Betsy Schantz started Serenity Bodyworks and Massage out of a desire to have a business of her own and a passion for helping others. She loved the idea of working in a calm and relaxing atmosphere and sharing that space with others. Ultimately, she wanted to be able to pour into others so they could pour into their people and communities.
When we first met, Betsy had just changed the name and location of her business. Under her first business name, she’d offered a lot of coupons and discounts to get people in the door. And while that had gotten her plenty of attention, she was ready to move away from that model and build something more sustainable.
The outward changes gave her the perfect opportunity to rethink her entire brand and approach things more intentionally. This time, she was looking to create a brand that would communicate what she’s about and attract the right clients.
Brand Clarity
The first thing we did was dive into Betsy’s Brand Clarity Workbook. Together, we defined her brand story and her ideal client:
Betsy Schantz of Serenity Bodyworks and Massage is a therapeutic treatment massage therapist based in Bend, Oregon who focuses on helping busy women find peace and comfort so they can live life to the fullest and pour into others from an overflowing cup.
She blends relaxation and focused treatment to take care of both stress and health problems in a natural way that helps her clients avoid the side effects and risks of medication and surgery. Her goal is to make self-care a positive part of the day that her clients look forward to.
Betsy wants to attract the successful, ambitious, active woman in her 40’s who is busy with work and life. She’s had a lot of professional success and carries a lot of responsibility at work, but she gives her personal relationships and hobbies top priority. Her life is full and she’s always on the go, but she knows she needs to take care of herself in order to continue living to the fullest.
Above all, she values her freedom and the ability to pursue her passions without restriction. She works to create a good balance between her career and life and invests in the things that help protect her ability to enjoy life. She values her health and looks for natural alternative ways to maintain her wellbeing.
Then, we talked about the types of businesses she wants to fit in with and stand apart from to define her place in the market:
Betsy wants Serenity Bodyworks and Massage to fit in with businesses that are run by women who are passionate about what they do and pour their hearts into their work. They go the extra mile for their clients and strive to always deliver the best possible service.
Betsy wants her business to stand apart from big box massage companies who are well-known, but fall short on the customer relations side of things. Their focus is getting as many clients in as possible, which makes it impossible to develop the kind of relationship that will truly help improve the client’s health and wellbeing.
Betsy had set up a beautiful relaxing environment and had developed an in-depth process to create personalized treatment plans for her clients. She needed brand graphics that would communicate her attention to detail, highly personalized treatment, and love for people and the world.
Her most pressing goal was to build up her client base without discounting her services so that she could cover her living expenses and start moving toward her bigger vision of owning a collective space where other like-minded holistic care practitioners could offer related products and services.
We agreed that the main goal for our work together would be to set her up with Brand Building Blocks that helped get her new name out there, draw her ideal client in, and represent what her business is about. These graphics would give her the tools she needed to finish her website redesign and start advertising locally.
Choosing a Direction
Once her Brand Foundation was in place, we got to work on Tone and Values boards to start translating all the abstract concepts we’d been talking about into visuals.
The tone words we chose for Serenity Bodyworks and Massage are: warm, tranquil, compassionate, organic, alive. I put a collection of images together for each word to make sure Betsy and I were on the same page and that I was headed in the right visual direction.
Next, we dug into Betsy’s entire brand story to find her values and discovered that peace, comfort, joy, love, self-care, and knowledge summarized everything she wanted to communicate about her business. There was a lot of overlap between her tone and values, so I reworked some of the same images into a new board which helped us see what themes we would be emphasizing.
Even in these early stages, we started to see earthy and peaceful themes coming up a lot. It made sense in light of her ideal client’s love of nature and Betsy’s own focus on rest and relaxation. Using that as a springboard, I created 5 style boards to show Betsy different directions we could take with her graphics.
Betsy loved the watercolor elements of one board and the small botanical details of another. Both styles worked really well together, so we moved forward with a mix of both.
Designing the Brand Building Blocks
With her Brand Foundation and a direction in place, we could move confidently forward into the design phase.
Since all of Betsy’s work happens in person and most of her clients come by word-of-mouth recommendations, I knew she’d get the most use out of print materials in her office and at events. Her branding elements would have to work their best on paper and create the polished look and feel her ideal client would be drawn to.
After trying several different styles for her logo, I decided that even though it breaks several logo design rules, a watercolor icon would work best. So, I broke out my gouache and got to work.
Out of all the botanical elements I painted, a small branch worked best. The imperfect lines of the paint created a personable and approachable feel while the botanical motif spoke to her ideal client’s appreciation of nature and love of the little things.The naturally occurring curves and arches created just enough flow and energy to keep things interesting and optimistic.
I balanced all that with a traditional serif typeface that communicates knowledge, authority, and quality. I chose a font that features soft curving lines that mimic and flow with the shapes in the watercolor branch icon to create unity between the two elements.
For her secondary logo, I created a monogram with a more modern twist. The shapes of the leaf icon worked so well with the letter “S” that magic just happened when they overlapped. I saw this working really well as a small seal and at in document footers.
The color palette flowed naturally out of the paintings I made for the logo. I chose three tones of green to make sure there was enough variety when solid colors were needed. They were all on the soft desaturated side to keep things peaceful, airy, and refined.
I had a lot of leftover watercolor leaves and branches that didn’t make the cut for the logo, but still had a lot of potential. I edited and put those together to create a collection of background patterns, borders, and stand-alone supporting graphics. Having all these elements to work with would create variety without sacrificing a cohesion.
Finally, I decided to use the logo font for headlines and titles to create a more traditional and feel. Using slightly spaced-out all-caps for headlines and CTAs would ensure the most important text would stand out while subheadlines and secondary text would be set in italics. Body copy would be in a clean sans-serif to make sure it stayed readable and didn’t interfere with any of the larger text.
For her marketing pieces, we felt that Betsy would get the most use of a business card, thank you card, and brochure. As we wrapped up those initial pieces, Betsy decided to also add a postcard, banner, and letterhead.
Letting me design all these marketing materials freed up her time and helped her make sure every piece was made with the same level of professionalism. I was glad to help her create pieces that all flowed together and built a really strong brand impression.
The Brand Clarity process we started with helped Betsy think about what she really wanted for her business for the first time. It helped her clarify her purpose and vision and make solid plans for the future. And it helped her see and own everything that her brand is really about at its core.
Having professional graphics helped her get her new website finished, announce her new location, and make a great impression with both new and existing clients.
I loved working with Lilly from start to finish.
As a new business owner, this was a huge investment for me. But I could see the quality of Lilly’s work and wanted that for my business. Plus, I needed that in depth research period to discover what would work for my brand. And when we spoke, we just clicked!
Throughout the process, I felt like Lilly was taking the time to truly get me and my business. She is very detail oriented and her passion for what she does shows in her work.
Now, people are always commenting on my graphics and how they love them. I’ve never had that before and it feels great to know my branding is working. Every time I look at my branding, I smile because it is perfect and exactly what I needed.
Betsy Schantz
Serenity Bodyworks & Massage