Making yourself a subject expert

- So, you know that I just returned from Creative South here a couple of weeks ago. And I had one of the most gratifying experience, actually, I had three of the most gratifying experiences down there. - Bill is about to share three stories about the impact LogoLounge has had on himself, and us, the community. LogoLounge is a collection of over 300,000 logos online and published in a collection of bestselling books of curated logos from around the world. Bill, through LogoLounge, has made himself one of the top resources in global logo trends and speaks internationally from LinkedIn Learning and is a go-to source for all things logo. - One is from a young designer, he's 20 years old, named Mark Hirons, who's out of London, just outside of London. From another designer named Brian Steely, who you may or may not know, hell of a designer. And from another one named Jeremy Slagle who you may or may not know. All exceptional designers, especially, you know, Mark's young, but the other two. And Jeremy came up to me at this conference. He says, "I got to credit you. "I'm so honored to meet you and I've got to tell you "that I was dating my wife, and we were in a mall, "and there was a Barnes & Noble, "and we walked in and I pulled the LogoLounge book "off the shelf, and I had two logos on the cover. "Cinched the deal." (laughing) I know, yeah man. And I'm at another event that same night, and Brian Steely, who, if you're not familiar with him, you need to look him up, just, just beautiful autoline, beautiful work, came up to me at this party and says, "You're Bill Gardner." He says, "I got to tell ya," he said, "You hunted me down and included my work "in this last book." And he said, "It has changed my career. "Being in that book, and the interview you did, "it has literally led to I can't tell you "how many clients." And the last one is Mark Hirons, who, I knew this story in advance, but I didn't know he was going to be at the conference. He flew over from the U.K. to be at this conference in Columbus, Georgia. And he had posted an unpackaging. Are you familiar with those? - Yeah. - Yeah, quasi-new to me, but somebody pointed this one out to me and it was his unpackaging, LogoLounge 10, over in England, and he got a logo into it. And you could just see this rash comin' across his face as he's unpackaging this thing. And he pulls out the book, and he's goin', "You know, I've got a logo in here." And he does this podcast on YouTube, Blue Deer Design, I think, is his firm. You'll have to look this up. But he, you know, this look on his face as he's opening, cracking that book open, and he sees his logo. It just, you can just see the blood drains from his face in such a way you can tell it's just like you felt the very first time that you got that thing in there. And, you know, that is what means so much to me about LogoLounge and what it's achieved is in that weekend, having three pay-offs, you know? These people that have shared with me how it kind of changed their life and - That's awesome. - Yeah. - That's got to make you feel incredible. - Oh, you know, you know this. You've got great designers working for you, Justin. And when they go into, when you go into a meeting and you're carrying their work, and the client loves it, everything in the world tells you that you should have some streak of jealousy or something running through you, but you don't. You've got this incredible feeling of pride. - So proud. - You know? - I love that. - You're kind of going, "God, my people." (laughing) You know? This is my team that, you know, oh but it were for me, that I had the talent to produce the kind of work that they did. And, you know, we just take such incredible pride in that. And I know that my team, Adam Anderson, and Nathan Holthus and Jay Walters, and Brian Wiens and, I mean, they're all so incredibly talented. And I always feel incredible walking into a meeting with their work because I know that, you know, I wish that I had the level of talent that they did. - That's well said. I think, you know, going back to your point about entering into awards and that sort of thing. - Yeah. - I honestly believe that it's a wonderful barometer, it's a wonderful sort of, like you had said, you kind of chase the ring. - Yeah. We don't do our work to get into award shows. - Yeah. - But there's something about when we do something at a certain level and we're like, "Oh," - Exactly. - "This is awesome. "We want to share this." And then when you get that letter, or that email these days, it's equally devastating when you get denied, right? But when you get the yes - Yeah. - You're just like, - Oh, and God knows, I've gotten enough denial letters. I think we all do, anybody-- - Yeah. Yeah, oh for sure. - And anybody that wouldn't you know - Yeah.