A Glimpse Behind the Scenes at the Infographic Sausage Factory
Wednesday, January 4, 2012 at 8:57AM For the past several years, I have been very fortunate to maintain both an extremely rewarding friendship and working relationship with David Meerman Scott, well-known marketing strategist and keynote speaker.
We have collaborated on several of his eBooks, the design of his hit hardcover book, World Wide Rave – as well as his bestselling and hip business book – Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead: What Every Business Can Learn from the Most Iconic Band in History. I should also mention that my firm was responsible for the design of David’s first book – Eyeball Wars (2001).
For full-disclosure, our working relationship goes way, way back – to when David was working on the corporate side as Vice President of Marketing at NewsEdge Corporation. Eymer Design then developed NewsEdge’s corporate identity, printed collateral materials, annual reports (revolutionary online version, as well as printed piece), and several smaller online/offline marketing initiatives.
Recently, I helped David in the development of a multistage infographic for his commercially sold ebook – Newsjacking: How to Inject your Ideas into a Breaking News Story and Generate Tons of Media Coverage – available for you Nook, Kindle or iPad.
For today’s post, I thought that it might be fun to demonstrate the process that we went through in the design of his new book’s primary graphic. 
Original sketch provided by David Meerman Scott 10.04.11
My refined version 10.05.11
my next round, 10.07.11
less "retro' direction 10.11.11
the final version 10.12.11
What I am not showing, is the productive back in forth conversation that took place between the two of us. As you can see, the concept did veer off in one direction and ended in another. This is all part of the collaborative process – that keeps this designer, heading to his desktop every morning.
– Happy New Year, Doug.
Reader Comments (1)
Doug -- I'm so glad you kept the early designs. Thanks for the post. People really like the final result (especially me)!