Nora Zimerman is a Designer and Creative Director offering Soul Branding and Website Design. She creates branded website experiences that capture the true essence of a business whilst honouring their Soul’s Mission. She has a talent for fully reflecting the Soul of a business onto the online space.
Her clients are Teachers, Leadership coaches, Multidimensional Healers, Lightworkers and organisations delivering and supporting deep transformation and consciousness for the benefit of all. Her unique Soul Brand Alignment Method supports clients in birthing a truly aligned branded look and feel for their websites.
Her extensive experience in corporations and Design agencies combined with her spiritual path and embodied feminine practices provides a potent combination of Design, Strategy and Spirituality to the Branding and Website process.
She is an avid swimmer, loves singing, dancing and walking in the Surrey hills. She is also a Women’s Temple facilitator and from time to time creates awesome party playlists. She is originally from Argentina and has lived in the UK for over 30 years. She lives in Surrey, UK and is a mum to two adult children.
Here’s what we covered on the episode:
Nora’s Background in Design
- How Nora and I were introduced by Lacy Boggs who was on Episode 92 of The Design Business Show
- From a young age Nora knew she wanted to be a graphic designer, but there was no graphic design degree in Argentina so she settled for architecture because it was the closest thing and she had grown up around that field because her father was an architect
- Nora completed three years of architecture school and then began to look for other opportunities and says she did some advertising work
- One summer Nora’s mom told her they were planning to offer a graphic design degree at The University of Buenos Aires and suggested Nora to come back to pursue it, and she did
- Nora talks about being part of the new graphic design program at the university and what her experience was like
- One day Nora caught a ride with 2 other men on campus and they decided to create their own studio together
- Their studio was called The Reform, and Nora shares that they did a lot of well-known work for different brands and touches on the government changes Argentina was going through at the time which opened up many opportunities for them
- Nora shares that the dad of one of her partners acted as their account manager and would bringing clients to them; through word of mouth people heard about their studio and started commissioning them to do work
- At the studio, Nora was a designer and says they were doing point of sale, packaging, logo design, really anything they could really since they were just starting out
- Nora shares that she had a job designing a rock and roll magazine and talks about how fun it was seeing all the musicians come for photoshoots and watching them play live
- The studio came to an end when Nora and her partners were finishing up university
- While traveling, Nora met her ex-husband who was british and ended up coming to the UK knowing very little english
- To learn english, Nora enrolled in a master’s degree at Chelsea College of Arts because she thought it would be more beneficial to learn and talk to people about what she loves versus taking english lessons at night
- Nora applied for an in-house design studio job at Procter & Gamble in the UK and worked for them nearly 15 years
- One benefit to working at Procter & Gamble Nora says is that she was able to see all the marketing being done for big brands and saw how they were operating instead of just being isolated to design
- Nora tells us what kind of work she did at Procter & Gamble and shares that she would write guidelines for use for many different brands which she loved doing
- Towards the end of her time at Procter & Gamble, Nora felt misaligned with the products they were selling
From Freelancing to Running a Business
- What moved Nora to start freelancing was her busy, unsustainable lifestyle as a single mom of 2 kids who was out working and commuting each day
- About 6 years ago, Nora decided to take her design work a little more seriously and now runs her own business
- Nora shares that marketing her own business was challenging at first because she explains that design work is very behind the scenes and it wasn’t really in her nature to promote it
- Something Nora tells her clients is, no one else is going to be offering what you offer in the same exact way you do, so don’t listen to all of the self doubt you may be having – remember to have a clear voice and make sure you’re aligned with what you are saying
- Nora realized she wanted to really collaborate with clients instead of just being an implementer of their ideas or her ideas only
- When collaborating with clients, Nora really likes to fully understand the brand, understand why people are attracted to them and allow the clients to drop in and connect to the essence of their offer
- Because Nora trained in women’s temple facilities and ran women’s circles, she began to use some of her practices for women to drop inside and really feel what if felt like to be with clients
- Nora explains that what they’re doing is translating the in-person experience to the online space
- What women’s temple training is — Nora explains that it is focused on becoming very present and attuned to what’s aligned in the moment so people can become attuned to their gifts, their service and what they are here to do
Nora’s Design Process
- How Nora’s process for her program starts with 4-6 weeks of a discovery and inquiry phase where her clients go through some video meditation and answer questionnaires — Nora shares that she got the method she uses from her mentor Michelle
- Nora explains that she uses a combination of the practices she’s learned to create her own in-depth process for working with clients and designing websites
- How Nora works with established businesses who are upgrading, it may be through their website or through a new vision they’ve had or because they had a spiritual awakening and want a change
- After Nora’s clients go through the discovery and inquiry phase, they then prepare for the photoshoot and dive deep into what they want to communicate with the photos
- Once Nora has all the material, she designs the website — Nora explains that some people want to know how to use their website so she creates tutorials for them and some people don’t want to know, so she sets them up with a developer who will be supporting them and their business
- Nora shares that her website design process takes a minimum of 3 months but her group program takes only 10 weeks and says her group program uses the same methodology
Tips for Creating a Successful Website
- As the year comes to an end, Nora shares that she’s excited to launch some of her group program client websites and she’s also excited for the launch of her own website
- When you’re thinking about your website, Nora says to remember that it’s there to create a connection, it needs to be easy to navigate, understand and the person landing on your website needs to understand why they would be a good customer or not
- Nora shares three things she thinks a website needs to have for it to be successful: connection, clarity and alignment with the business
- Another offer Nora has is one on one strategy sessions to help people get through the blocks they may be experiencing
- If you are on any social media platform, Nora urges you to treat that platform like a website and says if you’re looking to create your own website, pick existing websites you like and think about why you feel connected to them
- Nora says don’t be too worried about using your own words or your tone of voice because your website must be aligned with who you are
- Check out Nora’s website, where she offers a free masterclass which is all about aligning your soul’s brand to your mission or service
Links mentioned:
The Design Business Show 092 with Lacy Boggs
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