Brand Makeovers: Selena Navarro Of AntiDesign On The 5 Things You Should Do To Upgrade and Re-Energize Your Brand and Image
An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis
Learning and strategizing for your audience is hard work, but it impacts everything your company does. Once you have defined your brand values, story, and goals you need to be able to effectively communicate it to your customers. Understanding your audience provides insights into unmet needs, as well as a thorough knowledge of the environment in which your product/service is sold. You need to uncover how they think, what they want, and their lingo. Figure this out, and you’ll be able to match their expectations and desires. This allows a business to better develop their product/service offering and selling strategy to meet their audience’s demands.
As a part of our series about “Brand Makeovers” I had the pleasure to interview Selena Navarro.
Selena Navarro is the founder and owner of AntiDesign, a creative studio that specializes in brand strategy, visual identity, and intuitive websites.
Being a mixed Asian-American woman, Selena has a passion for making space for BIPOC-owned small businesses, nonprofits, creatives, boutiques, celebrities, and organizations that promote culture and empowerment. With her experience in these fields, she founded ANTIDESIGN in 2020, a boutique creative collective specializing in a client base of entrepreneurs, small businesses, and community organizations in the arts, culture, and social movement.
Her approach to branding, design, and communication is firmly based on the Emotional Design school of thought, which advocates that humans come to understand the world primarily through perceptions and emotions. In a commercial context, this means that customers primarily want to be enchanted with the promise of a great experience.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit more. Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?
I got my start in the design strategy world as the Creative Director for BossBoxx and Wells of Life, and today, I create original cult-worthy brands. But I wasn’t always an aspiring creator… First, I was a Biochemistry major at California State University Fullerton. Yup…I wanted to be a neuroscience researcher. I earned my bachelor’s, only to discover I had a passion for learning. So, I collected a Bachelor’s in Linguistics and Secondary Education.
College is very expensive for a 20-something-year-old. I needed a job that paid for my tuition and worked with my school schedule. I had a knack for graphic design and a passion for helping my community. Pairing my understanding of human emotions and design experience, I started creating brands with an audience-focused strategy. Thanks to the faith and patience of a few local business owners, I was introduced to the world of strategic design.
I have always been passionate about empowering entrepreneurs. I love to help small business owners hone their skills, do what they love, and become their own bosses. As an Asian-American woman, I am passionate about making space for BIPOC organizations that promote culture and empowerment. With the mindset that I could do anything I put my mind to, I started my first design collective offering small businesses the professional, creative, and strategic edge they need against a corporation-saturated market. I have had the honor of being the Creative Director for Wells of Life and Co-Founder & Head of Design for BossBoxx. Today, as the founder of ANTIDESIGN, I work with a killer team to create cult-worthy businesses that confidently attract dream customers with intentional and strategic branding.
Can you share a story about the funniest marketing or branding mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
Yes! When I was in college, I signed my first design client. They just wanted a simple logo with their company initials. I thought, “no problem!”. I presented a few designs, and they fell in love with one in particular. Long story short, I was finalizing some of their collateral, and before I send the designs over, I like to print them out. I accidentally printed one of their letterheads sideways, only to see their logo sideways for the first time!!! When the logo was flipped sideways, it resembled a very phallic image. I called the client right away, and luckily we laughed it off. We went with one of my other designs and made sure that when flipped around it wasn’t inappropriate. It was quite a hilarious goof!
The lesson here is to make sure that your logo looks good when flipped in any angle! It is also important to make sure that you have different layouts for your logo so that it can live on different kinds of collateral.
Are you able to identify a “tipping point” in your career when you started to see success? Did you start doing anything different? Is there a takeaway or lesson that others can learn from that?
When I started my first design studio, I offered custom tailored-for-you brand identity packages and fully custom websites. I never said “no” to any project. I took clients that nickel and dimed me. I took clients that insulted and disrespected me. I would quote a 30-day timeline to deliver a fully developed brand identity, with unlimited revisions and unlimited deliverables, if it meant they would help a business succeed. I would take extra calls and think of new ways we could better their marketing and strategy — for free. As I said, I wanted them to have the needed tools, and I trusted them to know their business. So the asks would continue, and I would create and create and create. I would pour my heart and soul into a design strategy, and clients would have me revise it to be unrecognizable. I’ll admit that the branding would often go from strategic and cohesive, to a mish-mash of things my client liked on Pinterest — all because I didn’t respect my own expertise and I let people who aren’t experts, abuse my skills.
I was burnt out, doing the most, and worst of all I was disappointing my clients.
What happened? I created a “clone” business. I had no boundaries. I offered way too much and undervalued my services. How could I hope to offer my clients a cult-worthy model, if mine was a disaster? It was time to invest in my business.
I re-evaluated my process. I refined my offerings and created packages that were packed with value, and priced accordingly. I still wanted to help small businesses follow their dreams, but I needed a tried and true system to make my process efficient and valuable.
I defined my target audience and started only offering services that I loved. I worked on providing as much value for the time and expertise I was providing, but also created boundaries for my personal life and sanity.
I soon found that my dream clients were attracted to my vision — I mean, I created my business tailored to their exact goals, values, and needs, so how could they not? Clients felt supported during the creative process. They respected my expertise. And we were seeing results immediately after launching our collaborations. Soon enough, I had a waitlist of dream clients full of excited referrals. With the exponential growth, I was able to hire an entire team of specialists — jam-packing more value into our offers!
Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?
Working in the creative field, we get to work with the coolest brands. The only limitation is our imagination. I’m not able to disclose all of the projects I’m working on but, I can say some of the more exciting projects I am working on are:
Wells of Life, International Charity: We set a goal to impact 1 million people through clean water this year. I am excited to report that we are only 42 wells away from that goal! This is a major milestone for our charity. One of my favorite projects was working on our commercial with NBC that played during the Olympics! WellsofLife.org (Shameless donation plug).
I am also working with an ABC star, an Asian-American owned modern jewelry organization, and a cult cannabis brand. All of which, prioritize giving back to their communities. It is important to me to uplift and support minority owned-businesses and to also put a spotlight on Asian-American representation in the media. To be able to play a big role in these movements while making a splash in a brand new market is exciting. Years from now, these brands will be remembered as the first of their kind. It gives me the chance to define artifacts of the future.
What advice would you give to other marketers to thrive and avoid burnout?
Know your strengths. Take your weaknesses and automate them, or hire out. You will save so much time and sanity by investing in a good team and automation system. Only offer services that you love, and ditch the ones you hate. Work on providing as much value for the time and expertise you put in, but also respect your personal life and sanity.
Define your dream audience. Even if you don’t think your business is in a place to reach your dream audience, try to bridge the gap between your current audience and your dream audience. Build a brand and system that specializes in your exact persona.
Next, re-evaluate your process. Refine your offerings and create packages that are packed with value — price yourself based on your time, expertise, and the value of your product and service.
Once you know your offerings, create a system that can be replicated over and over again. If you have the chance, I suggest reading about how Mcdonald’s success is not in their addictive french-fries but in their innovative, tried and true process that is efficient, easy to follow, and valuable.
Ok, let’s now jump to the core part of our interview. In a nutshell, how would you define the difference between brand marketing (branding) and product marketing (advertising)? Can you explain?
Many people are often confused about BRANDING & MARKETING. The easiest way to differentiate the two is to remember that branding DRIVES marketing because branding is STRATEGIC and marketing is TACTICAL.
First, I think it is important to understand the two parts of branding, brand strategy and brand identity. BRAND STRATEGY defines rules and guidelines on how, what, where, when, and to whom you communicate your brand messages. That’s why it is imperative that you start with a brand strategy. Doing things out of order introduces chaos and confusion to your brand. If people don’t know what they’re fighting for, they won’t fight. So be sure to start with your brand strategy and everything else will fall in line.
So how is brand identity different? BRAND IDENTITY or VISUAL IDENTITY is a holistic, compelling visual representation of your brand that draws from a strong brand strategy and resonates with your target audience. It is a clear set of characteristics, benefits, and attributes that define a particular brand — like your logo, colors, and art direction.
A well-defined and executed brand strategy and identity leads to a consistent brand message, a strong emotional & visual connection with customers, and higher brand equity. A brand strategy is a plan on how to help your business connect with its audience. It includes critical things like your mission and purpose, target audience, values, and competitive advantage. Defining your brand strategy first creates a STRONG foundation for your company. It allows you to make informed, strategic choices throughout your business development. It tells your audience what your company stands for and what it stands against.
Marketing is the tool you utilize to deliver the message of your branding. Marketing is goal-oriented and measurable. It will continually change and evolve, just as the products and services you offer will continue to change and evolve. Marketing will be directly and specifically geared towards sectors of your target audience, all while utilizing the foundations that your brand strategy has defined.
Can you explain to our readers why it is important to invest resources and energy into building a brand, in addition to the general marketing and advertising efforts?
Branding builds trust. Branding is a promise to deliver an experience. In the case of a business, branding is a promise that you’ll provide consistent and unique products/services — and then deliver on that promise every time. Your brand should be all about the experience you want your customers to have with your company and its products. If you are selling coffee, for example, your branding could focus on how delicious and original it tastes as well as how easy it is to make at home (or wherever).This might seem obvious, but too often businesses forget this crucial step in creating their brands– they don’t think about what they actually want their customers to experience when they interact with them.
Branding builds loyalty. When people buy into a brand, they develop an emotional connection with it that allows them to feel like part of something bigger than themselves. This feeling of belonging will help encourage repeat purchases from these loyal customers because they feel like they’re contributing to something bigger than just themselves.! Once people know and like your brand, they’re more likely to stick with it even if there’s something cheaper out there that offers similar features or benefits. This means they will continue buying your products or services without having to be persuaded by external factors like price or availability. Even if another company offers a cheaper version of your product/service, chances are that many customers won’t switch just because their loyalty has been established through branding alone!
Branding sets you apart. Building a brand will set you apart from your competitors, build relationships with customers and help your business grow. Standing apart from competitors goes beyond a beautiful logo or an impressive website — which is why it is so important to define your company’s values, story, and goals. These should be strategized for the long-term and with your audience in mind. Creating loyal customers requires guts, because being loved by some means being misunderstood, and even disliked, by others — because it is important to STAND OUT OF THE CROWD. Your company should stand against something as much as it stands for something. BOLD brands are brave, sometimes irreverent, and always unapologetic, and beacuase of this they gain a loyal following that can’t be bought, only earned. If your brand does not have simple and unique differences — it’s time to start investing in intentional strategy.
Branding is a promise
Your brand is a promise to your customers. It’s the key to your business and the reason it exists, so it makes sense that you should invest in branding. A strong brand not only helps you attract more customers but also keeps them coming back for more. When people buy into a brand, they develop an emotional connection with it that allows them to feel like part of something bigger than themselves. Remember, logos alone do not make up a brand. A brand is the culmination of all the communications, exchanges, and encounters a customer has with your goods, services, and personnel. A brand is to a customer the promise of an EXPERIENCE and the EXPERIENCE of that promise being fulfilled. It’s important to nurture this asset over time.
The bottom line is this: your brand is one of the most valuable assets you have. It can make or break your business, so it’s important to take care of and invest in.
Let’s now talk about rebranding. What are a few reasons why a company would consider rebranding?
We’ve seen firsthand how people are happy to pay more for their preferred brand, than less for an unknown brand. This is true for all industries. Rebranding your company is a great way to revitalize your business, attract new customers, and reposition yourself in the marketplace. However, what happens when your brand just is not connecting with your customers? When is the right time to rebrand?
First things first, complete an internal audit, or hire a company to audit for your brand. An audit is a powerful tool for your business to get clear on your audience, reception, strategy, and opportunities. While there is no straight forward answer to this, I have compiled some indicators that the time to rebrand has come.
- You never had a consistent brand strategy or identity to start with. Your business name is very literal and you struggle with pinning down your exact identity.
- You are a “clone” brand. A clone brand is a business that offers the same products/services as their competitors, their most unique quality is their discounted prices. They are not disruptive or unique, and therefor have nothing that makes them cult-worthy.
- You’ve outgrown your brand. What your brand stands for today does not agree with your vision for the future of your brand. Your current brand differs from what your brand aspires to be.
- Your audience has changed, or you never could reach your dream audience. Your brand’s current position does not resonate with your ideal audience. (However, if you find that your brand resonates with an unexpected audience, and it’s working for you, I would suggest reevaluating your brand strategy to resonate with your current audience).
- Your business model, offerings, strategy, and business morals have changed.
- Your industry has evolved and your brand is outdated. (A good example of an outdated brand and rebrand is Herbal Essence).
Rebranding takes time. It is important to invest in good design and intentional brand strategy when rebranding your business. Whether your goal is to introduce your business to a new audience, or save your business from being outdated, it is important to consider a rebrand carefully. Be sure to align yourself with a long-term vision for your brand and always keep your audience at the forefront of your focus.
Are there downsides of rebranding? Are there companies that you would advise against doing a “Brand Makeover”? Why?
Rebranding is not always in your best interest. By changing your company culture, you often run the risk of causing more problems than you solve. Some of the risks you run when rebranding is creating a brand that misses (no one resonates with your brand), trust issues (customers are confused), and reputation blows (crisis management). Rebranding can be a costly initiative that takes lots of time and research. When a rebrand is done for the wrong reasons, you can damage your business and turn potential and even current customers away. Here are some examples of when rebranding your company is not a good idea.
- Your audience is not who you originally intended, but they are loyal. If your audience is loyal to your brand, but they are different from the personas you strategize for — that’s ok! So long as your business aligns with your vision and morals, it is okay to leverage this new audience. I would suggest reevaluating your strategy and see how you can better answer the needs of your loyal audience.
- Your sales are down. Profits will vary every month. It’s easy to go into panic mode when you see a consistent drop in sales. Declining sales could be the result of different things. The first step would be to take an in-depth look at your engagement, financials, and marketing efforts to see where your numbers started slipping. Some easy remedies would be to focus on your customer touch points and ensure that every experience your customer has with your brand is exactly what you want it to be. Focus on the little details of your business a.k.a, your communications, engagement, customer service, marketing efforts, packaging, freebies, and more. Consider how you can answer the wants and needs of your customers. It doesn’t have to be complicated either. Glossier does a beautiful job of consistent, simple branding that highlights natural, clean beauty. Their communications, messaging, packaging, customer service, and free stickers with every order show just how much they pay attention to the little details.
- Your competition rebranded. While it is important to keep an eye on your competitor to see what is working for them, it is also important to be different from them. If you already have a loyal base of customers that love your brand, there is no reason to rebrand. A rebrand would just create distrust and confusion. If it ain’t broke, do we really need to fix it? Probably not.
- You found a style you like better. A mistake many business owners make is they design a brand for themself, not for their customer. I cannot stress how important it is to create a strategy and identity that resonates with your audience, not yourself. Distinguishing between your personal style and the style that best suits your business goals can be tricky. This is where it is best to rely on a professional or your team to decide what the best course for your business is.
Ok, here is the main question of our discussion. Can you share 5 strategies that a company can do to upgrade and re-energize their brand and image”? Please tell us a story or an example for each.
Identify your brand values, story, and goals — and be bold!
BOLD BRANDS value quality and uniqueness. They are run by passionate people who love brainstorming, dream-scheming and creating value for their customers. It’s crucial for companies to give their customers something that they can resonate with, that goes beyond a beautiful logo or an impressive website — which is why it is so important to define your company’s values, story, and goals. These should be strategized for the long-term and with your audience in mind. Creating loyal customers requires guts, because being loved by some means being misunderstood, and even disliked, by others. Your company should stand against something as much as it stands for something. BOLD brands are brave, sometimes irreverent, and always unapologetic and for it they gain a kind of loyal following that can’t be bought, only earned. If your brand does not have simple and clearly defined values — it’s time to start investing in intentional strategy.
Know your audience
Without people, you have no brand. For the most part, brands have three audiences: The people who buy from you, the people who convince others to buy from you, and fans/supporters.
Learning and strategizing for your audience is hard work, but it impacts everything your company does. Once you have defined your brand values, story, and goals you need to be able to effectively communicate it to your customers. Understanding your audience provides insights into unmet needs, as well as a thorough knowledge of the environment in which your product/service is sold. You need to uncover how they think, what they want, and their lingo. Figure this out, and you’ll be able to match their expectations and desires. This allows a business to better develop their product/service offering and selling strategy to meet their audience’s demands.
To further identify with your audience, I recommend using the language of your audience, another reason market research is so important. The more you communicate using the language of your audience, the better. Speaking directly to their pains and pleasures will create effective messaging, trust, and emotional connection.
Invoke Emotional Experiences with your brand, Create Brand Loyalty
We buy based on the way a brand makes us feel, so one of the best things you can do is to determine how you want people to feel when they come into contact with your brand.
Emotion Creates Brand Loyalty.
Brand loyalty goes hand-in-hand with consumers’ emotions. When customers develop a sense of brand loyalty, they’re building an emotional connection to a business. Not only do they feel like they belong, they also get excited to represent a company in some way, as a fan and an advocate.
Human beings can be complex — which is why before you can earn this level of loyalty from your audience, you first need to better understand the psychological side of the consumer-business relationship.
From the company standpoint, you deliver value by crafting a brand that speaks directly to your audience’s emotional needs and delivers a consistent customer experience that they can rely on. Through marketing efforts, consumers start to develop positive associations with your brand and have a clear set of expectations every time they interact with your brand.
This powerful connection comes down to needs and actions, which is where Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and Aristotle’s Seven Causes of Human Action come into play.
By staying true to your company’s values and delivering high levels of quality in your products and services while serving and supporting your customers well, you earn brand loyalty. At this point in the customer experience, they don’t feel a need to check out your competition because you consistently answer to their specific needs.
The little details matter — Creating Enchantment
I truly believe that the difference between a customer loving a brand, and a customer being a die-hard fan of a brand, lies in the details.
Think about the last memorable unboxing you experienced. What did you love about it? For example, I just ordered from @Glossier, and had an extremely pleasant unboxing. The details of the branding on the box, to the stickers and handy-dandy carrying bag that comes with every order, the experience left me pleasantly surprised and wanting more. These were small details, but they made a big impact — I put the sticker on my phone (free advertisement), and because the box was so pretty I ended up posting it to my social media (even more free advertisement!).
The brands we tend to love and remember the most are those that care about “the little things.” They provide a memorable and emotional customer experience that leads them to tell everyone they know about it. I call this enchantment.
Consider focusing on every touchpoint you make with your customer and make it a memorable and pleasant experience (service providers this is true for you too!). The goal is to invoke a specific emotion from your customer, whether it be security, joy, trust, or surprise. Some areas that you can look at is company messaging, providing value to customers through freebies or value-packed events, stepping up your customer service, creating content that speaks to other goals your customers have, and always creating a strategy that is customer-focused.
Ditch Digital Noise, Creating Intentional Touchpoints
One of the biggest mistakes I see businesses make is creating useless, noisy content. All brands have a distinct brand personality regardless of whether they deliberately build one. But without intention or thought, most brands end up with either a very generic “clone” brand personality or, even worse, a completely bland, forgettable personality. Often, they are one and the same. Suppose you’re a brand that prioritizes providing value for your specific audience and wants to be laser-focused on what makes you an expert. In that case, it’s time to start reevaluating your customer touch points. Quality over quantity is the key here! All touch points should be intentional and well-thought out.
From your perspective, would you rather follow a brand that posted content that resonated with your values, gave tips on related goals, and catered their content to you? Or would you rather follow a brand that just posted every single day without intention? Would you rather communicate with a company that had an automated system for customer service, or a real person? Would you rather support a product that related to your values for a little more or purchase the cheaper option with no values. Intention applies to all aspects of your customer touchpoints. Know your strengths and cut out the excess.
BE CONSISTENT!
The final tip is always to be consistent with your branding. Stick to your values and brand personality. Consistency is the promise you make with branding.
In your opinion, what is an example of a company that has done a fantastic job doing a “Brand Makeover”. What specifically impresses you? What can one do to replicate that?
Nike did an incredible job rebranding in an effort that seeks to highlight its commitment to diversity and equality. The ‘Just Do It’ slogan is still as prevalent today as it was in 1988, although the ad campaigns to go with that slogan have completely changed.
Given that they are already known for producing high-quality goods, Nike’s advertising efforts these days tend to focus on societal concerns that are still important, such as inequality, diversity, and poverty. Customers will remember the company’s principles and desire to purchase its items to support their vision of inclusivity as a result, changing how others perceive their brand. Their commercials no longer center around their products but the movements they believe in. Nike is able to answer more of their target audience’s needs by speaking directly to their values and creating a vision that people want to invest in.
This is a prime example of why it is important for companies to be upfront and proud of what they stand for and what they stand against. People will invest in what you believe in (and just as importantly what you don’t believe in!).
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
I am very passionate about education and giving children the tools they need to succeed. One area that I think our education fails our children is teaching them to understand their brains, emotions, and feelings. This is a resource that I think many adults could use too! I would create initiatives to instruct young people on how to feel and sit with their emotions, understand and interpret them, then effectively communicate them. These initiatives would concentrate on fostering empathy, awareness, understanding, and kindness in children from a young age. In order to prevent bullying, I would create programs that provide a secure environment where children can be themselves and receive support for being unique.
I think if we as a species could better understand what makes us tick, we would be more compassionate and loving toward one another. If marketers can leverage human emotion, then the average person should be armed to do the same with themselves.
Another initiative I would start would be to highlight minority children. I think it is so important for children to see adults that look like them in the media. Diversifying the media would not only inspire children to believe in themselves, but also dispels prejudices that hold children back today. This is one reason I am passionate about working with female and minority owned businesses, I want to give them an edge against corporations. I want to highlight more faces and genders representing their uniqueness, and I want children to be inspired by it.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
“The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones… It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop.” — Confucius
We are all victims of the “all-or-nothing” mentality that modern society advocates as the best strategy for bringing about change. We’ve become so preoccupied with reaching the top that we’ve forgotten what it takes to get there: a steady ascent with patience and perseverance.
Three years ago, I wanted to start my business, but I was too scared to jump in because I felt like I wasn’t ready. However, I realized that I was already doing everything that a business owner does, I just didn’t have the proper processes or documentation. Three years before that I would never have believed that I could even sign a client.
A mountain cannot be moved by charging headlong into it; rather, it must be eroded one tiny stone at a time. Confucius asks us to live by this straightforward philosophy, one that prioritizes steady improvement over sudden perfection.
The secret to sustained, long-lasting change is consistency. Instead of attempting to lift mountains, just move little stones one at a time. Be the tortoise instead of the hare. The race is won by steadiness and pace.
How can our readers follow you online?
https://www.linkedin.com/in/selenacaryn/
https://www.theantidesign.com/
https://www.tiktok.com/@theantidesign
Thank you so much for these excellent insights! We wish you continued success in your work.
Brand Makeovers: Selena Navarro Of AntiDesign On The 5 Things You Should Do To Upgrade and… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
