Who is the Blogger I’m so glad that you are reading my first blog post right now. But before I get really overwhelmed with the writing of this blog post, permit me to introduce myself and share a bit of my interesting experiences with you first. I am David Clement Oluwasegun. I’m a digital marketer, a graphic designer and a brand consultant….
Who is the Blogger
I’m so glad that you are reading my first blog post right now. But before I get really overwhelmed with the writing of this blog post, permit me to introduce myself and share a bit of my interesting experiences with you first.
I am David Clement Oluwasegun. I’m a digital marketer, a graphic designer and a brand consultant.
MY NINE YEAR JOURNEY TO THE WORLD OF BRANDING
My love for branding started when I was only a little boy. I was just 6 years of age when I started drawing. Little did I know that drawing is also an aspect of branding and that drawing was a definition of something that was locked up in me. My love for drawing increased the day my dad drew a school boy carrying a bag on his back for me which I so much admired. So in a nutshell, let’s say I inherited the gift of drawing from my dad, even though he is not an artist. My dad is a clergy man and an auditor.
When I got to class 3, almost two-third of my class mates would come to me to draw for them because I could really draw. I wouldn’t mind then because drawing is what I loved to do, even for others.
When I finished my JSCE (Junior Secondary Certificate Examination), I began to work as a sales boy for my mum’s friend who sells pastries somewhere in Ilorin, Nigeria. I was only 12 years old then. I used to earn ₦200 per day. We used to work for 4 to 5 hours at most everyday between the hours of 7:30am to 12pm depending on how fast the sales went. But we often close by 11am.
I would always go to a nearby cyber café every day after work to familiarize myself with the computer and the internet. Most times, I purchase 20 minutes at ₦40 (20% of my daily earnings). This exposed me to the social world, most especially, Facebook. If the world was like today as at then, I would have enrolled for a digital skill that year.
When I got to my final year at high school, I enrolled as an apprentice in an art studio where I began to learn more about drawing, painting and even sculpture making. Within few months, my drawing improved, and then I learnt how to shade with different types of drawing pencils such as the graphite pencils, the charcoal pencils and even the colour pencils. I also learnt how to customize cloths with mesh and how to write on the wall by daubing stencils. Stencil is a sheet of material (metal, plastic, cardboard, waxed paper, silk, etc.) that has been perforated with a pattern (printing or a design); ink or paint can pass through the perforations to create the printed pattern on the surface below.
I knew about Corel Draw and graphic design in that art studio and fell in love with it, but was never exposed to it there. Maybe because our instructor wanted us to learn step by step, I wouldn’t know. But stencil drawing and cutting is what we are required to practice most of the days. Our instructor would instruct us to create new fonts on stencils every day. Although it was fun; I enjoyed it but sooner or later after practicing it for 8 solid months, I got bored of it by the time I was done with my WASSCE in 2016. In a simple word, I quitted.
Within few months I got a job in the marketing department of Arla Foods. We marketed Dano Milk which is a diary consumable part of their products. I worked there for few months before getting a job in a business center nearby as a computer operator. I suddenly came across Corel Draw which was installed on one of those laptops I used to operate at work on a blessed sunny day. I began to practice it on my own without any external assistance. I started playing with the tools day after day, I shifted to the fonts and even colours. With time, I practiced how to design logos and other things. With my vast personal exposure with designing, I applied to some more professional posts in Multinational companies and alas I was engaged in one of the top cereal producing multinational companies in Nigeria.
In early 2019, I worked as a Brand Ambassador to Kellogg’s Tolaram. My major work was to brand events when we sampled about 1,500 institutions (83%) of the basic schools in Ilorin. Working in Kellogg’s improved my branding abilities. I would hang banners outside the vicinity of the school, raise up roll up banners and arrange pop up tables containing disposable branded cups of Coco-Pops. I also learnt about the use of Mascot in branding. This system of branding is a best thing since sliced bread.
Logos, colors and other design elements bring brands to life. Graphic designers hold the keys to these elements and put in long hours of work. It is important for a graphic designer to stay inspired so that their creative juices can keep flowing. So I continued to practice graphic design to stay inspired. I was introduced to Pixel Lab (a mobile app for graphic design) by my friend who is also a graphic designer. He tuned my mind from the frequency of mediocrity by teaching me the psychology of colours, the psychology of fonts and shapes and also advised me to make research about the basic things he taught me about graphic design.
My Own Brand
I am the founder of Dara Expressions, a brand which focuses on building and rebuilding brands with 21st Century branding strategies. I launched my brand in Dec 2019 with the designs I did with pixel lab; in fact, I also designed my brand logo with pixel lab. My brand has worked for several reputable companies in Nigeria, such as His Grace Events, Ace wears, Canaan Chicken, Renowned Stitches and even A.O.S Language and Linguistics Institute Ltd. A.O.S Academy has made more than ₦786,000 in 3 months while Canaan chicken has sold about 850 fresh chickens from the beginning of the lockdown till date (2 months) and still counting as a result of my brand positioning input to their marketing and operational departments. I will be talking about the amazing ways they did it in some of my blog posts, I’m sure you wouldn’t want to miss that. And one thing I would like to inform you that the ways are not much costly, but it definitely has to do with language used in communicating your brand and how effectively you talk and communicate with your chosen business audience without even knowing or meeting them in person.
Based on my knowledge and experience in branding, the means of communication; language is often distorted and impaired in most branding campaigns. So, my blog writings are going to be centered on:
THE LANGUAGE OF BRANDING: BASIC & LINGUISTIC ELEMENTS TO CONSIDER IN DEVELOPING A SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS BRAND
Before I go into that, I would like to make you understand what branding actually is.WHAT IS BRANDING
Branding has been defined by so many scholars and marketers in different ways, but when you take a careful look at their definitions, they are all trying to say the same thing. I do agree that branding is not limited to drawing alone. Branding in a simple word means the act of creating a strongly persuasive and positive (might be negative, depending on professionalism) perception about a person, a product, or a company (I will be talking about business branding). In other words, branding is a language. It is a process whereby the business is represented by a symbol or logo, colour(s), font(s) and even specific words. I called it a process because brand development is not a day’s job. There is a popular saying that “Rome was not built in a day”, meaning that you can’t build a brand in just a day. Most successful brands were built within 5 to 7 years, some even decades; in fact brand building never ends unless the business ceases to exist. Apart from the other brands I’m building based on consultations, my brand is also still under construction.
Branding is a very critical aspect of a business that cannot be ignored. It is a language itself because it communicates a perception to the society. In other words, it can build up or make your business imperfect.
A SUCCESSFUL BRAND SAMPLE
When you hear Coca-Cola, what comes to your mind?
In your subconscious mind, you begin to think about their brand colour which is red, the unique bottle shape, the lettermark logo (hint: I will be talking about “types and effects of logo in 21st century competitive market” in some of my blog writings) and things elating to it. Agree with me or not, Coca-Cola has created a reputation already. Your brand is your story. It’s your collection of values, forged by ideas and experiences. I’ve started with mine already. It is time to create or rebuild yours.BASIC AND LINGUISTICS ELEMENTS OF BRANDING
Here are the basic elements to consider in developing a brand which I would be talking about in following posts;
Target audience
Brand perception
Brand promise
Brand values
Brand voice and language
Brand positioning
I hope to see you in the following posts. If you have really enjoyed this post and learnt a bit from my experience and stories, kindly like and drop a comment. You can also share this post to your friends on social media via the links below. And if you would like to contact me, visit the professional bio for my contacts. Take note, I would be dropping my blog articles every Saturday, God willing. See you all next weekend!