Top 15 Best Procreate Hair and Fur Brushes

When you’re a graphic artist, some of the hardest things to portray accurately on an image are hair or fur.

No matter how many times you try it, it just doesn’t seem to look right. Well, to help artists, graphic designers all over the world have created their very own hair & fur brushes for the Procreate app on the Apple iPad and we’re here today to share the best ones out there with you.

Each of these brushes can help add that extra something to your artwork and while they may take some time to learn, once you have them figured out, that fluffy dog you’ve been struggling with will look so much better.

Let’s jump right in!

Best Hair & Fur Brushes for Procreate

I know, its a big list but that just shows how much time and effort the creators of each of these brush sets have put in to make sure they work exactly as you need them to if you’re ready and want to move ahead a bit.

1. 28 Realistic FUR 4 Procreate – $14
2. Hair Brushes for Procreate Vol. 2 – $6
3. Hair Brushes for Procreate – $6
4. Animal Fur Procreate Brushes – $3
5. 20 Hair brushes for Procreate – $11
6. Procreate Hair Brushes – $14
7. Procreate Hair Brushes 2.0 – $4
8. Procreate Fur Brushes – $6
9. Procreate Fur Brushes 2.0 – $4
10. Fur Brushes For Procreate – $10
11. Animal Fur Procreate Brushes – $14
12. Procreate Hair Brushes 4.0 – $6
13. 60 Hair brushes for procreate – $10
14. 25 Hair Procreate Brushes for Every Hairstyle – $14
15. Faux Fur Brushes for Procreate 5 – $12

 

More Top Procreate Brushes

• 15 Best Ink Brushes for Procreate in 2020
• Top 15 Best Oil Brushes for Procreate
• Top 15 Best Gouche Brushes for Procreate
• 25 Best Procreate Brushes for Illustration
• 15 Best Procreate Lettering Brushes
• 15 Procreate Watercolor Brushes 
• The 15 Best Brushes for Procreate 

Best Procreate Hair & Fur Brushes

 

28 Realistic FUR 4 Procreate – $14

Created by Ldarro’s Artist Goods, the 28 Realistic FUR 4 Procreate kit packs 28 brushes into an all-encompassing kit that will help you learn how to quickly draw realistic fur for your artwork. While they were created for Photoshop, to simplify and speed up the process of creating realistic fur for Procreate. Every brush in the kit gives you a way to create high-quality fur every time.

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Hair Brushes for Procreate Vol. 2 – $6

Created by Art with Flo, the Hair Brushes for Procreate Vol. 2 kit provides you with 14 amazing brushes so you can create everything from realistic curls, soft straight hair, and easy braids. A great addition to their Volume 1 pack, volume 2 contains six brushes to help you create curly hair with ease plus two brushes that help you create braids in a single stroke. The Hair Brushes for Procreate Vol. 2 makes painting hair easy on the Procreate app

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Hair Brushes for Procreate – $6

Speaking of the Volume 1 pack from Art with Flo, the Hair Brushes for Procreate kit help you build incredible, realistic-looking hair using a wide variety of brushes, including ones for wispy individual hairs to big strands. By starting with the basic shape, you can easily add details with the included textured hair brushes. Adding darker or lighter hair strands is even easier with individual brushes that help add more realism to your artwork. With 12 brushes included in the kit, creating the perfect hair for your project is as easy as it can be.

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Animal Fur Procreate Brushes – $3

Created by Digi Life, the Animal Fur Procreate Brushes kit comes with four amazing fur brushes that can help your animal artwork look more realistic in seconds. If you’re struggling with creating foxes, dogs, cats, or wolves look their absolute best, then you owe it to yourself to check out this brush set at a great price that can make creating realistic animal fur much easier.

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20 Hair brushes for Procreate – $11

A giant set of 20 brushes that you can do to create realistic, lifelike hair using your Procreate app is the intention behind Sundrameda’s 20 Hair brushes for Procreate kit that can help you save time, effort, and most importantly, the frustration that can easily come when trying to make something as precise as creating hair look its best.

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Procreate Hair Brushes – $14

Designed by Mels Brushes, the Procreate Hair Brushes kit acts as a hair salon on your iPad. Making it really easy to create beautifully realistic hair every time. Along with brushes to create beautiful hair, the kit also includes brushes for eyebrows, a single lash brush, as well as brushes for body and facial hair. As a bonus, essential base brushes have been included so you don’t have to switch brush sets when you begin painting.

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Procreate Hair Brushes 2.0 – $4

Used to create portrait artwork, the Procreate Hair Brushes 2.0 from Extreme Brushes is a small kit of five brushes that have been finely tuned to give you the best way to create realistic hair easily and will also speed up your workflow. From single strands to realistic hair and painterly hair, you can create beautiful hair with ease on the Procreate app.

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Procreate Fur Brushes – $6

With 14 different brushes, the Procreate Fur Brushes from Art with Flo can help make the fur you create look realistic with every brush stroke. With a variety of options, including brushes for short, long, rough, and fuzzy fur that are also great for blending while you add some texture to the fur in your artwork. In no time, you’ll be able to add realistic fur texture to your paintings with ease.

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Procreate Fur Brushes 2.0 – $4

With eight brushes, the Procreate Fur Brushes 2.0 by Extreme Brushes can help you create stunning fur artwork and save time when it comes time to create incredible works of art. The wide variety of brushes that come in the kit can help you create realistic fur on everything from little kittens to massive mammoths. At a great price, you can make adding fur to your artwork one less thing that stresses you out.

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Fur Brushes For Procreate – $10

Created by Seamless Team, the Fur Brushes For Procreate comes with 14 different brushes that you can use to add soft or spiky fur to your artwork for a realistic look that you can add to your animal paintings or curly or feathery brushes to add a nice touch to your creative paintings and no matter which you choose, you can add a fuzzy touch to any of your artwork.

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Animal Fur Procreate Brushes – $14

Any artist knows that some of the hardest parts to paint without things looking off are animal fur and with the Animal Fur Procreate Brushes from Mels Brushes, you can create realistic fuzzy and fluffy fur with ease. 32 high-quality brushes offer a wide variety of effects that you can add to your artwork. From a smooth fur effect to a wiry and coarse, and even a kitten soft effect can add a new level of realism. Combining brushes can create some amazing effects whether you’re painting cute little kittens or unicorns and monsters for a fantasy piece, the Animal Fur Procreate Brushes kit can make your work stand out.

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Procreate Hair Brushes 4.0 – $6

In another of their hair brushes collection, the Procreate Hair Brushes 4.0 from Extreme Brushes continues their trend of incredible brushes and with this latest kit, you can start painting hair easier than ever before. To get the most out of the kit, you will want to make sure that you have the latest version of the Procreate app installed on your iPad, and with every stroke, you can create fluid realistic hair.

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60 Hair brushes for procreate – $10

Endete brushes want to provide you with everything you need to create memorable and realistic hair in every piece of art you create. With 60 brushes for Procreate, you can create realistic hair for all of your designs from soft children’s hair to curly locks. Combine brushes to create new mixtures and new looks for all of your artwork.

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25 Hair Procreate Brushes for Every Hairstyle – $14

If adding hair to your artwork can make or break your work, having access to brushes that can help you create every hairstyle with ease is a must. The 25 Hair Procreate Brushes for Every Hairstyle kit from RiverosIllustration lets you create any hair type – straight, curvy, short, even bald – easier than ever. If you don’t know how to draw hair, don’t worry the kit is packed with freebies to help your skills improve plus a detailed ebook tutorial is included to help you learn even quicker.

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Faux Fur Brushes for Procreate 5- $12

To round up our picks of the best hair & fur brushes for Procreate, Seamless Team brings you the Faux Fur Brushes for Procreate 5 kit comes with a variety of 30 brushes that offer different texture fur brushes and also includes horizontal and vertical brushes that follow brush direction to help to create shapes as well as seamless and natural fur transitions from straight to curved lines. Color dynamic, the brush strokes vary in light and dark color which is great for adding dimension, depth, as well as some extra texture to furry things.

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Best Procreate Hair & Fur Brushes

When it comes to creating amazing-looking artwork, having the right tools makes everything easier. With our list of the Best Procreate Hair & Fur Brushes, we hope that we have provided you with enough tools to fill your toolbox.

The post Top 15 Best Procreate Hair and Fur Brushes first appeared on JUST™ Creative.

[Podcast] Personal Growth, Mentorship and Strategy with Philip VanDusen

Trying to build a bullet-proof business? In today’s episode, learn to use the power of strategy, design and marketing to build a strong standing business with Philip VanDusen. We discuss personal growth, mentorship and more.

Philip VanDusen is the founder of Verhaal Brand Design, a YouTube Star and has over 20 years experience in branding & design including roles like ECD at Landor, Head of Design for Global Snacks at PepsiCo, P&G Old Navy.

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Show Notes

• Philip VanDusen

 

Learn Brand Strategy

Brand Master Secrets helps you become a brand strategist and earn specialist fees. And our opinion, is the most comprehensive brand strategy course on the market.

The course gave me all the techniques and processes and more importantly… all the systems and tools I needed to build brand strategies for my clients.

This is the consolidated “fast-track” version to becoming a brand strategist.

I wholeheartedly endorse this course for anyone who wants to become a brand strategist and earn specialist fees.

Check out the 15-minute video about the course, which lays out exactly what you get in the Brand Master Secrets.

 

The post [Podcast] Personal Growth, Mentorship and Strategy with Philip VanDusen first appeared on JUST™ Creative.

10 Best VPN Services For 2021 + Top Deals

Streamlining business operations remotely has been one of the biggest challenges in 2020. The moment the pandemic shocked the world, people started adapting to remote work environments.

Around 88% of organizations encouraged their employees to work remotely and 91% of companies in the Asia Pacific region implemented compulsory work from home policies. For functions from holding brand meetings to monitoring production, businesses now rely heavily on virtual tools.

Unsurprisingly, privacy and cybersecurity are major concerns. Scams, intrusions by unknown identities, data theft and other types of cyberattacks can shake any business’s foundation. To protect their virtual platforms, brands have turned to VPNs (virtual private networks).

But the VPN market is so oversaturated, it’s hard to know which one to choose and why. We’ve made things easy for you and curated a list of credible companies with affordable and trustworthy services. Evaluated on multiple factors including the number of server locations, client software, security, bandwidth caps and dynamic IP addresses, our list only includes the most professional and legit companies. Read on to find the one that best meets your needs!

Top 10 Best VPN Services for 2020 & 2021 Compared

1. FastestVPN
2. NordVPN
3. ExpressVPN
4. PureVPN
5. Surfshark
6. CyberGhost VPN
7. IPVanish
8. Ivacy VPN
9. VyprVPN
10. ZenMate

 

1. FastestVPN

FastestVPN has been in operation for over a decade and has served brands across the globe. Secured servers, 100% anonymity and multiple IP addresses – to handle business operations smoothly – are just some of the services they offer.

FastestVPN is undoubtedly one of the premium service providers to have redefined security with their top-notch protection. They shield servers form malware, data theft and intrusions. Irrespective of the device you have, its services will not leave you disappointed. Even if you are surfing using public Wi-Fis, with their services you can keep cyberthieves at bay.

Best Deal From FastestVPN

With affordability in mind, FastestVPN offers a 5-Year Service Plan for $49.95. For just $0.83 per month you get to enjoy the following services:

• 15 Days Money-Back Guarantee
• P2P Optimized Servers
• 100% Anonymity
• No Logs

2. NordVPN

NordVPN frees you from any fear of scams or intrusions from unknown identities. Now you can surf a multitude of platforms irrespective of which region you’re in. With NordVPN, you can shield your servers and stay anonymous. You don’t even have to worry about search history as it keeps no logs.

Having compatibility with a wide range of platforms including Windows, OS, Linux and Android, it adds a unique touch to your browsing experience. Moreover, NordVPN offers encrypted proxy extensions to users at highly affordable pricing. You can enjoy a fast, reliable and protected internet connection with zero limits to bandwidth.

Best Deal From NordVPN

NordVPN offers a 68% discount on its 2-Year Plan. For just $3.71 per month you can enjoy unlimited access to a broad range of libraries over the internet, plus:

• No-Logs Policy
• 5,100 Servers Worldwide
• Connect To More Than 6 Devices At A Time
• Unmatched Protection
• Multiple IP Addresses

3. ExpressVPN

ExpressVPN is a top-rated industry leader that provides unbreakable protection and unrestricted access to online libraries. It defeats all barriers and allows users to enjoy surfing with complete anonymity. Whether you want access to social media sites or to dig deep to carry out extensive research, you can have a safe and secured browsing experience.

Moreover, ExpressVPN is compatible with almost every device from Linux and OS to Android and Windows. With powerful online protection and supercharged VPN support, it stands out from the rest. The company is equipped with advanced technology that not only protects your platforms but boost your servers’ functionality as well.

Best Deal From ExpressVPN

ExpressVPN brings to you an amazing 49% discount for their 15-Month Plan. The one year plan comes with an additional 3 months at no cost, coming out at $6.67 per month. Services included are:

• 100% Money-Back Guarantee
• No Activity Logs
• Top-Notch Security
• Flawless Encryption
• Super-Fast Servers

4. PureVPN

Next in the list is PureVPN with its outstanding internet access and privacy protection services. It lets you break through restrictions to enjoy unlimited access and swift browsing. With AES 256-bit encrypted network, the company steps forward with its unbreachable support.

Whether you want to surf online or keep your platforms secured, PureVPN has a great solution for every concern. With incredible censorship you can go past geo-restrictions and surf live videos and watch events without any interruptions. It offers 2000+ servers with super-fast access to gaming, entertainment and browsing avenues.

 Best Deal From PureVPN

PureVPN offers big savings with its 7 Day Trial + 1-Year Plan. After 7 days of access for $0.99, you’ll get a mega 62% Halloween discount, enjoying their services for just $4.17 per month. Its incredible services include:

• 10 Multi Logins
• 256bit AES Encryption
• Internet Kill switch
• Dedicated IP [Addon]
• Logless VPN
• 2000+ Servers

5. Surfshark

Surfshark offers unmatched content safety and complete anonymity. Perhaps the most impressive aspects of its services are its CleanWeb ad blocker and Whitelister split tunneling features. The product deters hackers, prevents online advertisements, offers vast compatibility (with platforms like Windows, OS and Linus), enables protection on selected apps and includes camouflage mode to keep your identity hidden.

Ad manipulation, hacking, price discrimination and malware are common threats people encounter online. Thankfully, Surfshark provides a range of affordable services to protect you from all of these.

Best Deal From Surfshark

Surfshark never fails to amaze its users. You can avail its services from just $2.49 per month, with an 81% discount for the 2-Year Plan. The incredible features available are:

• 30-Day Money-Back Guarantee
• 7-Day Free Trial
• No Borders
• Bypassing Censorship
• Anti-VPN Technology

6. CyberGhost VPN

With over a decade of experience, CyberGhost VPN prides itself on being a top-rated service provider. The company provides a broad range of services including multiple IP addresses, secured gateways, complete anonymity, safety of data, massive compatibility and a one-click solution to access all their unique features and tools.

Everybody wants to go untraceable when surfing online and to use a protected server to carry out banking activities. CyberGhost VPN understands the everyday problems that users face and provides custom-built plans to fit their needs.

Best Deal From CyberGhost VPN

CyberGhost VPN wants to deliver value to its customers so they’re offering 79% off one of their plans. For $2.75 per month you can get the CyberGhost VPN Annual Plan plus 2 months free, with a 45 day money-back guarantee. Features include:

• Transcend Digital Borders
• No Traces Online
• Instant Protection
• Free 7-Day Trial
• Exceptional Data Security

7. IPVanish

IPVanish is yet another remarkable service provider that helps you browse safely, without a fear. You can navigate over 100 online libraries and platforms with complete anonymity. Your real IP address will stay hidden and you can be anywhere in any region. The company provides a wide range of features including zero logs and automatic diagnosis, compatibility with various platform including Windows and OS, and a lot more.

IPVanish truly vanishes your identity from the internet with its impeccable services. Getting around censorship filters, you can break free through your regional restrictions. It offers fast and reliable services at attractive pricing.

Best Deal From IPVanish

IPVanish stuns with a discount of 73%. For $3.23 per month for the IPVanish 1-Year Plan you get to keep your platform and activities hidden, secured and well protected. Their amazing features are as follows:

• Zero Traffic Logs
• 75+ Locations
• 30-Day Money-Back Guarantee
• SOCKS5 web proxy
• 250GB SugarSync® encrypted storage & backup

8. Ivacy VPN

Ivacy VPN knows just the right way to keep you protected. The platform is backed with top-notch tools and software that helps to keep your identity hidden while surfing and shield your servers from intrusions. It safeguards your platforms and boosts their functionality. With no limitation to browsing, you can navigate to any site you want. Moreover, you can enjoy unlimited access, uncountable controls and get the option to unblock avenues irrespective of your region.

Best Deal From Ivacy VPN

Ivacy VPN offers a 7-Day Trial for $0.99, followed by $3.99 a month for 1 Year – a 60% discount. Alternatively, if you don’t want the trial, get 2 years of coverage for just $2.40 a month. Their service features are as follow:

• Ultimate Security
• NO Data Theft
• 100% Anonymity
• Firewall for Added Security

9. VyprVPN

VyprVPN helps to safeguard users by using multiple encryption protocols. It includes a secure DNS and WireGuard. The product provides features like a personalized kill switch which helps to drop restrictions off platforms and help you pass through without any trouble.

Moreover, VyprVPN provides its customers across the globe with unlimited browsing. With their global VPN support, no matter which region you belong to, you can avail their many benefits and navigate over 20 libraries. It offers a super-strong chameleon protocol service that leads to instant unblocking of platforms.

Best Deal From VyprVPN

VyprVPN offers a mega 80% discount, at $2.50 per month for the 24-Month Plan. The inspiring list of features they offer include:

• Apps for All Your Devices
• WireGuard® Advanced Protocol
• 30-Day Money Back Guarantee!
• 70+ Fast, Global Server Locations

10. ZenMate

Are you looking for a 360° protection when browsing online? If so, then you are in the right place. ZenMate provides an ultimate range of VPN services at highly reasonable pricing. To keep your devices from malware, data theft and viruses you need an assistance of the professional entity.

Powered by OpenVPN. the company keeps your server safe and secure. It encrypts the platforms with advanced grade technology. Keeping your IP address hidden, it also allows 100% anonymity. Now you can go to any platform without anyone even knowing who you are and where you belong.

Best Deal From ZenMate

ZenMate offers an 85% saving on their longest plan, at only $1.64 per month for 3 years. Learn about their features below:

• Apps For All Your Devices
• Lightning Speeds
• 74+ Global Server Locations
• Unbreachable Protection
• Strict No-Logs Policy

Wrapping Up

We know how confusing it is to narrow down all the VPN options out there, and then choose just one final choice. We’re confident that this list will help you determine what features are the most important to you and your business and assist you in refining your choices – with a few excellent deals included as an added bonus!

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About the author: Gerry Wilson is a professional mobile app developer and a passionate trending tech writer.

The post 10 Best VPN Services For 2021 + Top Deals first appeared on JUST™ Creative.

How Social Media Automation Can Save Your Business Resources

This article has been contributed by Vincent Sevilla.

If you have ever been involved in social media marketing, you know that one of its biggest challenges is the amount of time that it takes.

You need to continuously conceptualize content ideas that your audience will find relevant and useful. You have to research and produce the content and feed it to them frequently enough that they remain interested and engaged. On top of that, you will also need to create a content calendar that is aligned with your business goals and other complementary campaigns.

As you might imagine, this entails a ton of time and resources.

Aside from your business’ content marketing, you probably also have to provide timely responses to your customers’ questions and concerns, taking even more of your time and resources.

And after all of that, you’ll also need to understand what the analytics are saying about your performance. Are you meeting your goals? Are your efforts contributing to your bottom line?

If this sounds familiar, it’s time for you to look at social media automation.

But what exactly is social media automation? How can it make you more efficient with your resources? And will it actually be worth the investment? This article aims to provide you with what you need to know about social media automation for your business.

What is Social Media Automation?

Social media automation refers to the process of automating some (or all) aspects of your social media marketing activities.

Whether you’re a business owner, a social media manager or a marketer, you can use social media automation to:

• schedule your social media posts ahead of time
• publish your posts during peak audience times
• republish your popular posts
• set up automatic responses to your customers, and more.

By automating your social media activities, you’ll be able to spend less of your valuable time manually maintaining, growing and updating your social accounts.

It’s also likely that your brand’s social media presence will be vastly enhanced, simply due to increased efficiencies and effective use of data. Your accounts will be active beyond your regular business hours, your reach will be optimized, your performance maximized, conversion rates improved , data analyzed in real-time and your key metrics reported to you in a way you can easily interpret.

Social Media Automation Gets You Where Your Audience Is

As mentioned, social media automation allows you to publish your posts during peak audience times. This means you’ll be able to maximize your reach by publishing when your followers and potential customers are most active on social media.

Every social media platform, from Facebook to LinkedIn and Instagram to TikTok, has different peak times when it comes to their users’ activities. You’re missing out on a key opportunity to reach and engage with potential new customers if you’re posting at times when each channel’s audience is not at its highest.

How to Implement Social Media Automation

Now that you have an idea of what social media automation is and how it can help your business, you’re probably wondering exactly how to implement it on your business’s social media profiles.

Fortunately, technological advancements have made for a wealth of affordable tools you can use to automate different aspects of your social media marketing. Here are some of the more common ones that could instantly improve your social media presence.

Chatbots

One of the best ways to immediately improve your customers’ experience with your social media profiles is to integrate chatbots to provide timely responses to your audience’s simpler queries. This enables you to be more efficient with the use of your live human customer support resources.

A chatbot is a computer program that can simulate conversations with users. It can interact with your customers through texts, images, videos or call-to-action buttons. One of the big advantages of chatbots is that they can communicate with users on their preferred platform, including Facebook or Instagram Messenger, an online chat function on your website, Skype Chat and more.

There are numerous other advantages to creating a chatbot. They allow you to provide personalized attention for your clients in real-time, immediately respond to their queries and doubts at any time of the day, add useful functionality to your pages, and arrange programmed questions and answers in line with your business goals.

In other words, you’ll be able to provide customer support service around the clock, improve your customer experience, build stronger customer relationships, generate more sales, and streamline your social media marketing.

Fenty Beauty by Rihanna have created their chatbot on Facebook Messenger. As seen below, users simply need to click “Get Started” and the chatbot will help them find their makeup shade, suggest relevant products or learn about Rihanna’s latest makeup application techniques.

Image source: socialbakers.com

A simple Google search will lead you to a plethora of affordable and easy-to-use tools that can help you create a personalized chatbot on the platforms that your customers most commonly use.

Hootsuite

Hootsuite is a social media management platform that allows you to integrate your social media networks, including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn, all in one place.

With Hootsuite, you can keep track and manage all of your online brands and social networks, monitor what people are saying about your brand, monitor specific search terms in real-time, and answer their enquiries in an instant.

You can also make use of numerous features, including social scheduling, sentiment analysis, and real-time update monitoring. Like other comprehensive tools in this list, the creation, planning, and scheduling of your social media content can be streamlined by Hootsuite.

And because you’re able to keep the conversations flowing seamlessly across multiple channels, you can connect with customers socially at every step of their journey – enabling you to nurture the connections that matter.

Buffer and EvergreenFeed

Buffer promises simpler social media tools for authentic engagement. It’s an easy to use publishing, analytics and engagement platform that helps with things like telling your brand’s story.

With Buffer’s user-friendly interface, you’ll be able to create social media campaigns and find out the best times to publish your posts. You can also use the EvergreenFeed Buffer add-on to automate your posts. If you’re in the e-Commerce business and you’re looking for a better way to develop and analyze your social media strategy, then Buffer should be your top choice.

Paper.li

Image source: paper.li

Paper.li is a powerful content curation service that allows you to transform shared content into online newspapers and build your digital presence. Paper.li is very user-friendly, and lets you save your time by surfacing your content, such as blogs, articles, image, and videos. If you want to look for content based on hashtags and keywords, then Paper.li is the way to go.

IFTTT

IFTTT (If This, Then That) is a web-based service that lets you create chains of simple conditional statements. With it, you can combine two social media platforms together to save you a lot of manual tasks.

For example, you can use IFTTT to tweet your Instagram pics as native images on Twitter. You can also post your Instagram photos to your Facebook page, track your work hours in Google Calendar, and keep your social media profile images in sync.

All in all, IFTTT is a great tool for making sure that your activities are integrated, whichever platform your audience may be on.

Sprout Social

Image source: media.sproutsocial.com

Sprout Social is another well-known social media automation tool that you can use to schedule and publish your posts across multiple social media channels. It also allows you to create chatbots to quickly send responses to your customers, share information, resolve issues and track your progress.

If you’re working with a team, then Sprout Social is the best choice for you. It enables you to collaborate and give specific access to your team members, unify all of your connected networks and profiles into a single space and keep track of your messages.

Now that you know how to automate and improve your business’s social media pages using automation tools, there are a few things that you’ll need to consider if you want to succeed on the social media marketing automation path.

3 Tips For Social Media Marketing Automation Success

While the tools above (and many more available on the market) are already rich in features that can help you achieve tangible improvements with your social media marketing, there are some key concepts you’ll have to keep in mind to be successful.

1. Keep It As Human As Possible

The last thing you want to do when adapting automation for your business’s social media channels is to do away with the authentic human element that is needed to grow a loyal audience. Customers today crave authenticity and transparency, so while chatbots and other automation make the process much easier, you’ll want to ensure the human element is never lost.

As a business owner, you must search for ways to make your posts resonate with your following on a deeper and more personal level. You can use empathy, humor, and easy-to-understand language to make your content more relatable for your customers. But this also means you need to take the time to truly understand your audience. What language do they speak? Are they serious or more laid-back? What sort of content do they interact with the most? Paying attention to these subtle elements can make your automated posts connect with your audience.

2. Agree on What You Need to Automate

Before you start implementing automation on your business’ social media page, you’ll need to consider your overall objectives. For example, you might want to use automation tools to increase your reach and audience engagement with a steady stream of fresh content. Or perhaps your goal is to provide optimal user experience and better customer support.

The tools may be affordable, but they all still require resources. So before you get carried away with automating most parts of your social media marketing, take the time to understand what your priorities are.

3. Track Your Automation Progress

The last key point you need to remember is to regularly monitor the progress and performance of your social media automation efforts. Tracking your progress entails whether your campaigns are meeting your objectives, while also checking whether automation lets you achieve your business goals.

If you’re using chatbots, for example, check if you’re able to cut down on your customer response time. How many of those customers are satisfied with the response they got?

All of the tools mentioned above provide native analytics feature to help you understand how you’re performing. These can provide valuable insights that can vastly improve your campaigns. One business managed to boost its engagement rates by over 100% on Facebook and 300% on LinkedIn after using Sprout’s publishing and reporting features. Meanwhile, another saw their incoming social messages leap to a massive 600% increase after utilizing similar features from these automation tools.

Again, you need to have a clear understanding of what you’re looking to automate and why – this allows you to have a more clearly defined strategy when it comes to automation and enables you to make the necessary adjustments as you close in on your key metrics and goals.

Final Words

There you have it. If you’re looking to improve your social media presence and save your business resources, then consider using social media marketing automation for your business’s social media activities.

But you need to keep in mind that while the rich features that automation tools provide can instantly make life easier for you, having the necessary understanding of your audience and your goals will allow you to optimize the use of these tools.

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About the author: Vincent Sevilla is a professional web designer and inbound marketing strategist. His goal? To innovate ideas, create good art and to travel all the best places in the Philippines.

The post How Social Media Automation Can Save Your Business Resources first appeared on JUST™ Creative.

8 Graphic Design & Branding Services for Musicians, Bands & Artists

This article has been contributed by Nick Voorhees.

It’s no secret that social media is over-saturated with competing interests ruthlessly seeking attention. An unfathomable amount of new posts are uploaded every second and most of us mindlessly scroll while our minds are elsewhere.

Like any other business owner, musicians, music producers, DJs and other music creators are forced to navigate these oversaturated waters that are essentially a popularity contest. The music industry has reached a point where branding can create a more successful career than the music itself.

Standing out in a unique way is more crucial now than ever, which has led many musicians down the path of working with visual artists.

The demand for talented graphic designers is at an all-time high because of the large range of services that are needed to create an unforgettable brand. However, it can be hard to know exactly what music creators need and how to connect with them.

There are many ways to find clients in the music industry, and some services are starting to gain more popularity, especially during the pandemic.

1. Cover Art

Unfortunately, people are judged by their covers

Image source: amazon.com

“Mood” by 24KGOLDN and Iann Dior has generated around 36 million streams on Spotify this year, which means listeners have seen this album cover 36 million times – much to the graphic designer’s advantage. It’s no surprise that many music producers take album art seriously because it will forever be associated with their brand.

Album covers are the most commonly used promotional tool in a music artist’s toolbox. For every song release, the album cover is a powerful resource that can be utilized to capture the attention of the public. A professionally made album cover increases the likelihood that fans and potential fans stop what they’re doing to press play.

The design needs to reinforce the music creator’s brand in an eye-catching, relevant and honest way. If music creators can find a graphic designer that can help them produce a cover that is both original and demands attention, they have won half the battle to create a successful career.

If you’re a graphic designer that wants to sell cover art, check out Melody Nest. You can sell pre-made album cover art as well as custom covers to music creators that have song releases coming up.

Pro tip: Motion cover art has become widely popular on Instagram and many artists post 5-10 second videos with visual effects layered on top of their previously-made cover art. Lots of musicians are willing to pay a small additional fee for this service, so be sure to upsell!

2. Logos & Branding

Musicians have a deep desire to be famous

Image source: edmtunes.com

If you’re a true music fan, it’s probably easy to conjure up images of the logos of your favorite musicians. Logo recognition is an integral part of being a true fan because it makes you proud that you even know what it looks like.

An easily recognizable logo is integral to the careers of many music creators’ careers. According to soundplate.com, having a unique and powerful brand image makes musicians “more desirable for bookings, help you shift merchandise and make your online music profiles look much more professional.”

Music logos appear across a range of mediums, including:

• live event posters,
• merchandise,
• social media,
• music streaming services and
• music videos.

In all honesty, musicians can at times be oblivious to what they want in the first place when they approach designers for a logo, so be prepared to be patient –– you’ll make a lot more sales if you remain calm and collected. If you’re able to create magic, musicians will love you for it and will want to share and post your work everywhere.

If you want to find immediate access to musicians to work with, AirGigs, Melody Nest and Upwork provide options for graphic designers to sell logos to musicians, music producers and DJs.

3. Photoshopped Images

Give their fans something to share

Artist credit: Downlink

Since the majority of musicians need content to post on their social media accounts every day, they need new and creative ways to do it. A great way to stand out from other artists is with images like the one pictured above. Obviously, not everything shared on an artist’s platform will be created by a graphic designer, but they will need more than just cover art and a logo to share with their fans.

Lots of music creators commission artists to edit photos to give their fans a taste of how they want to be portrayed. Artwork like this is very popular in the electronic dance music realm, and DJs love to share visually captivating posts of themselves –– their fans eat it up.

It’s important to remember that each genre in music has a unique aesthetic and visual appeal that’s original to the style of music. Even two styles of similarly aggressive music can have completely different looks. If you’re not sure how to figure this out, make sure to get your client to send you plenty of references.

If you’re willing to conduct business via social media, Instagram is a great way to get this done. Search for tags like #electronicmusic, #musicproducer or anything similar and find artists that post these kinds of edited photos. You may land clients just through a few cold messages.

4. Music Visualizers

Keep listeners entertained

Image source: ondesoft.com

For those that aren’t really sure what these are, music visualizers, or audio visualizers, are animated videos with visual effects that react and change to the sounds of a song, creating a pleasant experience for the listener. Visualizers are a great alternative to music videos because they are far less expensive.

On YouTube, visualizers have become extremely popular with channels in all types of genres, especially EDM. With the fast growth of electronic dance music, there are many high-profile channels on YouTube with millions of subscribers that use captivating visualizers to keep their fans listening to their channels for longer periods of time. Here are a few worth checking out:

• Trap Nation
• SuicideSheep
• Proximity
• UKF

If you’re a graphic designer that has any experience with Adobe After-Effects or other video editing software, then creating interesting visual effects to sync along to music is something that’s worth exploring. Music visualization is a lucrative market that has remained quiet in the mainstream for reasons that still seem unclear, so now is the time to jump right in.

Related: 40 to70% off Adobe Creative Cloud

Oddly enough, Fiverr generates a lot of business for music visualizers. Obviously, they are known for offering “cheaper” work, but there are a good amount of graphic designers charging fair prices and landing a lot of sales. They seem to be the only marketplace online currently selling music visualizers.

5. Lyric Videos

Make lyrics look good

Many artists reach for lyric videos instead of visualizers or music videos for some music releases, like Katy Perry’s Firework . Lyric videos are a bit like a music visualizer but the designer will add in the artist’s lyrics in clever and eye-catching ways.

If you haven’t made a lyric video, below are some helpful tips:

1. Listen to the song a few times to understand the mood
2. Google the type of music to learn more about the aesthetic of the genre
3. Have your artist gather images they want to use
4. Use the artist’s lyrics as inspiration for fonts, colors, etc
5. Constantly send updated versions to musicians (a lot of them are extreme perfectionists)

Fiverr is a good choice for lyric videos, but there are plenty of options that you can find in Facebook groups where artists will post queries looking to create these animated videos. If you search for groups like “music producers”, you can find people asking and inquiring for design services.

6. Merchandise Design

Sell out of merch at every show

Artist credit: Illenium Clothing

All great artists have merchandise – whether it’s hats, shirts, jerseys, socks, sweatshirts ot stickers. Many musicians make a substantial amount of their total income selling merchandise at shows and online, so it’s critical to have great design work. This is especially important for larger acts.

According to Tone Deaf, “nowadays, touring artists earn between 10-35% of their revenue through merch sales… the very biggest names bring in $300,000 to $400,000 USD per year.” Merchandise sales fall right under touring as the most lucrative aspect of being a professional musician.

Musicians want to create imagery that not only represents their brand, but something that will sell. So, if you’re talented in both design and marketing, you can really hit a home run by approaching artists both large and small with a few mock-ups (even if they didn’t ask for it) and see if they bite. If what you have is amazing, they may just buy it from you.

Design Hill makes it easy to pitch your work to musicians to help them create their merchandise. Otherwise, create original work and start sending emails!

7. Video Editing (YouTube)

Bring originality to their subscribers

Many music artists release videos on various social media channels to increase their brand exposure and generate engagement. As well as the expected music-related videos, some artists have branched out into content like tutorials, tips and tricks, journaling and funny clips.

If they have a lot of subscribers on their channel, they’ll be open to inquiries from good designers to help them broaden their content. If video editing is your wheelhouse, use YouTube and Instagram to find music creators who could use the help of an editor, and reach out to them directly.

Keep an eye out for musicians creating tutorial or educational videos that are of a lower editing quality and send a message to them asking if they’d like help. Music creators will most likely be receptive at some point, so getting yourself known to them at the beginning is a good choice.

Pro tip: Try to find musicians gaining traction as they will generally be the most excited to get some extra help.

8. Social Media and Music Streaming Banners

Consistency is key

Artist credit: Cloudsz

For platforms like SoundCloud, Mixcloud and Facebook, instant visual appeal is mandatory for serious music artists. Great banners are sought after on these platforms because that’s where a musician’s music lives. They want their music’s home to be not only auditorily amazing, but visually stunning as well.

As you can see from the photo above, the circle with the usual Soundcloud profile picture on the left blends into the banner. This is the standard layout for any successful artist or upcoming artist on Soundcloud, so many hire a professional for this job. Usually, musicians hire the designers that made their cover art, so to get your foot in the door, start selling album covers! Offering bundle packages is a good way to upsell.

Conclusion

To really stand out and find clients on any of these platforms, it’s all about having something special to offer. There are countless sellers that all have the same goal in mind… and that is to sell. In order to separate yourself in these competitive landscapes, you have to offer more value than the rest.

One way you can set yourself apart is to provide free samples to potential buyers. To be clear, I am not advocating for accepting jobs for free. But if you’re contacted on freelance platforms and a musician is describing something they need, surprising them with a mock-up without them even asking will immediately pull your potential buyer in.

You can also choose to be receptive and engage with potential buyers for an extended period of time. Ask a potential buyer a lot of questions and get them to talk about their project – musicians often love to discuss their visions anyway. The more a musician speaks with you, the better chance you have at working together.

If you’re looking to sell on social media, rather than reaching out to prospective clients with your pre-made portfolio work, reach out with a design specifically tailored for them. You don’t need to spend hours creating it, but something that showcases that it was made specifically for the target buyer, and only them, will open the door to meaningful dialogue and lead to a mutually beneficial experience.

Provide true value and you’ll do great things.

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About the author: Nick Voorhees is a drum and bass music producer and the owner of the musician freelance platform Melody Nest. He is a graduate of University of California, Santa Cruz, Icon Collective College of Music, and has been working in the music industry for almost a decade.  

The post 8 Graphic Design & Branding Services for Musicians, Bands & Artists first appeared on JUST™ Creative.