Now that a few weeks have passed since debuting the new Melissa Desjardins Photography, I am finally taking a step back from all the excitement to go back and share my rebranding journey with you.  This was my very first time hiring a professional for branding, graphic design, web design.  Before I had done everything myself and it had been YEARS with the same site and brand. I knew it was LONG overdue, it was time for a major overhaul, so thats what we did!I had met Katie of KD Creative at the CLIC conference in Alexandra, VA in August 2014 when she was one of the speakers.  I really enjoyed her presentation, her fun personality and I really saw the learned about the value of rebranding.  A few months later, I emailed her, we got the ball rolling and the process was set to begin January 2015.  I felt very comfortable with her, which is important because communication is KEY! Since I had never done this before, I had no idea what to expect, especially how the process worked.  If I could offer the most important advice, it would be to be completely honest with what you do like, what you don’t like, and be specific as possible.  Katie was extremely patient with me, I knew a lot of what I didn’t like, but as for what I wanted, I really wasn’t sure because I hadn’t seen it yet! I just knew I wanted something different, its hard to stand out in a saturated market of photographers, while staying true to yourself. Once I stopped focusing so much on being “different” and just focused on being me, everything just seemed to flow much more naturally 😉

Looking back now, I see that my previous brand was somewhat masculine and I had shortened my name, mostly because people couldn’t pronounce it and it was too long, so hence “Desjar Photography” was born.  This was a huge deal to change my business name! I know it was necessary and I don’t regret it but its a pain when you think about how many things you have to change (business license, social media, email, domain, just to name a few) lol.  The truth is, my last name is very pretty and it does mean “of the garden” in french and I wanted my brand to be my whole name, not just part of it 😉

My old site was very simple and clean, which I thought I loved all the white space, but when creating my inspiration board at the very beginning, it was evident I wanted color, I wanted the site to be fun, and definitely edgy.

Old site: This is from a 2014 screen shot, its all I could find! Note to self: if you want to document your old site, make sure you do so before you take it down 😉

New site:

Ahhhh, I just CANNOT believe what a huge upgrade this is for me! I love when everyone says to me “its just so you!” That is music to my ears.  Well done, Katie, well done.  I cannot thank you enough!

© Melissa Desjardins Photography 2015 | Wedding and Portrait Photographer | Central VA and Destinations Worldwide