I'm Laura Marie: business

My senior year in High School taught me a few things... first, that being too busy only makes you work against yourself.. and second is that if you're going to learn anything, you have to WANT to learn it first.

Or else you. will. get. nowhere.

So we had a ridiculously blown out of proportion last project of the year.. that lasted probably over half the year.. called "Senior Projects" Bum bum buuuum! (all highschoolers cringe inside..) Anyways, it was kind of a project of your choice (like choose your death..) but you had to jump through some crazy amount of flaming hoops to get there (there being your death.. okay okay I'll stop..)

Blast to the past.. old photos are so fun.. :")

So I chose my project to be about marketing. I was starting to really get interested in photography and knew if I was ever going to work a business, marketing would need to be at the heart of it. So I began my many many late nights of reading and research. As I searched, I surprisingly became very interested in it! I enjoyed researching and learning about something that I can use to be successful! It was definitely a new experience for me.. you know, liking to read and learn.. haha But after all was said and done I was extremely proud of the amount of information I received through my own hard work!

Studying marketing taught me a lot of different things, but first and foremost it taught me that the relationship you have with your customer is always most important above everything else. As a business person, you need to appreciate each and every client and to show them that. To be honest, genuine, completely real, kind, informative, clear, and always flexible with all clients.

So this past New Year I decided to send out packages to my past 2013 clients! I am so so grateful for all the kind families and couples that have trusted me to capture their memories! What a privilege and delight! I wanted to send them something that really showed I care and how thankful I really am! By sending the packages I wanted to encourage that bond that a business owner should have with their client, a real connection and care.

So I started with a simple Thank You/Happy New Year message and some favorite prints, of course:

This year I hadn't included a printing rights form for my clients with their discs, so I figured now would be a good time to do so. I designed and printed all the papers on my own, cut them all out, threw in some favorite prints and tied it all up with a festive New Year gold ribbon! :D

Once I received my wonderful Moo business cards everything was finally together and perfect!

I had some colorful envelopes on hand that tied in pretty well with my color scheme, I filled them up and addressed them all! Ready for the post office!

A quick, fairly cheap, very delightful gift and marketing idea! I loved the response from these packages and hope all my clients enjoyed them! Who doesn't like getting some old fashioned, just for you, thoughtful snail mail?! :D

Hope you enjoyed! See you next time!
Laura Marie

Just yesterday my long awaited (seriously, like just under a year of waiting to make these and finally order them...my own fault..) business cards finally arrived!! :D I have been struggling for so long to decide on color schemes, design, logo, etc... Tossing soo many ideas in and out and in and out of my head! Well about a month ago I finally finished the front side for my card design and what I think I am going to stick with as my logo/symbol...

HUGE shout out to moo.com where I order my cards. I was blown away at their great service, packaging and quality product.

I had tossed and turned about ideas for a name for my business. I knew I loved using my own name, because its me. Its original. You just can't go wrong. But there are seriously SO many Laura Maries. So I tossed that out the window, fretted for a few long months, only to come straight back to my name. I want my business to be personal and something people feel comfortable with coming to. My clients need to know who I am and about me first and foremost before they start diving into hiring me for an event as important as a wedding. So this philosophy brought me to the idea of incorporating my name into some type of phrase that was more unique than the name itself.. ideas popping left and right, hello laura, i'm laura marie, it's me laura marie (hahaha just kidding on that one), laura marie photos, photos by laura, "enter catchy line" by laura marie .. yada yada yada. None of which I was thrilled with except really I'm Laura Marie. It was personal, automatically skipped the introduction ;), had my own name, and really just plainly stated what I want people to know. Im Laura. This is me. This is my work. My art is who I am and my goal is for my work to be produced completely, honestly, whole-heartidly by me. Plain genuine and simple.

So now that that was finally out of the way, I quickly dove into the design of my brand. (Granted my cards are really only the start of it, I at least began a solid foundation.) I found myself brainstorming ideas all the time. One day I was sitting in church (grunt grunt, nobody judge ;) ) doodling and I came up with the idea that I eventually ended up with now. From the few things I learned through my high school photoshop classes, I knew what I was essentially capable of doing on my own and scribbled down ideas from that. I got home and stayed up until I think 3 am working on it (my brain works best at night...)! Success! I had finally made a design! I quickly put together the back of my cards with my information incorporating the color scheme I decided on and wa-la! They were done!

Moo.com is a printing site that I have been following and getting emails from for nearly over a year now. I have always wanted to try them out but never had a design ready to do so! So finally I logged on and uploaded my designs from photoshop, piece of cake! Easy to use and completely painless! Now, I will say, the prices weren't the cheapest in the book, but I am a firm believer of you get what you paid for and it was totally true here! When I received the package I was so excited! I ordered 200 matte finished, rectangled, square edged cards. And wa-la! They were perfect! Exactly what I expected and more! They are so thick and such sturdy material! They will keep in so much better shape than my old ones and I feel they represent any business wonderfully!! So there is my sales pitch!