When I first started Shepherd Like a Girl, it wasn’t the Shepherd Like a Girl brand that you see today. It was actually another brand called DIY Sheep Crafts. As my business grew and evolved, I knew that DIY Sheep Crafts needed it’s own website and Shepherd Like a Girl needed its own brand.

You see, as my business progressed, what I started to notice was that it was getting confusing for my ideal customer. 

They were asking me these questions: Is my business about sheep? Is it about starting a craft business? Is it just for people who have sheep that want to start a business?

This was a huge indicator to me that it was time to build my brand and my brand identity so that I was better speaking to my ideal customer. I didn’t want them interacting with business and turning away because they weren’t sure if I was here to serve them. 

I had to make it really clear that my business was for any crafters, artists and makers – not just people who have sheep – who wanted to build a profitable craft business, like I have. 

I knew who I wanted to serve my handmade business owners at a deeper (and clearer) level through the Shepherd Like a Girl brand so I pulled the trigger on a massive rebrand. 

Brainstorming Brand Colors

As mentioned above, I really was starting from scratch with my brand and I decided to start with what colors I wanted.

At the time, I was drawn to the color navy, but didn’t quite know what other colors I wanted to go with that.

I went to Spoonfloor.com because I knew they had blog posts about color combinations and that would be a great resource for me to draw more inspiration from.

I instantly found a color combination I was pulled towards. I was pumped!

From there, I started looking at my competitors and one of them already used navy as their primary brand color. I needed to differentiate myself and my brand so I knew I had to pull that color out and I was devastated about it. 

Back to the drawing board!

I went to go to my entrepreneur friends for more color ideas. I knew I wanted something earthy and they suggested a dark green. I liked it!

I went to Pinterest next to look for more color and theme inspiration. Here is what I found:

It was the perfect start and I knew I could move onto the next part of branding my business.

Creating My Brand’s Logo

Now that I had my ideal colors set in my head, the fun of building a logo was the next step. I love Canva.com and I can get pretty creative but for this task I decided that it was best to outsource. 

I went to upwork.com, which is a website where you can hire any kind of freelancer you want for many different price points. 

Disclaimer about Upwork is that you are hiring a complete stranger from anywhere in the world. I knew this going in and knew that it would take some extra communication to get the finished product I wanted. For ongoing work, I don’t normally go this route.

I posted a job listing looking for someone that could design my logo. Here is what I included in the listing: I needed a favicon, different files sizes of my logo, and I wanted unlimited revisions. My budget was $100. 

Once I posted the listing, I then started getting bids back from freelancers. After looking at a few, I decided on one person and hired her for the job.

I wasn’t completely clear on what I wanted in my logo, but I did know that I wanted to incorporate a shepherd’s crook and I wanted it to have an earthly vibe. I sent her over those ideas, along with the ideal colors, in hex code, that I wanted to use.

Here is what she first came up with:

With those four designs, I then took that to my audience to see what their opinions on them were. 

My audience thought the first one looked like it was for a food joint, but they did like that it was easy to read. 

For the second one, my ideal customers liked that it was balanced and symmetrical. However, this was their least favorite. 

The last two logos were the most popular. 

The feedback on the third one was that people liked that “shepherd” and “like a girl” had equal real estate, instead of “like a girl” being smaller.

For the fourth one, my audience was drawn to the more feminine colors. 

So lots of feedback here!  

Oh and one more thing, my sheep friends were confused why I had a feather in it since that had nothing to do with sheep (they were still thinking my brand was about sheep crafts).

That made me realize that if I wanted to use the feather, then I needed to have some a really good story behind it. 

Since I didn’t, I decided that I didn’t want to have the feather in the logo and I wanted to have a butterfly instead.

A butterfly represents transformation and that is exactly what this business is for me – the transformation I help guide my students toward in their own businesses and lives. 

With all these opinions and feedback, I went back to the designer with a better idea in mind. I  told her that I wanted to move forward with the second design’s font, but I wanted her to change a few things. 

I wanted her to remove the feathers, add a butterfly, move the shepherd’s crook to be over “herd” of shepherd, and make “like a girl” bigger.

Here is what she came back to me with:

It took a few more times going back and forth with her to finally get what I wanted. 

My tip for you here is don’t be afraid to keep asking for what you want.

Overall, it took about a week for me to get the exact logo I wanted and a few times I had to repeat the same thing back to her. Twice I even drew on my phone to communicate what I wanted. See my great design below. *haha*

When I finally got the design that I wanted back, I was so happy! There is no way I could’ve come up with that finished design on my own. It took a good designer, the feedback from audience, and my own intuition. 

Pulling It All Together

Once I had the logo, I was able to fully finalize my brand colors. We had been exploring a few different shades of green throughout the design process and decided on a dark emerald. 

I got the hex codes that were used for my logo so then I could use the same consistent colors for any marketing material I or my team would be creating.

It’s super important to be consistent with your branding because that’s how your ideal customer will begin to identify you. 

All in all, I am happy with the branding process I went through, and hope that it helps you to know what steps to take as well. 

If you are struggling with starting your handmade business, then grab my Quick Start Handmade Business Checklist to get you moving in the right direction today!