There's a first time for everything...

This week was full of new, daunting tasks. I’ve always loved learning new things that help me grow as a digital marketer and a student. This week’s big project did exactly that. I was introduced to an entirely new form of marketing; print marketing.
After having discussions with my supervisor, we both decided it would be helpful to have custom greeting cards printed that we could use to send to donors and thank them for their support. Being a non-profit organization, we have to approach marketing from a donation view point instead of a sales view point. While I consider myself pretty savvy with the Adobe Design Suite, I’ve never designed anything to be printed by a print shop before. Knowing that I lacked the knowledge necessary to take on this project alone, I reached out to one of my Visual Communications Design professors for guidance. I learned so much from my conversations with her. I was able to design a file that could be read and understood by the print shop. I also learned new terminology and best practices for print design as opposed to online design.
For example, when designing a digital graphic, you don’t have to worry about the bleed, and print quality. But to my surprise, both design practices have a lot in common. They just like to name things differently, such as the size of a graphic. Digital graphics go by pixels, or EM’s, while print goes by more standard dimensions such as inches, and points. While this project was very intimidating, I can safely say I now know the basic requirements when designing for print. I just emailed the final version of the design to Work Printing, a print shop in Baltimore, and hopefully in my next blog I can share with you the final product!
Now back to the stuff I’m good at! Digital Marketing. Another big project I took on this week was attempting to enhance Quarry Theatre’s SEO ranking. Because Quarry Theatre is a non-profit with not very much capital to invest in marketing campaigns, we need to drive visitors to the website through organic search results. I went through the website and realized there were no keywords on the homepage that emphasized that Quarry Theatre was a theatre company in Baltimore. Additionally, nowhere on the website did it say what Quarry Theatre was. While there was great copy highlighting their current projects and how people can get involved, most visitors visiting the website just want to know what the heck this organization is. I was able to re-write some of the existing copy to include keywords for Search engine optimization and more general descriptions of what Quarry Theatre is.
This week has kept me on my toes and has helped me grow more knowledgeable about the marketing industry. I’m starting to see the importance of understanding all aspects of marketing, not just the digital side of things. With this new knowledge I will continue to try and make myself a well-rounded marketer able to face anything a client throws my way…..even printing.

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