CLIENT RETROSPECTIVE: LIP SERVICE

Lip Service is a Los Angeles underground fashion staple. Born out of the mid-80s LA rock and metal scene, Lip Service is a long-standing alternative lifestyle brand.

We served as the brand and design management team for The Original Cult (the parent company for the Lip Service and Kill City apparel brands) for nearly six years, working as their go-to creative and production experts for all things web and graphic design.

CLIENT OBJECTIVES:

• Develop and maintain branding. Create an overall visual aesthetic that expresses the rebellious spirit and underground culture of the company while also conveying a reliable and professional impression. Design and produce websites and promotional content to perpetuate the company’s brand across multiple platforms.
• Improve website usability. Review and improve the company’s retail website user experience to increase sales and customer satisfaction.
• Develop and maintain promotion campaigns. Create and execute marketing and advertising campaigns consisting of websites and landing pages, webzine, weekly email campaigns, social media management and promotion, and print advertising.

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Retail Website

This is one of several site designs we developed and produced for the Lip Service retail website, including a lookbook-style homepage featuring a rotating display of the latest season’s looks. We blended a clean and organized aesthetic with edgy and organic design elements to achieve our design goals.

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Webzine

We developed the Lip Service webzine as part of our efforts to expand the brand after the first site redesign we did for them. The site was built in WordPress: we hand-crafted a custom magazine layout theme for it, embedding the WordPress framework and functionality into a custom HTML/CSS layout and design. We developed the visual theme of the web magazine to coordinate with the look of the web store while giving it a distinct personality that’s more relaxed and has a bit more edge.

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Email Campaigns

We put together 2-3 emails newsletters every week for both Lip Service and Kill City, for the retail division as well as the wholesale. We created a wide variety of original designs for these weekly emails, using a base template for the basic layout (header, footer, products) and we created a custom visual theme for each email. Both brands had a wide range of collections and style groups, and we featured a different one every week, so each email needed a unique look, while maintaining the visual branding that customers would easily recognize.

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Promo Graphics

We created fresh promotional graphics for the webzine and social media on a regular basis, continually reinforcing the company’s branding and increasing customer awareness of new products. We also put together trade show collateral and other marketing materials.

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Social Media

We developed and maintained the social media presence for Lip Service for several years. We kept the company’s profiles active by posting engaging content and links, updating fans with the latest news on new and upcoming styles, company-sponsored event announcements and coverage, press coverage and other relevant items. We also stayed engaged in conversations with fans and customers throughout the day, responding to comments and answering questions on the main networks as well as participating in company-related discussion forums. We worked with the company’s PR team to construct special promotions, as well as contests, applications, and discount codes. Our network focus was to attract not just numbers but true fans and prospective customers, likely to purchase from each season’s releases. Fans and followers only count when they become actual customers.

Print Advertising

[Gallery not found] Print advertising was also a regular part of our branding and advertising strategy, and we designed and produced magazine ads regularly.

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