Yes, this is my real voice.
Timeline: 16 Weeks
Roles: Brand Designer, Product Designer, Marketing Designer
The Brief
I love books. I hate books. I love to hate books, and I hate to love books.
I’ve been working in the traditional publishing industry since undergrad in a multitude of roles - though primarily as a writer and illustrator - and through it, have come to understand its good, bad, and ugly sides. So when given the opportunity to take a whole semester to develop a product around a problem space I was passionate about, I knew it was going to be about books in one way or another.
Readers struggle to discover new books. Social media brought on an atomization of book marketing: writers are expected to be their own marketing team while still maintaining creative output, and readers are increasingly led into silos of popular works and leaving hidden gems behind as word of mouth competes with virality.
Marketing books isn’t rocket science. You just have to prioritize the reader, and treat them like a complex individual whose tastes can be challenged, instead of a demographic with only select interests.
Building the Brand
I had a vision of what I wanted Bookmarkd to look like early in the process, and let my instincts lead me through it. I wanted the brand to evoke the bespoke nature that literature demands, while also introducing desperately needed energy. This eventually resulted in the creation of a 28-page brand book that lead the visual aesthetic of the subsequent prototype and other related materials.
Early branding concepts for Bookmarkd, including fonts and brand colors, vision and mission statements, and early interface ideas.
Select Pages from Brand Book
Product Design and Prototyping
Pitching a platform means building a platform. Imagine that!
The Bookmarkd platform itself was modeled with competitor and complimentary services like Goodreads, Libby, and Audible in mind. I studied what works and doesn’t from both a design and usability perspective, and began wireframing a functional prototype.
From there, I kept iterating and developing the prototype for usability of concept, until I felt comfortable to apply Bookmarkd’s aesthetic to the prototype. Since the Discovery and Library tabs of the “app” would be the most prominent and used features, I prioritized modeling how those functions would work, to best sell the vision of the final product.
Early wireframes of the Bookmarkd interface in Figma.
Product demonstrations of the Bookmarkd platform prototype.
Other Materials
I genuinely enjoy making merchandise. Reimagining a brand’s aesthetic as something that flatters
both the brand and the end user is a fun and interesting challenge! For Bookmarkd, I wanted the merchandise to have a bespoke, sophisticated feel to match the brand itself. I determined that Bookmarkd’s typical end user would share a lot of characteristics with end consumers of similarly ‘cultured’ brands. I’ve heard a lot of jokes over the years about ‘NPR tote-bag people’, but the
consumer that phrase derides is exactly who I’m appealing to: the curious, sensitive, and worldly.
Example mockups of Bookmarkd merchandise. Clockwise from top left: promotional bookmark, mug, canvas tote bag, and pocket tee.
Takeaways
More than anything else, this project taught me how to self-direct a full project for an extended period of time. Building Bookmarkd was a marathon, but I’m incredibly proud
of the results.
Bookmarkd is both a genuine attempt at creating a solution for the shortcomings I recognize in book marketing and publicity today, and a wholehearted expression of myself as a designer. I’m grateful for the opportunity to present my design sense and strategic mind together so holistically, and with a subject I’m so passionate about.
