Still Cautious, Sketchy Feeling Lingers but I am Having Fun!
I’ve started to play with the idea of making a composition notebook. It seemed like a rather simple and safe option which helped put the “cautious Liz” at ease. I also knew I’d have at least 1 sale with my first idea.
Cool, I could get 1 sale… Based on the research I’ve done that already put me above a lot of others… That’s a horrible rationale!
Okay so moving on, channel the “value Liz”, “marketing Liz”, and “honest Liz” Ugh… I don’t know if I like how I’m sounding… ehh it is apt so let’s move on…
Make a Customer Persona
In short, a customer persona is a “fictional” representation of an actual customer. The easiest way to create a persona is to use yourself as the reference point. I feel I should point out that you shouldn’t make it exactly you but a generalized you.
If I’m going to make a composition notebook I need to make it something I or the younger me would have wanted. Even now as I’ve gone through the school shopping there is still a lack of goth-inspired anything school.
A Quick Note: If you are targeting kids as the end persona you should also make a customer persona for their parents, grandparents, and/or guardians.
Here’s the Persona I made for the kid version of me. I’ll be honest to a degree with a few changes it could apply to me today. Then again that’s the idea with Personas, detailed yet applicable to others.
I’ve made a Free Template you can use to make your own:
Get Your Free Customer Persona Template
There’s no catch to the “free”, click and the link and it is yours. What’s included is a Word doc or a fillable PDF so you can decide which you want to use. As well as 9 persona user avatar icons to help you get started.
Have fun with it, make it your own!
Onto the Creative!
This is where my background could shine! I’ve been creative for as long as I can remember. I have to give credit where credit is due, it’s all thanks to my dad. Every Christmas I got 2 things; socks and a sketchbook. You can’t believe how creative socks can make you!
Haha okay lame joke aside, always having a sketchbook handy was amazing. They led to an Art and Design degree. Then a career that has included Video Games, Graphic Design, Digital Media, Video, and more.
Now I wanted to get something out sooner than later. Despite having had so many sketchbooks I’ve rarely drawn consistent thematic images. So I took a page from my Freelancing/Consulting background, I often promote Canva as a tool for my clients.
Why Canva?
Simple. No, seriously it is simple to use. With a few tips to get a head-start creating some great stuff on Canva is simple. That’s exactly why I suggest it to my clients who have wanted to put on the creative hat. If it’s good enough for them, it’s good enough for me. Especially as I didn’t want to invest too much time yet.
Still Cautious… I’m Not Sure About This
I still felt like this was a bit sketchy… so I was very cautious about my time investment. Even there Canva helped reassure me as a result of how much it could handle.
So I set off to find something that would appeal to my persona. Surprisingly there were a lot of options that were appealing to the cute goth theme. I have to admit the inner child was giddy over the options. I built several mock-ups but the one element that just didn’t work for me was the little label section.
Branding, Branding, Branding!
I was so happy with the assets I found and the way I arranged them. I was hooked, I had to come up with a label that could be branded. I wanted to build a brand when it came to composition notebooks. It needed to be something that could stand out and yet be adaptive enough to work for several books.
The idea behind the brand was simple. “Ehh” is commonly associated with an expression of indifference or surprise. I liked that.
I was Having Fun!
It wasn’t for the maybe a little too detailed persona anymore. It was for kids that I wanted this brand to be appealing. But not just that, I also wanted it to have a “me” element. I didn’t even know what that meant in terms of books but cute and quirky stood out.
You can see the label in the picture. It works for the “ehh Composition” brand, it was cute, quirky, and would appeal to kids.
It started with what I had dubbed “A Cute Pastel Goth-Inspired Composition Notebook.” From there as you can see in the picture quickly went from 1 idea to 3 ideas.
Share your thoughts!