I'm looking at a picture of it here. And it looks like it'll just show up like your stories in the top left. And then it gets into the stories of everybody else. And it looks like nearby might be like the first option right next to your story. If that's the case, and you're able to post two stories in a geographical location, I think that could be really beneficial for businesses attract more local people to your Instagram account. Again, I don't know if you have to like opt into it or if like any story that you share just automatically gets pushed to it, I can imagine they do that might be a little bit of privacy concerns there. But I think, you know, it might be like how you select a story to just go to your close friends, you could also select it to go to your story, but also the nearby story. So it's again, it's kind of really new, just kind of looked at it or seen a post about it in the past seven days. So there's not a whole lot of information out about it. But I definitely think that one out of these three Instagram updates has the biggest potential for success or tools that could actually be beneficial for content creators or businesses. So that's, those are the big ones for Instagram. Let's go ahead and jump over to tick tock tick tock is testing out 15 minute 15 minute posts and updates now. Because 10 minutes, I guess just wasn't enough. But this is something really drives me crazy when tick tock keeps expanding and making longer videos when they've always just what they started on was short form videos. And now we're getting into 15 minute videos. It's like who is creating these 15 minute even 10? Minute tic TOCs? Like I still haven't seen a single 10 minute tic toc. And I don't want to so why they see the need for 15 minutes? I'm not sure. Are they just trying to really take over the entire video market from YouTube, which I don't think they ever will. But are they trying to expand to that? At some point, I think potentially because they've you know, recently, in the past six months or a year they've made it where you can turn landscape photos, or videos, and you can turn your phone and view at full screen. You know, that's a functionality of YouTube. And so now they're adding even more even longer videos. I don't know, maybe that's their end goal is try and take over the full video market. I don't see it happening. I mean, they might make money off of it. So I can't blame them for doing it. But it's not really an update that I like, I don't want to go to tick tock for 15 minute videos. But apparently, there are some people out there that do so we'll see how that one shapes up. Or if they'll actually push it through if if it's been talked about and they're testing it, I'm sure it actually will roll out because there's people out there that obviously want it. So it is what it is. I will never I will make this claim now that I will never make a 15 minute Tiktok video. And you can hold me accountable for that for as long as I live. But last one last update here switching over to Facebook, obviously with threads. Meta is trying to push threads more and more to get people on board. And I think it's working. I've been a lot more active on threads recently. Probably more active now than I was when it first launched. I've kind of gotten back to and gotten a lot of good engagement and conversations out of it. But what they're doing now is if you're on Instagram, you've probably seen that they're pushing, showing updates, threads updates on Instagram. They've been doing that for a few weeks now if not longer, I just started recently noticing it. But now they're also going to start pushing, they already have started posting threads to Facebook as well. So they're trying to get more and more people to switch over to threads. And I think it's honestly working. Every day I get on there, I see more and more interaction, more engagement from my standpoint. And I think they're really trying to capture not just the Instagram users, but also the Facebook users now as well. And in case you missed it another update is that when you're on threads itself, if you go to tag somebody, and they don't have a threads account, or they haven't created or signed up for threads yet, but they have an Instagram, you can still tag them. And then they get a notification on Instagram, actually, you know, trying to encourage them to sign up. And that shows kind of an Instagram icon next to the tag instead of just the regular tag as if you're tagging somebody on threads. So just another little cool quirk that they're trying to get people. You know, I used it when I was promoting the most recent podcast, not this one, obviously. But the one prior to this with quince mountain that we did, which by the way was a great episode, if you haven't listened to it yet, definitely go back and tune in. But he, I tagged him he doesn't have a threads account yet, but I was able to tag his Instagram account. And I haven't gotten. I haven't seen this yet. But supposedly, those Instagram users who don't have the threads account, actually get a notification within Instagram itself. So now they are kind of pushing threads, even more beyond just Instagram, which obviously, threads was an Instagram product, but it all falls under meta. So now they're going to, or they already have started pushing it to Facebook as well. I don't think you can tag people in threads that have Facebook accounts yet. But honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if they start doing that soon. So those are kind of the the big updates in the world of social media and the different platforms for this week. I think going forward with the digital wrap up, I'm going to try and highlight a few of these every week. So that, you know, just kind of quick hits like this and not do necessarily a full episode on it. But just short updates and then get into a bigger discussion or topic or interview, like the interview that's coming up with Kaylee here in a second kind of structuring it that way so that it's a little more planned out on the podcast. It's not just you don't know what you're gonna get on this week's episode, we'll do you know weekly updates and then some form of longer discussion, interview, whatever it may be, that part will kind of vary still, but the general structure will be intro, social media updates, longer discussion or slash interview. So hopefully, it's something that you know, you as listeners or watchers on YouTube, if you're not watching on YouTube, go to youtube.com/at hardened digital to see my smiling face. But hopefully it's something that provides a little more structure for the listeners and viewers and will be more beneficial to you all. So thank you all for the support. Let's go ahead and jump into the interview with Kaylee. All right, Kaylee, welcome back. Thanks for joining me on the digital wrap up. Let's give her a big round of applause for braving the camera again. How's it? How's it going? Since last time, we talked to you?

Unknown: 13:58

It's gone. I'm ready. Today I'm not actually stressed or unprepared. I actually dressed for the occasion. And made a list like I'm 100%. Ready?

Riley Harden: 14:08

Nice. Which if you want to see, well, we're dressed like you're into that. I guess. Just a quick shout out to go watch on YouTube. It's youtube.com/at harden digital, where he posts all of the video podcasts there as well, if you want to check us out and watch us talk about all things design. So this is kind of a something that not necessarily a Kaylee's rant in Section I know we've talked about that, but some kind of outdated styles or design elements that, you know, should have been left in the early 2000s I think before or before. So we're going to talk about those things that you kind of see with stuff that people tendency to, to edit in design or just stuff you see in other people's work. We're not going to necessarily call anybody out, I think you'd have one call out. But that's special call out. Yeah. But we're not going to call any businesses or other designers out by any means. But so yeah, it's just some outdated trends or myths of, you know, myth as in, you should be doing this, or this is something that's cool to do, but it's really not. So let's just go ahead and jump into it. I think this is more than just the design one. This is kind of design and writing, whether it's emails, text, writing for magazines, whatever it may be writing papers in school. The first one is kind of using two spaces after a period.

Unknown: 15:49

Yes, it drives me up the wall. I learned about it in college, like I distinctly remember them explaining why we no longer do that, you know that that was 10 years ago. But that probably stopped. Far, far, far before that. Apparently, the trend started with typewriters. And you had to hit the spacebar twice to leave enough space for the next letter to not overlap. That's where I learned that it came from. And somehow that translated into the first people learning how to type on a computer. And it just kind of never officially was like, Hey, we're done with that. Yeah. But the correct styling, I'm calling the Associated Press Like, the correct answer for this question. People

Riley Harden: 16:38

in our field. Yes, AP style, AP style is

Unknown: 16:41

what we're going with, and it's one period. And it may not be that noticeable to normal people. I'm just weird. But when I see it, in newsprint or in any event, this this is our call out everybody. My husband puts multiple spaces in his text messages between sentences. It drives me bonkers. And it's very noticeable. So it's one of those things like, I don't know if there was ever an announcement that hey, we don't do that. But here's the formal announcement. This is my official announcement that if you send me anything that has two spaces, I'm going to delete a space. Because it looks it just looks wrong to me. I don't Yeah,

Riley Harden: 17:26

I get it a lot actually, in emails from clients, if they want to send me a poster, like, sometimes they type up specific things they want said, and there'll be double spaces in it. And yeah, it's annoying to me. I always have to go back.

Unknown: 17:40

I do. Consistent. Yeah, sometimes they'll do one, and sometimes they'll do two. And that bothers me even more. Because then they're like, I think they know they're not supposed to but they're doing it anyways.

Riley Harden: 17:52

Yeah. I tend to not see it on social media. So like, whenever clients send me stuff in email, I'm like, Hey, can you post this? And there's double spaces or whatever. It's like, I'm, I don't care what you say if that's your style, whatever. It's not right for social media. So I think that's kind of I surprisingly, don't see it. Like, in posts. I guess from the business side of things. Maybe personal like personal pages, probably do it quite.

Unknown: 18:21

I don't know, if I necessarily see it a lot in social media. I see it a lot. When I work on magazines or newspaper. Because everything is especially on newspapers, everything is justified for the whole column with Yeah, and the to space. You can see it it's like glaring. Oh, yeah. So to me, it's, maybe that's just the world I've been in. But yeah, it's very noticeable. And so I'm officially making the ruling that we no longer do that.

Riley Harden: 18:49

Awesome. Well, there you have it. That's the podcast. That's the whole thing. We're just making this declaration. Yep. No, you talk about magazines and newspaper. And that's kind of a big part of your background is that type of design. Moving on to the second kind of trend or myth is filling every every inch of space and not leaving any white space. Can you kind of go into that one.

Unknown: 19:15

That's well, it's probably because of the same universe of newspapers you used to fill up every centimeter every available. Everything that was available, you filled it up because you were paying for it. You wanted as much information there as possible. Now it's kind of I think, needs to be the opposite. Like you, even in advertising in social media, like get to the point. You don't need extra crap. Even on graphics for social media, you don't need extra stuff. Like leave it alone. Yeah. So it'd be more impactful to me on Facebook. If I'm scrolling if I see something that's a giant white blob with like one little thing thing in the middle that would stand out because there's just so much stuff that you're saying. Yeah. So I think it's it's hard. I don't know if it's a generational thing, or if it's just people want to overload with information. Sometimes it's not even necessary information. It's just like we're typing because there's space. And then the actual point that you wanted to get across, it's been completely lost. So

Riley Harden: 20:27

yeah, and I see that a lot with social media graphics. You know, one, graphics aren't great for social media in the first place. But there are certain situations that you use them. And so be it, it is what it is. But then when you go above and beyond then put every small detail about this event, or whatever you're promoting in the graphic. And then it's like, there's too much stuff there. I instantly just score, I buy something, you're defeating the purpose,

Unknown: 20:57

I'm more of a like, make it huge, whatever the event is make the graphic huge. And then in the actual text of the post, here's the details. Yeah, we don't need to know the whole dinner menu for the night's event. Yeah. On the image. Yeah. So I see it everywhere. And it's not just, I have to convince people when I'm doing magazine, sometimes that like, we don't need to put that much stuff on the page.

Riley Harden: 21:27

Yeah. And I, I think, the posts that get over congested with stuff in the image itself, it's like, you're, I guess, turning more people away, because most people are probably like me, or it just you have half a second to capture somebody's attention. Having all this text, no matter what else is in the graphic. All this text is going to make people just up Nope, don't want to read it. I don't care. That's not what they're here for. They're not here to try and decipher all this information in a graphic, if if you can capture their attention with this graphic and this image or whatever, then they're more likely to stop for a couple of seconds and read the caption of the post. And that's where you put that information.

Unknown: 22:14

So it applies to everything. Yeah, I mean, websites you don't need. Every single, like, I'm not gonna read it, I'm not going to read that I don't in ads for magazines, or ads, even on billboards are huge ads. If you have 7000 things people are going to read. They don't have time to do that. Yep. Or for some reason, I see it in magazines, they've got a full page ad. That looks fantastic. There's 10 words on there, maybe. And then you go to these little eight page ads that have six times as much information in a little baby ad. Yeah, why we feel the need to cram all that in there is mind boggling. Because I guess that's just how it's been done. When you used to have to pay for space, or the space that you were filling up? I guess so.

Riley Harden: 23:09

Yeah. And websites, especially people, web space, or white space kind of guides the eye, right when you're looking at a website. So you just have all this information like information overload, which I know websites supposed to have more information than, say, your Facebook profile or whatever. But like, you have to use it strategically and actually have white space, it really does help guide your eye. And that's why you need to be able to think to Yeah, that's why you don't just see columns of text on websites and all this stuff, like

Unknown: 23:41

even newspapers. Now they've gotten to where, if you want to make an impact, they you'll see them it'll have columns sorts of stuff on the edges, and then the center is just like, wide open. And that's immediately what your eye goes to. Because there's space. Yeah. And it's noticeable. So I think the idea that we have to fill it all up needs to just go. And I'm not saying everybody needs to be super minimalist. Yeah, and just have an X in the middle of a blank white page. Like we don't all need to go that hardcore. But there needs to be a balance of this is understandable, and still looks good. And

Riley Harden: 24:23

yeah, if you have so much content, so much written information that you're struggling to fit it all on a page, just get rid in, you probably should just cut some information, find what's not necessary, I guarantee in probably 95% of situations, there's always something you can cut out whether you ramble on a sentence or one since it's just irrelevant and not providing any value, whatever it might be. I'm sure there's always something you can cut out. Yep. So next one, this more specifically in design and I guess, I guess somewhat applies the social media design stuff to talking about graphics again. But script fonts.

Unknown: 25:09

I feel like this since the beginning of script fonts, if people want something to look fancy, they just put it in script, then you can't read it. Yeah. I don't know, I don't feel like at this point and necessarily increases the value. I don't think it. There are instances where yes, a script font is great. If you're going to make a whole paragraph in a script font, no one's going to be able to read that it has to be used sparingly. For emphasis. It was never meant to be full blown. sentences, paragraphs, any of that. Even things written in italics. is almost too much like that doesn't make it look fancy. There's a reason that italics exist. Yeah, but it's not just to make things look, I feel like more expensive. fancier,

Riley Harden: 26:08

like menus, I feel like restaurant menu is that you go to a fancy place and put it in the script, and then it's, then you can't read it. And especially, I don't want to call older people out. But older people, if they're going to a fancy restaurant, and they have script font, they already have enough trouble reading the menu in big letters and whatever regular font you use, but uh, you try and fancy it up and put it in script and write

Unknown: 26:34

it does, we don't need that. Yeah, most of the time, I will put something in caps and bold. If I want it to be fancy, like if I want it to be noticed. I'll use the exact same font that the rest of the text is and just make it caps. I'm all for that. I don't know, maybe that it might just be me. But I don't think what people's idea of making it look more expensive or more luxurious or whatever, necessarily translates from it just being in a script font. And there are 1000s, probably hundreds of 1000s of script fonts out there in the universe. And some of them are cool. Some of them are readable. Some of them not even close.

Riley Harden: 27:20

Yeah. And like, at the end of the day, you want your information to stand out whether it's a graphic on social media, magazine, menu at a restaurant, whatever it is. But if you kind of distract from that message, because they can't read it, then

Unknown: 27:40

I've seen specifically wedding websites, or wedding invitations, wedding invitations, that stuff the whole industry, because it's I can't think of a better word besides fancy, but it's elegant. Again, I'm using my quotes that no one can hear on the podcast,

Riley Harden: 28:00

if you're watching on youtube@youtube.com slash at hardened, digital,

Unknown: 28:03

supposedly more elegant, to use a script font, but on the website, I can't read the men, it's like the main menu items are in a script that I can't read.

Riley Harden: 28:16

Yeah, and I think this really applies to listeners, not necessarily. I feel like this is more for the every day person who's getting married and trying to design the save the dates and stuff like that on their own that like, you know, that aren't in the marketing world that kind of just do these one off projects, whether they're creating a flyer for their sorority or nonprofit they're involved with or weddings are a big one. I think that a lot of people kind of just create their own stuff. Or there's templates online and oh, it has script font on Canvas, so probably should use that.

Unknown: 28:56

But sometimes it's not the way to go if if the average person couldn't read it, or if it's got a headline, that's 12 words. You cannot make the whole thing in a script font. You can pick like a word. Yeah. For emphasis, pick whatever word is most important. Sure, I'm all for that. I use script font. i It's not like I don't use them. But it doesn't necessarily add the value and the elegance that I think people assume it does. So yeah.

Riley Harden: 29:27

And if you're listening now and like you're getting married soon, or you have to design this stuff, and you're like, well, crap, I thought I was going to use script fonts. And now I don't know what to do for my wedding invitations. Reach out to us. This is something Kaley loves doing. We have I think some examples on our website. Probably I haven't looked in a minute. If not there'll be up by the time this episode is published. But you know, that's something that people might think, Oh, we're a marketing agency. We can only do business business stuff but Haley does, long before she joined forces with me she did a lot of freelance stuff on like Etsy and designed wedding invitations, these fun, different, I guess full wedding packages. Yeah.

Unknown: 30:14

I did. One was, I've done wedding invitations for people in England and Australia. And people wanted like a whole western theme. So that was new. I've never done like a cowboy themed wedding invitation before, but I, I like doing that stuff. And I think a lot of people assume. Like, you can order them on Etsy. You can order you can make your own on camera. That's fine. I'm not against that. But if you want me to do it, yeah, please call? Yes.

Riley Harden: 30:48

Kind of moving on. This one is more, you know, we just talked about the everyday listener, the non business side of things. But this one kind of shifts back to the business side of things. And that logo, Logos must be literal, is a big thing that people really, you start a business, you have no design experience, no ideas or thoughts. Besides, this is what the business is I need to make this literal logo.

Unknown: 31:21

And I'm not once again, I'm not saying you can't, your imagery and your logo can't be very obvious as to what you do. But just because you run a construction company, doesn't mean you need a house and a hammer, oh god and a tape measure in your logo. Like you don't have to have any of that

Riley Harden: 31:47

contracting contractor companies have that same roof with three windows or whatever. And then they just put something different. Underneath it, you don't

Unknown: 31:58

have to have there's no rule that says it must be literal, especially if the name of your company is whatever construction like you don't then have to have the image that says construction like or excavating businesses don't have to have a big excavator in their logo. One that's complicated, like I've seen welding companies like you don't have to have an image of a welding machine. In the name of your fabrication company, you don't have to have that. Like you can either hope that people can understand that if you're called something something construction that you do construction, or like our hardened digital InDesign logo. It does have a little like, word bubble. But there's not necessarily anything to it that says digital InDesign website. They Yeah, right it there's no computer on it. There's no mouse click, there's no. Like, it doesn't have to be 100% some of the biggest names out there in the world, your logo has literally nothing to do with their company. Yeah, Apple is an apple.

Riley Harden: 33:23

Yeah. I mean, obviously, not everybody knows what Apple is nowadays. But when they just got started or whatever, hey, Adidas

Unknown: 33:32

logo is like a weird looking flower with stripes in it. Yeah. I'm sure there's a meaning I don't know what it is just off the top of my head, but like, Nike. What does that have to do with anything? Yeah. So

Riley Harden: 33:46

but that's just proof to like, yeah, obviously, these are huge examples, you know, international brands that everybody recognizes. But if they can do it, your business can do it too. And still find success. Obviously, there's tons of other things that go into running a successful and growing a business. But if you're afraid that people won't recognize you by your logo, that's not true.

Unknown: 34:13

Doesn't have to be literal. You could do something completely abstract that just looks cool. And people might remember it better just because it looks cool. Yeah, the seven construction logo, they've looked up and they all look the same. How you going to stand out?

Riley Harden: 34:29

Yeah, but you do something way out there. Like obviously be appropriate, like, whatever. But the more you can use little things like as a logo to stand out from the competition, the better, right? All these contracts or companies that we've talked about that have that same logo, it's like, I don't want to I don't want to hire any of them because they're all just the exact same looking and like I want somebody who's Put a little more thought into it a little more creative and kind of sets themselves apart. Because, you know, if they have something different than everybody else, I would assume that maybe they put more thought into their business or they're more creative. And, like, to me, that's just I

Unknown: 35:16

mean, that might be like, with industry specific to Yeah, like, I don't know, there's just, I think that's one of those. That's why I'm saying it's outdated. It used to be every single logo was spot on. Like, if it was landscaping, it had like a shovel and a tree and some grass, like, everything was very literal, to whatever the company was. And all I'm saying is, you don't have to do that unless you just feel like it's absolutely necessary to you. But in the grand scheme, it's not necessary at all. You don't have to have any imagery with your logo at all. Like it could just be the name could just be the letters. Yeah, the letters typography, it doesn't have to be an image of any kind, I would recommend doing it. But at least for watermark purposes, or icon purposes, but you don't have to be so on on the nail as I was. phrases, yeah. You don't have to be so exact with what you're trying to portray.

Riley Harden: 36:28

Yeah, I mean, like our logo. And if you're watching on YouTube, it's over here. I was smooth. We're sitting at an angle, it's, it's different, whatever. But like, you can just look at it up here that there's the HD. So there's the typography, and there's the chat bubble around it, right. But then there's also the heart and digital and design written out underneath it.

Unknown: 36:55

Sometimes we use suggest the icon, sometimes we use just, yeah, just the lettering, sometimes,

Riley Harden: 37:02

in a lot of the logo packages that we do like full logo packages that we do. We do a just an icon, which would be the chat bubble in this instance. And then we do like a vertical one where the name of the business is underneath it. And then a horizontal one where the name of the businesses. Right, I just

Unknown: 37:23

did a logo yesterday, where the horizontal and vertical versions don't actually match. But they have the same elements. Yeah, the same fonts. And it's just arranged differently. And the more circular one has extra stuff in it, because you can do that. But then the long, horizontal skinny one looks different. And that's okay. And none of the elements actually are 100% literal to what the company is. So

Riley Harden: 37:55

yeah, stain on all around. On the topic of logos to another one is the circular logo with text inside of it.

Unknown: 38:03

This. I'm not gonna say it's outdated, I think this one might just be a little overdone. And it might be since Canva appeared. But I think the whole the whole universe, I've seen so many logos, where it's just a circle outline, some, a lot of them have flowers. Maybe it's industry specific to a lot of boutiques or hair salons or that kind of industry have the circle with the name like in a script font in the middle. Yeah. And they all look similar. So that's back to the same thing of like, you have to distinguish yourself. And I get it, that the circle, like it looks fine, it looks nice. There's nothing wrong with it. Besides that it's overdone. It's also very hard to put a circle logo in certain areas. So if you've stuck to that you've committed, then you can't change it. Because there's nothing else you can do with that circle. So I think it's just avoid because so many people have already done

Riley Harden: 39:13

it. And if you have a circle with the background of the inside of the circle being white, then you lose the capabilities of putting it as a watermark and doing all these other different things with it that if it just simply wasn't inside of a circle, right? It'd be much better but if

Unknown: 39:35

you take away the circle and all you've got left is plain text. Well, you don't necessarily really have a logo you have the name of your business right now. Yeah, so that element of the circle with some little

Riley Harden: 39:52

put something else.

Unknown: 39:53

stuff right. You have to still think about if that name can't stand alone without If that circle is the only thing making it a logo, then you don't really have anything. It's not a logo. It's kind of just overplayed, like, that's a way you can use a logo, you could put your logo inside of a circle. Yeah, for a certain design. But if that's what you have to use on everything, feel like you're kind of limiting yourself. And I've seen even just driving through driving through a small town, you probably have 12 businesses right in a row, that 10 of them have a circle logo. So it's just a little overkill. It's to me, it's something that people should be moving away from, just for the sake of it being memorable. Yeah. But I think people who are designing their own, which is fine, like if that's what templates are out there. So I guess I would say look a little harder to find something that looks completely different.

Riley Harden: 41:02

Yeah. And again, if this is like, you're in the middle of starting a business or planning a business, and you're thinking about your logo, and now it's, Oh, crap, I was gonna use a circle my logo, reach out to us, like, even if we don't design a

Unknown: 41:18

brainstorm session of like, yeah, these are the elements that you want to include, but maybe we don't need the circle.

Riley Harden: 41:25

Yeah. Like Kaylee would be happy to talk to you. And whether we actually end up designing a logo for you or not, hopefully, at least get some ideas off of it. Right. Like, we have consultations, and we talk with businesses about their social media, sometimes just kind of give them ideas type of thing, and we don't end up working with them. And that can be the same type of thing. Kaylee does with it,

Unknown: 41:50

I had, I had to do the same thing. In I mean, I do it now I did it in college before I could even start on a project of having multiple variations of the same concept. And then picking which one will work the best. So we I'm not saying I'm going to completely throw out what you have. Or that your ideas are incorrect. It just maybe we can rework it or rearrange it.

Riley Harden: 42:17

Yeah. And I think we talked more about that on a previous episode than we

Unknown: 42:23

probably

Riley Harden: 42:26

trying to. Yeah, Episode 48. What to Expect When hiring a design agency, I think we talked about coming to us with information. Thought Process concepts behind it and not just being like, this is the business this is the name.

Unknown: 42:45

Right? So you can have that idea or view like, Hey, I saw this on Canva. And I liked the look of it, maybe we can figure out a way to incorporate that. But differently,

Riley Harden: 42:54

or I saw this person make this cool logo on Tik Tok and I want to make a cool or updated logo. Yeah, so logo talk. That's what we're gonna name this episode. No, that's really good. I mean, I think there's a lot of people that create one off logos for random things, events that that'd be

Unknown: 43:16

good. Yeah, something to stay away from.

Riley Harden: 43:18

Yeah. Last one on your list of outdated trends or design myths is outlining text. Yes. This one you seem very,

Unknown: 43:30

I seem very upset. Yes. This is just Kaylee's rant. This

Riley Harden: 43:34

is Kaylee's rant section of the podcast. Think we always end the last one is always the one that you're kind of more passionate about?

Unknown: 43:42

Well, I think it's just because it's, it goes back to what I've said before about, I think it makes it impossible to read. Yeah, if you have unless it's humongous text. That's super thick. And the outline is so small. You can't read it, I still wouldn't do that. I would never ever vote for outlining text with a different color. There's just no reason for that. If wherever you're trying to put it, the background is too busy or the background is the wrong color or the background is too dark, then you need to figure out a new plan. Like you need to rethink the whole design all together.

Riley Harden: 44:26

So I have a challenge to that. I produce some mini vlog series for one of our clients. And it's a lot of times just the Zoom call where it's just a person's shoulders and up or whatever. And a lot of times we put text across the screen well, a lot of times he wears a black shirt, and then there's natural blue or light like white light behind them. And sometimes the text goes over like in the background the little so it's over the white but then it's also over his black shirt. It If there's literally no other place to put text on the screen,

Unknown: 45:04

right, if that's the case, and you have to do that, and you can't put like a color block behind it across the whole thing, or if you can't do that, and you have to put text over like something that's busy, you can use the drop shadow, I'm not super against a drop shadow. Okay, if you use it correctly, and you manipulate it, so it doesn't just look aggressive. But outlining the text in a different color, it just takes away from the thickness of the font itself, and then it makes it harder to read. So you're taking something that was busy, and putting something busy on top of it. So we need to keep it simple. Or if you have to use a different font that's thicker. Or like a bold version of it, and use a color that you can read on both, I have to do that a lot with magazine covers, to pick a font color that can handle all the things that are behind it, even if it crosses over some other element. So there are other things you can do. outlining it in a different color. Just I cannot see any reason.

Riley Harden: 46:17

Even black and white, like black and Ally even why

Unknown: 46:21

Yeah, I would still never ever do that I would rather you completely rearrange stuff, or make it bold, or something out it just I feel like it just makes it worse in almost every situation. I can look up all look up some examples and see if I can find one where I'm like, You know what, this may be the only exception out there. But for the most part, I would just say please never ever. Yeah. And we don't need that many colors either. They did it on a magazine the masthead of a magazine that I just started. The outline of the main title of the magazine is gray. So they changed the inside color. But the outline is always great. I'm like, why do we need that? Like why even outline why outline and at all? It's perfectly readable without it? Yeah, I fought for this on different projects

Riley Harden: 47:23

that on a magazine of like, I know the magazine, so you're designing kind of st makes it look like unprofessional, childish, like,

Unknown: 47:33

it just looks at once you it's just maybe it's outdated. Maybe that used to be the trend. I can't imagine why. Yeah. I can't imagine in my head. Why that would ever be a popular trend. But I do think with different people I work with if they've been in the industry for a long time. They're like, we'll just outline it. No, no, no. I will fight for that one. Almost every time. I'm going to look up an example that I feel like there's probably an exception, where people are going to come at us in a comment, be like, Well, I do it for this specific instance. Or if you're going to do it, if you have a good example better be Yeah, it better be really fantastic looking and be on purpose. Like it needs to be like a huge thick outline, or huge border or something where you maybe you don't necessarily need to read what it says. But it's just for the effect. And for the design style. I suppose. Still, I'm sticking with it, you should never ever have to do.

Riley Harden: 48:48

Fair enough. If you have a an example that you think is good, or that you've used it in the past, you're like, there's no other option like I kind of just did tag us in social media reply to the comment on the post that you found this podcast and whatever it might be. And we'll have Kaylee design something different for you or Oh, that'd be fine, you know, kind of gives you a different perspective of what you could do instead. And that similar might not be able to recreate the exact thing, but something similar at least so I feel like

Unknown: 49:18

okay, I do have one exception. There. See, I thought it would already. When you're trying to make things look like Chrome, like text look like Chrome. A lot of times to get the correct effect, like halfway to have

Riley Harden: 49:30

the thing. We didn't really do Chrome, one of the design cons, one of

Unknown: 49:35

them, I think is Chrome. Yeah. To get it to look like the correct chrome effect. Sometimes you have to have an outline, because you have to have a gradient going a different direction of the main gradient. Yeah, to do the effect. Okay, so there, there's my exception. That's the one thing I can think

Riley Harden: 49:54

of we talked ourselves in a circle. Awesome. Well, Oh, anything. We've covered six, five, I combined the two logo ones just fine. Okay, but anything else off the wall crazy outdated myths or concept styles. Since we've been talking anything else pop into your head?

Unknown: 50:19

Not particularly a lot of stuff. I feel like the general population knows if it's outdated. Yeah. And trends change, like bubble letters will go out and then bubble letters will come

Riley Harden: 50:32

back talking about script fonts, fonts in general, Comic Sans,

Unknown: 50:38

Comic Sans, I think it has a place. Does it need to be on everything?

Riley Harden: 50:45

On a brochure? Um,

Unknown: 50:48

unless it's for some kind of childcare, childcare?

Riley Harden: 50:55

Yeah, so I still

Unknown: 50:56

feel like there are so many other options. I saw thing yesterday, specifically about using Comic Sans and Helvetica. Because that used to be the go twos. Yeah. And how people were like, We need to please pick something else. Yeah. So the trends, I did research, just to see if I was crazy, but some of the trends from the past 20 plus years. design trends were bizarre. Yeah. And I'm happy that other people also agreed, and we're like, No, we need to, we need to stop that immediately. A lot of the web design trends where

Riley Harden: 51:33

Oh, yeah, bad. I'm sure.

Unknown: 51:36

The internet has improved. Yeah, some of them were like, from the very beginning of websites, when the buttons were like. I don't even know how to explain it, like beveled. So they came out, but then also, like, pushed back and then the text was also beveled. And it was like, aggressive. Yeah, some of the web design trends, if you want to look up some funny stuff. The web design trends from the past are excellent. But like design trends in general, probably bout every, what, 10 years. There's like a whole new phase. Yeah. So I'm fine with that. Because I'm fine with things changing. But these are some that just maybe made it made it a little too long. And we need to just

Riley Harden: 52:26

doesn't have a place with today's digital world. Yes. Cool. Well, I know we have another episode planned or on the books. Talking about design. Now, I'm kind of looking at your notes here. But do you want to preview that?

Unknown: 52:46

I mean, we can. This was just me off the top of my head. Yeah, thinking about times in real life where I saw something that changed. And it was noticeable, like a design changed somewhere out there. I guess I can. You don't, I don't want to go into them. Because I only have three on the list so far. That was just off the top of my head that I could remember noticing something. Or I'm like, wow, they changed the font, or, wow, that was not a good

Riley Harden: 53:18

laser aren't necessarily specific to the marketing industry or people in the mark

Unknown: 53:22

marketing world. I was thinking like me out and about that I

Riley Harden: 53:26

like one of these on the list. I know specifically, like I mentioned or notice to like, it's not a great example, because I'm in the marketing world. But you know, something that other people have pointed out that I saw people talking about

Unknown: 53:40

it, maybe people just don't notice that stuff. And it could just or just goes right over there. Just be me. Yeah. But I noticed weird stuff. When people get new menus, restaurants I go to even not frequently. Yeah, they get a new menu. I'm like, oh, like a whole new design. How exciting. And I usually crap, right? Or if people I'm getting way too into it. If there's a sequel to a movie, and the title font is different in the sequel. Yeah, bothers me. Like, Why could you not it's a sequel? It's the same exact series. Why is it different? Fair enough. So maybe it's not going to be a rant episode. I swear.

Riley Harden: 54:21

We'll see about that. But hopefully, we'll have some examples if you are watching on YouTube. And we can flash those across the screen for when she points them out. Because again, they could be something that you maybe it was more subtle and you didn't notice it or you forgot about it, whatever it may be. But that'll be a good episode coming up here in the next few weeks. So we'll go ahead and wrap up today and I'll talk to you on the other side. Kaylee, we'll give you another round of applause here for joining us in another episode in the bookstore. I think you're contracted for another 30 but now just kidding. I have how many Yes, yeah, we'll come up. But thanks for joining us. And we'll see you the next time you're on All right. All right, that will do it for this week's episode of the digital wrap up. Thank you, Kaylee for joining me again. It's always fun having you in studio, which is a full 10 feet away from your office. It's not like you're traveling, but it's always fun having people in person in the studio talk, hopefully, goal of mine in the very short, near term future is to start getting some more people into the studio to record with and talk to, you know, trying to work some things out, and maybe some partnerships with the local Chamber of Commerce here. So I think with the new structure, and you know, sticking to that structure of the social media updates and the interview or a longer conversation, topic, discussion, whatever it may be, and then getting more people into studio, hopefully, start transitioning the podcast into even better forms. So thank you, everybody who supports if you want to support the show, there's a link in the show notes for you to make monetary donation. As little as $3 a month if you want to support the show helps us you know, update our equipment, software is everything. Just a good way to support the show and get a shout out on the show. suggest topics ask a question, whatever it may be for showing your support. So thank you everybody for tuning in. And we'll see you next week on the digital wrap up