The power of before-and-after

As designers and artistic people, I think it comes naturally for most of us to view the existing logos, signs and truck wraps that clients bring to us, and think about how much better we could create something for them—and how that would help their business so much more. Given our years of experience, that makes sense. But the layperson certainly has a much more difficult time seeing past what they currently have. It’s harder for them to understand how a different approach might present their business not only in a better light, but have that translate into better sales for their business.

We knew that our designs were resulting in dramatic improvements for our clients. But up until a few years ago, we had not done a great job showcasing many of these success stories and using visuals like before-andafters to highlight the radical transformations which have taken place for our clients. We had done a good job talking about financial results of rebranding, but we probably didn’t show people visually what those transformations looked like.

Of course, financial data is a language most clients can understand. When you have hard data, you can say, “Before the rebrand, this company did x amount of revenue, and one year after, they did y amount…” Now you’ve helped quantify their return on investment. If you can showcase how a business had doubled in revenue in two years, do you think they’d think the sign you’re proposing, or the new wrap design/rebranding would not be a worthwhile investment?