Resources
See how the Rhode Island School of Design thinks about their brand expression and how they break down their tone of voice.
A slick site with all their brand guidelines captures in one place. There's some interesting content under the Theory category that talks more about the brand itself.
The luxury automaker showcases their brand elements in a simple site experience. There voice and tone section is definitely worth checking out.
Explore the brand's take on all things band in this simple but engaging brand site.
A link straight to the Converse brand book that showcases what an iconic brand looks like at the foundational level.
A comprehensive guideline that covers literally everything about the brand -- history, guidelines, resources, usage, even the story behind their tagline. A very thoughtful example of an external brand book.
A comprehensive look at the Mailchimp voice, the rules that govern it and the nuances that make it.
More helpful for designers than writers, this brand site showcases the design system in a bold and thoughtful way.
Shopify has a very thoughtful breakdown of their verbal identity and content that spans everything from language to grammar to tone to naming.
An impressive breakdown of their verbal identity with tons of great thinking around tone, vocabulary, inclusive language, stylistic writing choices and more.
An in-depth look at the brand with a great section on voice and tone. They outline writing principles, preferred CTAs, inclusive language direction and have lots of great copy examples.
An interactive and playfully designed brand site that is less informative and more a showcase of their brand expression.
A sparse but beautifully made brand site that showcases the thoughtful design work behind the brand.
No writing is showcased but the design work is quite impressive.
While this site doesn't have much in regards to writing, it does have a section on their strategy where it talks about their philosophy.
More for the designer than writer, this online brand book offers a thoughtful look at the brand and even shows the design idea and concept behind the work.
A basic guidelines site for the brand but it includes everything from writing to illustration to marketing. The writing section goes deeper than most with sample messaging, audience-specific messaging, persona and more.
The site itself is very minimal but there's a link to download the full brand book which has a lot more information about the brand, including a snapshot of their strategy, tone of voice and full brand system.
A very transactional resource for the Meta family of brands. It mostly covers logo and usage for the various brands.
A public and online document of Google's brand guidelines. It doesn't give much more than the basics but still interesting to see.
A comprehensive guideline for all things Dropbox including strategy (a rare public find), brand system, and writing principles.
Firefox puts it all out there for public view -- including their positioning, persona, tone of voice and full design kit of parts.
This is the show that talks to leading designers, illustrators, creative directors and photographers around the world about the delights – and dramas – of being a creative.
Made by Folk chats with the creatives behind exciting projects, products & ideas.
A Change of Brand is about the world’s most-loved consumer companies and their rebrand glory, drama, or disaster. This series goes deeper than color palettes and typography, talking with brand leaders and agency creatives to retell the story behind the change.
Never Not Creative is a community for creatives to come together and tackle the challenges we face in the creative industry. From how to manage and improve your mental health, to getting paid what you're worth and everything in between.
What does it mean to live a creative life? CreativeMornings, a breakfast lecture series for the global creative community, brings some of its most remarkable and inspiring archived talks—from hometown heroes to design legends to community leaders—straight to your headphones.
The top emerging trends of 2024 according to Pinterest. A good resource for trend tracking and staying up to date with the latest in culture.
Search 700+ untranslatable words by 80+ languages and 60+ tags, or click refresh to see a new batch.
An extensive list of POC talent, from writers to designers and artists that's kept up to date and a great resource for finding talent for a variety of creative projects.
A meeting point, where digital design professionals from across the globe find inspiration, impart knowledge and experience, connect, and share constructive, respectful critiques.
All of the quippy shorthand or abbreviated lingo that is ever-evolving. Use this guide to quickly get comfortable learning jargon that is unique to certain regions, offices and departments.
A list of 15 of the best brand guidelines, both comprehensive and simple style guides.
The Creative Independent is a resource of emotional and practical guidance for creative people, published ad-free by Kickstarter, a public-benefit corporation. They produce interviews, wisdom, and guides that illuminate the trials and tribulations of living a creative life, as told by working artists — including writers, musicians, designers, visual artists, and others.
An excellent resource for finding imagery for mood boards, decks, and more.
Eye on Design is an editorial platform that explores what it means to be a designer today. They cover issues important to the global design world + elevate the voices of contemporary designers as a way to build a more engaged design community.
A leading platform for the creative community with featured work, articles, designer spotlights, newsletter, podcast and more.
A UK online magazine dedicated to the creative industry. You can find articles, advice, industry news and more.
A great resource for finding the latest books and editorials in design.
A good resource for saving and exploring ideas to get inspired for projects.
Since 1999, AdForum has provided advertising agencies and production companies a digital space to showcase their creative work and talents to brands and prospective new business partners.
Land-book was created for Designers, Developers, Product Owners, Marketing Managers, Startupers, Freelancers and, really, everyone who appreciates fine designs and well-crafted sites.
The Brand Identity is an independent graphic design resource with a global reach, showcasing the best projects, companies and products relevant to the industry.
Your go-to place to discover and review online brands.
The #1 resource for keeping up with corporate branding. They cover redesigns and new designs of notable products, companies, services, and organizations across all industries and locations. Brand New is edited and written by Armin Vit, co-founder of UnderConsideration.
You don’t need to be a genius, you just need to be yourself. That’s the message from Austin Kleon, a young writer and artist who knows that creativity is everywhere, creativity is for everyone. A manifesto for the digital age, Steal Like an Artist is a guide whose positive message, graphic look and illustrations, exercises, and examples will put readers directly in touch with their artistic side.
A must for anyone who feels creatively stifled. Elizabeth Gilbert dives into the mysterious nature of inspiration. She asks us to embrace our curiosity and let go of needless suffering. She shows us how to tackle what we most love, and how to face down what we most fear. She discusses the attitudes, approaches, and habits we need in order to live our most creative lives.
Steven King is the G.O.A.T. when it comes to writing and his memoir delivers incredible inspiration and insight into his genius and his discipline.
Written by the founder of Red Antler, this book is all about brand building for startups and lessons learned from a seasoned pro. The full title is "Obsessed: Building a Brand People Love from Day One"
Regarded as the most challenging field in advertising, copywriting is usually left to the most talented professionals--often agency leaders or owners themselves. The book features a work selection and essays by 53 leading professionals in the world, including copywriting superstars such as David Abbott, Lionel Hunt, Steve Hayden, Dan Wieden, Neil French, Mike Lescarbeau, Adrian Holmes, and Barbara Nokes.
If you feel like you've got the wrong tone of voice, don't understand the ins-and-outs of grammar, or just don't feel confident writing about yourself without sounding like an idiot, read this book.
From aspiring to expiring copywriters, this book will help you become a more efficient, more confident creative. In other words, you'll make more money. And friends.
Writing copy is often assumed to be a natural talent. However, there are simple techniques you can employ to craft strong written content with ease. With insightful interviews from leading copywriters, as well as illustrated case studies of major brands, this new, expanded edition teaches the art of writing great copy for digital media, branding, advertising, direct marketing, retailing, catalogs, company magazines, and internal communications.
Figma's annual conference returns June 26 - 27 in San Francisco. Attendees will have the opportunity to explore the future of product development.
CreativeMornings is a free monthly breakfast lecture series designed for creative communities. Volunteer hosts and their team members organize local chapters that not only celebrate a city’s creative talent, but also promote an open space to connect with like-minded individuals.
Break down the barriers between Product, UX, Design and Dev so you can build better products, faster, together. UXDX USA takes place May 15 - 17 in New York City and online.
Be part of the largest showcase of visual design and creativity at OFFF Barcelona, which hosts innovative and international talents who share their insightful experiences. Taking place April 4 - 6.
Be inspired at every turn, meet other passionate creatives, and learn how to create whatever you can dream. And while nothing compares to being face to face, you can still attend online.
The conference for everyone who uses words to make a difference. This November, join the conference IRL in London, attend pre-conf online training sessions, or book the Video Package to watch the talks on-demand.
A two-day event on corporate and brand identity with some of the most active and influential practitioners from around the world. Taking place October 10 - 11 in Salt Lake City, Utah.
Since 2011, Where Are All The Black People? has been uniting and amplifying Black voices within the advertising community. Every year, industry talent from students to C-Suite attend WAATBP to celebrate successes, address setbacks, and build community with their allies.
Touts iteself as AI-powered tools for rappers, writers and wordsmiths.
Instantly estimate your script time at your reading speed with this fast and easy-to-use tool. You can even listen to your script as well.
A simple and distraction-free text editor.
In addition to character and word count, this online editor can help you improve word choice and writing style, and, optionally, help you to detect grammar mistakes and plagiarism.
Thesaurus and word tools for your creative needs. Synonyms, antonyms, rhymes, translations, and more. Find the word you're looking for!
Written by the people from Emotive Brand, this website has a collection of adjectives that are very handy for brand attributes and personality development.
The best tools and resources for naming.
Get instant answers, find creative inspiration, and learn something new.
The best online thesaurus IMHO.
The Deck of Brilliance can help you face that blank page and looming deadline with a bit more confidence. It gives you 52 tools for working up ideas in short periods of time.
A comprehensive, free online dictionary, thesaurus, and encyclopedia with synonyms, definitions, idioms, abbreviations, and medical, legal, and financial dictionary, available in 14 languages.
Hemingway App makes your writing bold and clear. The app highlights lengthy, complex sentences and common errors.
A game-changing thesaurus that lets you enter a word, phrase, description, or pattern to find synonyms, related words, and more.
A look at some of the strongest creative work, the best PR and marketing campaigns from brands and agencies featured in the Famous Campaigns newsletter over the past year.
A collection of beautifully-designed and well-executed websites.
Great Landing Page Copy showcases & celebrates websites that respect their readers. In other words, websites that are easy to read, feel relatable and sound like a human, not a robot.
Landingfolio features the best landing page designs, templates, component and more on the web.
A collection of purpose-built, digital, accessible guidelines from global brands.
Milled is a search engine for email newsletters. Find sales, deals, coupons, and discount codes from 105k+ brands and retailers.
A collection of real world Copywriting case studies used by successful companies.
AdForum's Creative Library features more than 200,000 campaigns and 36,000+ companies to discover.
LoveTheWorkMore compiles and constantly updates all Lions-winning creative works, spanning across Cannes Lion’s entire history.
The Drum asked its readers to nominate their favorite commercials ever. Leading creative directors from the World Creative Rankings and The Drum's Judges' Club then ranked the ads to present the top 100 TV and video ads of all time.
A cheat sheet of the most referenced ads in the industry, made for students or anyone looking to study up.
A collection of identity style guides from around the world, showing the various grids, layouts, and details included in the style guides designers prepare for clients.
A hand-picked collection of brand style guide examples, pattern libraries and design systems for inspiration.
A completely free and curated Swipe File maintained by some of the top marketers in the world.
Explore every issue of The Atlantic — from 1857 to now.
The Dieline's 2024 Trend Report spreads out the tarot cards and tells you what is foreseen with packaging trends.
An annual roundup of observations, conversations and premonitions surrounding the work we do and the spaces we occupy. Rather than pulling a definitive resource of what’s to come, the Research Center at Mouthwash Studios brings multiple perspectives on heavily loaded topics to the forefront.
From film to fashion and architecture to advertising, creative fields have become dominated and defined by convention and cliché. In this article, Alex Murrell discusses why distinctiveness has died.
Deloitte asks and answers what can we expect from the generative AI boom, the sustainability imperative, and the rising pressure to monetize across tech, media, and telecom.
VML Intelligence presents “The Future 100: 2024”, an indispensable guide to the coming year, featuring the 100 trends that will change the world.
Lippincott's annual list of brand trends to explore—and the tensions to not overlook.
Digiday breaks down the 'funny brand voice', why it's become so popular and how it's impacting the broader mainstream social media landscape.
Curated by The Corita Art Center, this article asked seasoned creatives and artists about their rules for being creative. There's some great soundbites in here.
Written by Luke Leighfield, this post has A LOT of relevant information if you're looking to get into freelance work.
Day One Agency's dictionary for the future features six words that will define 2024.
While this is written by a photography about photography, the words and lessons can be applied to all creatives. They are simple and brilliant -- a great read when you're looking for clarity.
A field guide for new and aspiring copywriters full of helpful information and interviews from working freelancers.
Em Seitz, a copywriter with 10 years experience, presents her semi-polished thoughts on branding and advertising + the bits inspiring her to try harder.
A newsletter highlighting positioning and messaging insights for B2B writers from Emma Stratton.
Sonder & Tell, a verbal agency, has a great newsletter that highlights their recent work, verbal trends, and more.
Written by Scott Galloway, a professor of marketing at the New York University Stern School of Business, and a public speaker, author, podcast host, and entrepreneur, writes this newsletter that discusses brand and business.
A weekly newsletter with a summary of the previous week’s posts, announcements regarding the Brand New Conferences, and important UnderConsideration-wide announcements.
Written and curated by Casey Lewis, this newsletter is an almost daily digest of all things youth culture and Gen Z consumer trends. It's a great read if you want to stay on top of trends and of-the-moment viral happenings.
Written by Paddy Gilmore, this newsletter examines how brands use humor in their campaigns and branding.
A newsletter by Emma Gannon about creativity, books, Internet culture and wellbeing.
Written by Nick Parker, a UK based writer, this newsletter discusses brands doing interesting things with their tone of voice.
You’re two hours away from increasing your copywriting speed and confidence. And when your confidence rises, your salary follows. More important, by the end of this course you’ll have the upper hand on creative self-doubt and the almighty blank page.
Every award-winning campaign, brand, or design starts in the same place: with a great creative brief. Learn a step-by-step process for producing creative work that’s eye-popping and strategic.
Google lays out your path to a career in UX design. In this program, you’ll learn in-demand skills that will have you job-ready in less than 6 months. No degree or experience required.
Want to become a creative copywriter and make good money without wearing pants? Created by Tasha Young, who’s been writing for a living for over 10 years, this copywriting course has everything you need to get started with total confidence — even if you have no experience!
Led by Scott Galloway, Section's Brand Strategy Sprint teaches you how to build a sustainable, differentiated, relevant brand that comes to life at every step of the customer journey.
A four-class series designed to help anyone who’s newer to naming, or who wants to make naming a more comfortable part of their current role. The classes work well together, building a solid foundation for your naming practice, but you aren’t required to take all four.