April 19 - SECURITY

Back in January I posted a similar update, one from Maxwell's Daily Reader, a book my Brother Will got for each person in my family for Christmas 2 years ago. It's a book about leadership primarily, but also on so many other positive characteristics. Every morning I read it and am glad I do, but sometimes I'm more than just glad- I'm totally amazed and appreciative for the lesson I learn from it. Today was another one of those days. :)


April 19

SECURITY

During the term of President Ronald Reagan, leaders of seven industrial nations were meeting at the White House to discuss economic policy. During that meeting Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau strongly upbraided British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, telling her that she was all wrong and that her policies wouldn't work. She stood there in front of him with her head up, listening until he was finished. Then she walked away.

Reagan went up to her and said, "Maggie, he should never have spoken to you like that. He was out of line, just entirely out of line. Why did you let him get away with that?"

Thatcher looked at Reagan and answered, "A woman must know when a man is being simply childish."

That story surely typifies Margaret Thatcher. She appeared to have no doubts about herself or her beliefs - and she was absolutely secure in her leadership as a result. That is the case for all great leaders.

Secure leaders are able to believe in others because they believe in themselves. They aren't arrogant; they know their strengths and weaknesses and respect themselves. When their people perform well, they don't feel threatened. They go out of their way to bring the best people together and then build them up so that they will perform at the highest level. And when a secure leader's team succeeds, it brings him great joy. He sees that as the highest compliment he can receive.

-The 21 Indispensable Qualities of a Leader

DO YOU BELIEVE IN YOURSELF ENOUGH TO GRACIOUSLY TAKE THE HEAT AS A LEADER?


I think this concept can and should be be applied to everyone's life, whether you're in a leading role or not! Read that last paragraph over again... It can just as easily say "Secure PEOPLE are able to believe in others because they believe in themselves." It's true! It's about taking criticism in, but not taking it personally. And more than that- It's about knowing yourself and your abilities well enough, and TRUSTING in them and yourself, to decide when to take criticism and when to tune it out completely because it's just untrue. Definitely something I need to get better at. But hey I'm trying.. :)

Hopefully you guys found this to be as helpful as I did!

GREAT 8 CREATIVE Final logo concept

Welp, after lots of great feeback from friends on Twitter and Facebook, I've been able to come up with what I strongly feel is the winning design for GREAT 8 CREATIVE! As always though, I'm open to suggestions and thoughts on the concept and appreciate them all, so fire away if something comes to mind!

See the other concepts and read the full story on this design process here: GREAT 8 CREATIVE logo concepts

The almost-final GREAT 8 CREATIVE logo:


Special thanks to the following for their time and brilliance!
Ryan Weeger
Michael Durwin
Kevin Garcia
Lucas Tetrault
Elizabeth Adams Bean
Riley Dickens
Chris

GREAT 8 CREATIVE logo concepts

Story time...

As you might know already, I'm starting up a new business called GREAT 8 CREATIVE. To give you some background... I'm basically going to be taking every successful move I've learned through running Huddy Design, and using it to start fresh as a more professional and specialized creative design business. Since I'm no longer a Hudson (got married to Ryan Weeger this past November), the nickname "Huddy" won't catch on to new clients- hence the reason for the business name change. It will aim towards helping small business grow by providing custom website designs at "template" prices, custom logo designs and a small variety of custom Identity design. Ideally, it will also be targeted at athletic businesses and/or people such as coaches, trainers, small gyms and more since that's where my background is... all things sports.

The reason why I decided to call it Great 8 Creative is very personal to me. I'm the youngest of 8 kids and to put it simply, I LOVE my family. And there's an immeasurable impact my role as "the baby" of the Hudson clan has had on me, both as a person and as a business owner. My upbringing and what I've learned from my parents and my siblings is something I'll be forever grateful for. And I definitely plan on using and honoring what I've learned from it all, as the morale of my new company.

In short, my family is honest. My family is so compassionate. It's so unique it's almost weird.. but definitely unique. in a good way. Every one of us is extremely driven. And it's always just flat-out FUN to be around each other. I won't get into too much detail about why or when or how my family is all of those things but anyone who knows us can see that each quality is obvious. The "Great 8" has grown and will continue to grow for years and years to come, but what's so awesome about that is I still wholeheartedly believe that all of these characteristics, all of these qualities that have become our family's backbone, have stayed intact. I know they always will too. And they're exactly what I want to bring to the table with Great 8 Creative.

HONEST. Here to help clients grow their business, no matter what.
COMPASSIONATE. Genuinely wanting to help others find success and just a better situation for themselves.
UNIQUE. Building high-quality products and great client/designer relationships - something that no other freelance graphic+web designer can truly replicate.
DRIVEN. Steam-rolling our way through until we get the results our clients wanted.
FUN. None of that stiff, big-design-firm vibe here. Humor, personality, good relationships, real conversations between client/designer... it's all more than welcomed, it's expected.

So that's what I want to emulate in the new company and that's the look I'm going for in my logo. Maybe not all of these things at once... that's what my experience and brand will nourish over time, but obviously I want my logo to be a good representation of what Great 8 Creative will do and be.

That all said........ I would LOVE your input on these concepts!!! Any comments, good critique, bad critique, ideas, thoughts, anything- it's all greatly appreciated!!


#1) initial concept, monogram of lowercase "g" and the number 8:



#2) a different take on the monogram, combining an uppercase "G" (definitely more subtle in this one) and the 8.. trying to go for something more energetic and unexpected (definitely a rough draft so don't worry too much about the rough lines/points.. I'll clean them up eventually!):



#3) Trying something more off-the-wall/less expected. Replacing the use of the 8 with the 8 circles and focusing more on the "GREAT" part of the company name. I kinda like the symbolism I was going for in this one, with the whole story behind the "Great 8" ..how we've all kinda stuck together to form something great. I also think this one has a lot of potential for when I add color, could really bring it to life:



but what are your thoughts??

Maxwell Daily Reader - January 8

Last year for Christmas, my brother, Will Hudson, bought me a copy of John C. Maxwell's The Maxwell Daily Reader. And I LOVE it. Every morning, I read the short entry related to leadership, and pretty often, it really makes me think. Today's entry is no different and I definitely want to share it because I think literally everyone could benefit from putting it to use:

JANUARY 8

POINT OUT PEOPLE'S STRENGTHS

People often make a mistake in personal development when they focus too much on their weaknesses. As a result, they spend all their time trying to shore up those weaknesses instead of maximizing the strengths they possess. Similarly, it's a mistake to focus on the weaknesses of others. The self-proclaimed "experts" who spend their time telling others what's wrong with them never win with people. Most people simply avoid them.

Instead, we need to focus on finding people's strengths and pointing them out. Most people have strengths they rarely get to use. Those strengths may be job skills, knowledge, general abilities, personality characteristics, or other attributes. I once read an interesting fact based on research, saying that every person can do at least one thing better than ten thousand people. Think about that! You possess an ability that can't be matched by anyone in your town or neighborhood... or in your college or university... or in your company or maybe even in your industry.

Have you discovered that ability? If so, you are probably well on your way to pursuing your life's purpose. If you haven't, wouldn't you love it if someone came alongside you and pointed it out? How would you feel about that person? I bet you'd be pretty grateful.

Why not try to become that person in someone else's life? When you do, you just might be helping others to discover the thing God created them to do.

-25 Ways to Win with People

POINT OUT A GREAT STRENGTH OF SOMEONE IN YOUR LIFE TODAY.

Taking Care of Business! part 3: MY DOCS ONLINE

Part 3 of this series (just recapping all the projects we've completed over the past couple months!) talks about the work done for My Docs Online, a secure online file transfer service that's been a success since 1999. Huddy Design created the new logo, redesigned the website, and developed a custom Flash Banner for the new My Docs Online home page.

Steve Campbell, co-founder of My Docs Online, contacted me a while back about a complete redesign of their company identity. As usual, I started with the logo (You can check out the logo redesign process here) and shortly after, moved on to redesigning the website. I'll never forget one of Steve's first comments to me about the original website design: "We don't think our website is old school, we KNOW it's old school!" too funny. TRUE at the time, but funny. ;) So, I knew my plan of action was clear: carefully redesign their website without shocking long-time clients by the completely updated look. Incorporate a modern feel to match the new logo, implementing current trends in web design to reflect their place in the market as a top competitor- bringing modernism and their long-lasting reputation together.

The old My Docs Online logo:


The NEW My Docs Online logo:



So, I got to work on the new design. I knew right away that I wanted to use a custom Flash Banner for the home page, and I'm so Glad Steve was on the same page from the start. They're a huge trend right now for a reason: Flash banners are AWESOME for getting a lot of information across without making people feel overwhelmed, and they can be used to help present the company's biggest selling points in an entertaining and effective fashion, when designed in a sort of tabbed format. And since Flash also gives developers the flexibility to build interactivity into any Flash component, this also gives users the ability to control which points they want to see and when (if developed effectively, of course). This makes any website even more user-friendly because it's just fun and more intriguing! So professional stock photography, catchy taglines for each selling point, and custom controls (pause/play, skip to a slide) and transitions all came into play for this project.

The home page design, incorporating the current trend of using a Flash Banner to communicate the company's best selling points:

concept 1a
concept 1b
concept 2a
concept 2b

Once Steve and his team decided on the new look, I got to work on the development phase of the Flash component. Aside from developing the visuals, I also wanted to build it in a way that the client could easily update himself; an XML file was developed and utilized to accomplish this part of the task, which included the amount of time each slide was displayed, image paths to read in, and all titles and captions to be displayed. So all of these are now accessible to the Client for easy updates to the content the Flash Banner displays... Images, titles, captions, timing of each slide- it’s all there for him to update whenever he wants to. A great time-saver for both of us, and ultimately, a huge money saver for him to be able to make changes himself!

the final design, live on the all-new My Docs Online website:


See the Flash Banner and the rest of the new design in action at www.mydocsonline.com and read what Steve has to say about the new look here, on the MDO blog. (Thanks for the shout out!)

Steve and the rest of the My Docs Online team were so easy to work with, it was awesome. Thanks to them for the opportunity!!! Best of luck with the new look. :)

Taking Care of Business! part 2: STORE-IT

Soon after the re-design and development of Hudson Shuffleboards wrapped up, Huddy Design signed on Charlie Koeller, Founder and President of Store-It, a large scale storage facility company based in Montana. Store-It was started to give owners of boats, RVs and other large modes of transportation, a place to keep them. Store-It also provides general storage containers as well for everyday storage needs. Given its location (Montana, right by Flathead Lake) and lack of other storage options in the area, Charlie has come up with such a smart, practical solution for a company if you ask me! The only problem he really had was his website. It had no SEO techniques incorporated, which meant the only business he was getting was by word of mouth. And the layout design was.... well, let's just say Charlie and I agreed, a major facelift was past due!! :)

Before:





If you're a graphic/web designer, I'm sure you can imagine how excited I was to completely transform his web presence. :) With Charlie's goal in mind (to keep things as simple and clean as possible), I got to work. We definitely utilized the awesome work of his photographer in the extremely minimalist design of his new website, and kept the overall tone of the design as professional and straight-forward as possible.

The result of which is this 3-page, elastic layout (content scales automatically to fit the size of the user's browser):





To see the Store-It website in action, visit www.Store-It.us.com

All the best to Charlie and the Store-It crew! Pleasure to work with you guys. :)

Taking Care of Business! part 1: HUDSON SHUFFLEBOARDS

A LOT has been going on for Huddy Design since July 15th, let me tell you. :) All great things, and I am so grateful for that. I'm hoping to do a more detailed review on some of these projects in the future, but I just want to do a quick recap for now... short and sweet!

First up: HUDSON SHUFFLEBOARDS; ECOMMERCE WEBSITE RE-DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT (V2)

As you may know, Hudson Shuffleboards is run by my brother, Will Hudson. Within just a few short years, Will has taken over the shuffleboard market and his boards are now a top commodity to some of the biggest dealers in the market, even Amazon! His tagline is "Quality Shuffleboards at an Unbeatable Price" and his target market is just about anyone who wants to have a good time. :)

So, when Will asked me to take on the redesign and development, I kept all that in mind; "Design something that reflects quality above the competitors, unbeatable but fair and respectable prices, and incorporate an easy-going and entertained lifestyle... something that people of all ages would want to be a part of."

As always, a handful of other specs came into play which I might review sometime later. I'll just say that the main goal of this project, along with incorporating the overall feel I just talked about, was converting Version 1 of the site from being in 90% Flash, into a completely more optimized layout- one that was also a lot easier and just more accessible for Client updates and faster user-navigation.

Before:



After:



Like any piece of art- no matter its form- this project will never be completely done as there are a few items we'd like to enhance a little more. But so far, the response has been great for Will. Which makes me happy too! :)

You can check out the rest of Will's site at www.HudsonShuffleboards.com

Next up: STORE-IT; WEBSITE DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT