Hi guys, it is time to buckle in, because
this video is going to be a long one.
Today we are going to talk about YouTube channel
branding - not about the specific amount of
like pixels that each type of banner needs,
because let’s be honest, YouTube and Facebook
and Twitter change their layout like every
week.
Instead, I’m going to talk you through my
entire process of redesigning OhhmyAnnie’s
channel, which I did for a presentation at
the recent YouTube conference ClamourCon.
So just in case you missed that talk or you
couldn’t be at the conference, I figured
I would also show it to you guys right here.
But, before I get into it, I want to tell
you guys that while this video is totally
free, I have also designed a supplemental
e-book.
It has even more tips than are in this video,
it has questionnaires for defining your brand,
basically a step by step guide for how to
redesign all of your channel branding.
So, you can get that in the description right
down below for only five dollars, or if you
want to get it for free you actually can for
the next 48 hours.
I'm going to be sending it out for free to
every single person who signs up for my mailing
list.
The mailing list is brand new I really want
to get you guys on board so I can share everything
that I'm working on.
So, all the details about all of that is going
to be down in the description.
Alright, so, I begin any channel redesign
project, really any redesign project, by doing
an audit of where we’re starting.
Here’s a clip of Annie’s videos to give
you a sense of her channel.
Hey guys, it's Annie, and today I'm doing
a style video that I haven't done much of
on my channel.
Hey guys, it's Annie and I am currently having
the worst hair day ever.
Hey guys, it's Annie welcome to my room tour
video.
Super fun videos, right?
Annie and I actually have a very similar aesthetic,
so this was not a difficult project for me
to take on.
But, as well-produced as her current videos
are, it doesn’t quite translate to her branding.
On her YouTube channel, she has this bright
neon banner that doesn’t really tell you
anything about who she is.
She does use the same font on her Twitter
banner, but there’s a lot of wasted space,
and then her end screen is totally different,
I don’t know what’s happening there.
Her thumbnails are pretty good, they definitely
convey that the videos are for young women,
lots of bright colors, good photography.
And I think Instagram is where she’s really
shining, because she has a good eye for color
and composition.
So, before I start designing, it’s always
important to think about what the goals of
this design.
I asked Annie what her goals were for her
channel, and she wrote back that she wants
to get a million subscribers, get sponsorship
deals, and continue making a variety of videos
while keeping her audience engaged.
So that says to me as the designer that her
branding should look professional, because
she wants to look trustworthy to brands.
It should have messaging that encourages people
to subscribe.
And since she wants to make a variety of videos
and the common them between all of them is
going to be Annie, her face and her personality
should be front and center.
So again, we haven’t started doing any design
work yet.
There is so much prep work to do before you
even open Photoshop.
It’s so important to make sure that you
really understand the personality and the
vibe of the person or the company that you’re
designing for.
So, I chose my favorite Instagram photos of
hers, and I also challenged myself to brainstorm
a list of words that I thought described her
channel.
This is also a great time to define your target
audience - for Annie that would probably be
women between 13 to 35, but mainly focusing
on women in their 20s who are in college or
just out of college.
In my list of words, I’ve included phrases
like healthy living, aspirational, cool girl,
because from watching Annie’s recent videos,
I think she wants her audience to want to
be her.
You know, she's this cute, pretty girl living
a fun, trendy life in Los Angeles, but she’s
no Kylie Jenner, she’s still accessible,
and she wants to encourage her audience to
live their own best lives as well.
So back to the photos, since these are from
her own Instagram, Annie is already doing
this - this isn't a mood board of what she
wishes her channel could look like - it’s
based on what her Instagram looks like right
now.
I also gathered my favorite screenshots of
her recent YouTube videos, again so I can
make sure the branding matches what she's
already doing.
Alright, our next step, and this is probably
my favorite part of the entire process, is
to make a mood board of external images.
I found these images on the Instagrams and
the websites of companies that I thought that
Annie and her audience would shop at.
This includes Forever21, Target, Sephora.
And I also looked up trendy topics like Coachella,
bath bombs, holographic.
And even though there are a lot of photographs
in there which is totally fine, I also paid
attention to pull a variety of images that
have text on them, whether that's the banner
from a website or the packaging from a bottle
of hair dye.
I definitely got inspired by these overlapping
gradients in the Coachella schedule, that
look is so in right now.
Also this typography with the text outline
kind of repeating through the shadow.
And this handwritten text on top of some pastel
colors, I think that is so pretty.
I referred back to this mood board over and
over, anytime that I got stuck in the design
process.
So ok, now we can open Photoshop.
This is the time to play with colors and gradients
and textures and fonts and just experiment.
Really get to know the letters that you’re
working on, try them in a ton of different
typefaces, if you’re doing some hand-lettering,
just write them over and over again.
Look at them in all caps versus lowercase,
look at the shape that the letters make.
Here you can see that outlined shadow that
I had been inspired by, also a couple different
gradient ideas.
And also this gradient triangle pattern, which
will be popping up again later.
But before we get to that, a great building
block for any kind of redesign project, especially
if it is personality focused like this one,
is a photoshoot.
Super fun, right?
You basically get to be America's Next Top
Model for the afternoon.
When you're planning your photoshoot, you
really want your face, your makeup, your hairstyle,
your clothing, to be memorable and recognizable
because your look is as much a part of your
branding as anything else.
Luckily, Annie had just gotten these photos
done for a video where she dyed her hair,
but I want to point out one specific reason
why they’re so great.
It’s because they’re on a blank, blurry
background.
If the background was just plain white, it
would be kind of boring, but if it was too
busy, it would be hard to layer other elements
on top.
But a blurry textured background like this
is easy to extend with the Clone Stamp Tool,
and it has a little visual interest without
being too crazy.
Also Annie’s hair is a bright, recognizable
color, so we don’t even have to add that
many extra design elements to this photo,
because it's already bright and colorful on
its own.
So, speaking of photos, Annie was using three
different profile pictures on YouTube, Twitter,
and Instagram.
And her hair was different colors in every
single one.
So, I think that we can replace them with
this photo from her photoshoot, I just did
a little bit of editing to it to smooth out
her skin and make sure the colors really pop.
I also put a subtle gradient overlay over
the photo, which adds a little bit more color
and makes it match those screenshots from
her videos that I had shown you guys earlier.
If you’re going to be successful online,
you really need consistency, because you don’t
want someone to find you and love all of your
content on YouTube and then go try to look
you up on Instagram and not be sure if it's
the same person.
But if you have all the same photos and all
the same branding across all of your different
social media, it just looks like one large,
professional body of work.
So ok, we are a good couple of hours into
the design process and I'm finally going to
do some real design work.
I decided to start with the endscreen, because
I always like to just jump right in with something
that has a lot of different elements to it.
You can mess around literally forever trying
every single color and font combination trying
to find the perfect one.
Spoiler alert, there is no perfect one.
I find all of that so much easier to narrow
down when you’re working towards a specific
outcome that has specific restraints.
So, since we really want to make Annie’s
face the central point of her branding, I
included one of the photos here on the side
and I brought back that triangle design that
I had mentioned earlier.
Adding a gradient to that triangle texture
and making it look like it’s behind her
is super modern and it definitely matches
a lot of the images from our mood board.
The greens and the blues contrast with Annie’s
pink hair and they add some visual interest
that’s unique to this design.
For text, I decided to go with hand-drawn-looking
fonts, since I think that matches the accessible,
trendy vibe that we’re going for.
The fonts that I used are called Moon Flower
and Sunrise, and I’ll link them right down
below.
I also added these fun arrows, which are from
The Noun Project.
This is an amazing site that has thousands
and thousands of royalty free vector icons.
You pay 40 dollars a year and then you have
unlimited access to everything on the site,
it's incredible.
So instead of messing around trying to make
a hand-drawn Twitter bird myself, I can just
go to the Noun Project, type in Twitter, and
oh look, there's our perfect icon.
I can just download it and use it in seconds.
Also, that’s another tip - don’t feel
like you need to use the official logos of
all of the other social sites out there.
Usually the colors all kind of clash with
each other and with your branding, and I think
that people looking this can still understand
that we’re talking about Twitter and Instagram.
Alright, so, that is the endscreen finished,
let’s move on to the YouTube banner.
Honestly, that first design element, the endscreen,
always takes the longest, and from there you
can adapt what you've already done into every
other type of banner that you need to make.
So on the YouTube banner, we’re using the
same photo and the same background.
Also the same triangle pattern and the same
two fonts.
I did bring in another gradient to add another
pop of color, so don’t be afraid to bring
in new elements as you need them, just don’t
feel like you need to reinvent the wheel with
every graphic that you make.
One more little pro-tip - these little dashes
here actually aren't from the Noun Project.
They are from the icon set that goes with
the font Playlist.
Icon typefaces like these are a really great
way to get extra little design elements so
that you don’t need to draw each one yourself.
Now I know that some of you guys were hoping
that I was going to sir down here and do an
full on walk-through of designing every single
piece that I ended up with.
Unfortunately that would have made the video
like 4 hours long, and also it's a lot of
pressure on me, because I tried a lot of different
things that all looked really bad and I don’t
want you guys judging me for it.
But, to give you a sense of the process, here
is an early version of the banner that I was
designing for Annie.
It's cute, but it’s bringing in way too
many different elements from what I had already
designed on the endscreen.
And all of the pastel colors are starting
to look a little juvenile.
That’s something to be careful of if you
make the same types of videos as Annie or
as me - pinks and purples and pastels are
great, they’re my favorite colors, but if
your target audience is people in their 20s,
try to make sure you’re using those colors
in very deliberate way, so that you don’t
accidentally design a banner for children.
Alright, from here we can move on to Annie’s
Twitter banner.
And as I said, this part of the process goes
really quickly, because we’re literally
just moving around elements to a different
sized banner.
And then we're also just changing a little
bit of the text so that it's optimized for
Twitter instead of for YouTube.
So, ok, let's talk thumbnails.
I could make another video that is as long
as this one just talking about thumbnails.
In fact, I do have two videos all about thumbnails
- one where I do a full walk-through of designing
a thumbnail and a second one with just 10
more tips and tricks for your thumbnails.
So I'm gonna link both of those videos right
down below.
But for now, these are Annie’s thumbnails
that we started with, and this is how I redesigned
them.
Now, Annie’s thumbnails are not bad, trust
me, I have seen so much worse.
Her photography is great, the text is legible,
the colors are eye-catching for her audience.
And ok, I actually do think there is a valid
argument to be made for less polished thumbnails
and less polished branding overall when you
are trying to encourage your audience to go
out and take some kind of action.
Whether that’s a weight loss video, a DIY
tutorial, a makeup tutorial - if you’re
trying to get people to do the thing that
you’re trying to teach them, I think that
people can get intimidated by highly polished,
professional branding, because they think
that this content is not for them.
I do think that sometimes “bad” design
can make a project seem more accessible.
If it’s too over-designed, people might
think, oh I couldn’t have made that, therefore
it's not for me.
It really depends on if you want to be more
aspirational or more accessible to your audience
and that's something that each person has
to decide for themselves.
But ok, that was a bit of a tangent, just
something that's been on my mind lately.
Let's get back to Annie's thumbnails.
I only had to make a couple small adjustments
to make them match our channel branding.
I don’t want to make each thumbnail super
matchy-matchy, because the videos aren’t
in a series, and so the number one priority
is to make sure that they're eye-catching
in the sub box and in search.
But, it does make designing your thumbnails
go quicker if you have a template to work
off of, so I used the same fonts that we used
in the banner, I used some of the same gradients
and then I let the colors of the photos inform
the rest of the colors in the thumbnails.
So, now these three thumbnails are kind of
in the same design family as the rest of our
branding, but as just like they say about
eyebrows, they should be sisters, not twins.
Alright, so now that we have all of these
elements made, we can take them apart again
into a style guide.
This is especially helpful if you have different
people making different graphics for you because
you can give them all the same style guide
and then you know that all of it is gonna
match.
But even if it’s just you working on your
channel, a style guide lets you see all of
your elements all in one place.
Let’s say Annie decides to start a Facebook
fan page, now she can quickly put together
a Facebook banner just by rearranging all
of those different elements from our style
guide.
You can also use those same assets to make
a website, which will make you look legitimate
and professional to brands which is where
all the money comes from.
I made this
one for Annie in about 20 minutes using one
of those drag and drop website builders.
And then we can also make merch.
Obviously these slogans are a little cheesy,
but we have our fonts, our logo, our triangle
pattern, so if Annie ever decided that she
wanted to sell workout clothes to go with
her weight loss series, now she has a great
starting point to build from.
So that’s about it.
We can take a look at the before and after
to see how much more cohesive everything looks.
And be sure to always keep in mind why you’re
doing a branding project like this.
When people see professional branding, they
see that the product they’re consuming is
professional, it has thought put into it,
and they’re more likely to trust Annie to
offer consistently good content and trust
her thoughts and ideas.
If people come across her content on two different
sites, they’re more likely to remember who
she is and connect the two together.
So, if you’re not a graphic designer, it
can be so easy to get so overwhelmed by all
of the different possibilities in visual branding.
I mean, I am a graphic designer, and I still
get a little panicked at the beginning of
every single project that I work on.
I think that’s why being an outsider coming
into her channel for the first time knowing
nothing about her was so helpful.
I didn’t have any preconceptions about who
she was or the type of content she maybe used
to make and isn't making anymore.
Instead I could watch her latest 10 videos
and then make her branding design based on
who she is right now.
If you’re redesigning your own channel,
you might want to ask a friend or co-worker
who hasn’t seen your videos before watch
some of them and then try to describe to you
what they think of your channel.
Not what their opinion is on whether the videos
are good or not, just how they would describe
them, what they think your goals are, what
they think your target audience is.
And that is so helpful in understanding your
own content without all of your personal biases
clouding it all up.
In the E-book I’m selling right down below,
I have an entire questionnaire just for this
purpose, and trust me, it is so helpful in
defining your brand.
Honestly, I think that when you’re working
for someone else, it’s a lot easier to just
pick some design elements and go with it.
Especially, when you have a deadline, and
now just a, oh maybe I’ll redesign my channel
some day.
Honestly, if I had chosen to make this background
stars instead of triangles, would it have
been wildly different?
No not really.
I could have made any number of minor changes
to each separate element in the design and
the overall design still would have been pretty
much the same.
So try not to overthink it, don't drive yourself
crazy with it.
It is totally free to change your YouTube
banner as much as you want, so if next week
you see a little tweak that you want to make,
just do ahead and do it.
You just have to get to the point where you
have a finished product that you can go in
and adjust, and you don’t want to get stuck
in design purgatory trying out every single
little combination trying to find "the best
one."
Because, and this is a little graphic design
secret from me to you, there is no such thing
as an objectively "best design."
And as soon as you understand that, so much
pressure just feels lifted off your shoulders.
There is still so much that I could critique
and change with what I already designed for
Annie.
The saturation on her hair isn’t quite consistent
across each element, I should really go in
and fix that.
Also the font is a little hard to read since
it is all the same weight - so I could in
and experiment with small caps, or making
you know, the first letter bold.
But that is all nitpicky stuff, I just want
to show you guys that even though I am presenting
this to you as the example, it is definitely
not perfect and there is no way for it to
be perfect because I could always find more
little things that I want to change.
So at some point you just have to upload it
and then be good with it.
So, ok, I know that was a lot.
I hope you guys aren't too overwhelmed.
Again, if you want the e-book that has even
more tips and little worksheets for you to
fill out and really help you define your brand,
you can get that down in the description for
five dollars, or if you're watching this in
the first 48 hours that it's posted, you can
get the e-book for free by signing up for
my mailing list.
And don't worry about getting spammed by my
mailing list, I'm going to be sending out
one weekly newsletter, just kind of an overview
of everything I'm working on so that you don't
miss them.
I'm going to be featuring some of your photos,
I'm going to have some exclusive sneak peeks
of some of the craft projects that I'm working
on, I might have some discounts for some merch.
Trust me, this newsletter is the place to
be and it is completely free, so head on down
to the description to sign up for that.
Oh, and one more thing and then I'm going
to let you go, I know that some of you guys
are probably like, I mean yeah, that sounds
great, but it seems like a lot of work, how
do I just hire someone to do it for me?
I’ll be totally honest, I’m not taking
on a lot of freelance projects right now,
but I might make an exception of the right
project comes along, so if you want to talk,
feel free to email me at karenkavett@gmail.com.
Though for best results, I do recommend watching
my How to Hire a Freelance Graphic Designer
video first, I'm gonna link that right down
below.
So be sure to subscribe if you liked this
video - I’m going to have tons of summer
DIY projects coming out in the next few weeks
as well as even more graphic design videos.
If you want even more videos about designing
for YouTube, I have made so many videos on
that topic and I have put them all into a
playlist, so I'm going to link that down below
as well, you can learn all about designing
thumbnails, business cards, resumes, everything.
So leave me a comment if you have any questions
about any of this, and if you made it to the
very end of the video, leave a comment that
has the words Ampersand Squad in it, because
you put a lot of time into this video, and
I thank you for that.
And now we're gonna go have our own little
secret special club down in the comments section.
So thank you guys so much for watching, I'll
see you guys next time.
