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Episode
91

Moving from Designer to Full Time Brand Consultant

An interview with
Matt Davies

Introduction

When you start out as a designer you'll likely focus on the visuals. But as you begin to understand the role design plays in business, you'll start to see the value of good brand strategy, and will want to work closer with your clients to understand and solve deeper business challenges before you work on any design.

For some designers, as they grow in their career they become more interested in the strategy side of branding more than the design, and they may want to focus on that full time. But how can you make the transition from designer to full time brand consultant?

On this weeks podcast we learn how Matt Davies did it. Matt started out as a designer, built an agency and managed a team before becoming a full-time independant brand consultant. Ian interviews Matt to discover his journey, why he made the transition, how he works with clients, and how becoming a brand consultant has allowed him to earn a higher income too.

Matt Davies is a brand & culture strategy consultant, UK top 50 advisor, speaker, co-host of JUSTBranding and the author of 'Storyategy', a book designed to help business owners unlock the power of their brand with a story based branding strategy.

This episode is sponsored by Wireframe, a podcast from Adobe XD.

Matt Davies Interview Transcription

Ian Paget: Looking back at your career, I see that from, I believe it was 2003 to 2008, you was a designer, but fast forward 12 years, you're now a brand consultant. I think the thing worth pointing out is that, there's not even a mention of graphic design in your role. You are a full-time brand consultant now. What was the reason why you made your mind up to make that transition to full-time brand consultant rather than graphic designer?

Matt Davies: These are exciting questions. First of all, Ian, thanks so much for having me on and absolutely loved the podcast. I mean, what you're doing here is phenomenal. Thank you. It's an absolute honour to be on.

Ian Paget: I appreciate it. Thanks Matt. It's good to be able to chat as well because since we last spoke, you are also now a podcast host as well with Jacob Cass, which is awesome. Congratulations for that.

Matt Davies: Yeah, I'm loving the podcast. Yours is far more advanced and mature than ours. Me and some Aussie bloke just like talking about brand strategy but yeah, no, it's pretty interesting medium, it's an interesting medium and I think they're fantastic because you get to speak. If you start one, you get to speak to some really interesting people and I think that's only a good thing for self-development and developing your listeners. Awesome. Anyway, let me dive into this question.