Sales Graphics Blog

When EBONY was born in the 1950s women were romping around in poodle skirts, but today heritage only gets a media brand so far. That’s why new management introduced a revolutionary set of tools to position the JPC brand (EBONY & JET) with the likes of Hearst, Condé Nast, and other major players on the media stage.

Rather than rely on old presentation tools with steep learning curves, EBONY & JET called on our design team to breathe new energy and life into the brand. Then they took the visual refresh a step further and moved the sales team over to our presentation software, CustomShow.

The new design and presentation tools were a perfect match for the brand’s fresh energy, evolving image and new leadership. Video and animations brought EBONY & JET’s allure to life while the presentation tool ramped up productivity and gave the sales team control over the brand’s new and evolving message.

EBONY & JET’s crisp new design and bleeding-edge corporate presentation tools are now the engine for a newly defined, progressive media company. The company’s new presentations didn’t just increase performance and productivity, it started a movement and propelled the media conglomerate into a new generation.

As the VP of Marketing-Media at JCP says:

“When it came time to refresh our brand and reintroduce ourselves to the ad world, we turned to the responsive team at Sales Graphics. They make it easy for us to succeed by helping us appear cutting-edge and vibrant. Our sales team is excited about the new slides, and that has already started to translate into more presentations and more effective sales calls.”

In the past few years the online video landscape exploded. 86 percent of the American population has consumed an online video in the past month, representing a 706 percent growth in the space since 2006. This represents a significant opportunity for brands who want to use video to augment their marketing objectives.

Some brands take this journey by way of Old Spice style promotions, but every video must fit the personality of the brand, and the best video create some kind of call to action.

One example of this is the latest video we created for L2 Think Tank. A couple weeks ago L2 approached us to design a video infographic that demonstrates the findings in their latest Digital IQ Magazines report.

Because their research is a lead generation vehicle for their memberships, the objective of the video is to increase exposure and put the report in the hands of more people.

We sprung into action and created a video that briefly explains how they ranked the digital acumen of 87 magazine brands (many of whom are our clients). We also animated infographic style findings that demonstrates the most pivotal realizations from the report.

Our animations create an approachable introduction to the research, providing the firm with the lift in downloads that increases lead generation opportunities. For more information on how we can help your brand create marketing videos that align with your business objectives, drop us a message.

Take one step inside Disney Land as a child and the place feels like a wonderland. Walk in through the gates as a marketer and it looks like the work of masterminds. Disney understands the power of brand translation, and the way they weave their image through everything makes them a perfect Sales Graphics client.

Disney came to us initially in hopes of creating a Media Sales & Marketing image for all the Disney Media brands including Disney Channel, Disney XD, Disney Online, Radio Disney, Disney Family Fun, and Disney Jr. Because every division of Disney has its own nuances, it was our responsibility to pin down the essence of every part of the whole.

Disney sent us a collection of whatever creative they had on hand, from web graphics and Keynote presentations to videos and more, and from that we took what we’ve learned over the past 50 years of presentation creation to create a unified look-and-feel for the group.

The logo morph above is an example of our easy and seamless presentation design work, and for brands who want to take their presentation management a step further, we also specialize in scaling this creative across corporate sales teams so marketers and sales teams stay on the same page.

Take a single step into Ferrari corporate and one thing is immediately clear. Every decision there is based on performance. The brand’s offices are positioned above a showroom floor that serves as a constant reminder of everything they have achieved. With a Ferrari on display there’s no doubt, this is a brand that takes presentation seriously.

For the times when Ferrari can’t fit actual cars in the conference room they rely on next best thing. Ferrari chose Sales Graphics to build their sponsorship packages and while we couldn’t quite figure out how to get the car to the top floor where our offices are, the result looks like it was built while gazing upon the source of inspiration.

The final presentation looks and feels like it was made by the same people who design the lines and contours of next year’s model. Ferrari’s presentation decisions are cutting edge and high performance, but like any good brand, they’re founded on timelessness.

We’ve all suffered through it at some point in our lives –a presentation design overloaded with text, bullet points, and extraneous data. Every slide turns into a slowly-ticking hour hand, taking countless minutes of our precious time. We all know that dull, text-saturated presentations are huge pitfalls for a company, but now we’ve got proof that excellent presentation design can actually increase attention, improve cognition, and help drive your point home. Here are a few cold hard facts that show how (and why) effective presentation design makes a difference:

1. We found that moving animation enhances product recall, perceived product values in terms of the hedonic and utilitarian dimensions, and attitude toward products that are high on the hedonic dimension,” says Yee-Lin Lai Kuan in The Effects of Moving Animation on Recal, Hedonic and Utiliatrian Perceptions and Attitude.
2. According to Judy Meyers’ “The Color of Learning” in the AP Science Database, colors aid in the process of remembering.  Color also encourages specific feelings and have particular associations.  Yellow, for example, is associated with youth.
3. Graphics make apparent the things that would take much longer to discern from heavy text or sprawling spreadsheets.
4. Based on a claim made by the U.S Department of Labor OSHA Office of Training and Education, “…retention of information three days after a meeting or other event is six times greater when information is presented by visual and oral means than when the information is presented by the spoken word alone.”
5. Animations can either augment or distract, but the difference is in how the animation is executed.  Research shows that relevant stimuli that highlight points of influence are effective, while haphazard visuals tend to create equally disorganized memories in the mind.  Long story short, animation is good, but it must be integrated strategically.

USA Network: Characters Welcome

USA Network asked us to design their Upfront presentation to match their on-air brand. Using our CustomShow® presentation software, we were able to bring their characters to life inside each slide. The presentation included interactive nagivation and a wide selection of videos.

To launch their new internal idea-generating program, The Power of Suggestion, Condé Nast turned to the award-winning design team at Sales Graphics to produce a video that showcased some of the many employees at Condé Nast with great ideas to share.

After interviewing over 40 employees and listening to their ideas for how to improve Condé Nast and generate new revenue streams, Sales Graphics edited together a sampling of their ideas and produced an engaging video that helped sell the idea through to senior management.

The “Power of Suggestion” video now lives on Condé Nast’s Intranet to help encourage more employees to share their ideas, and to help Condé Nast continue to be a leader in the media industry.