Independent Visual Designer
Self-employed
Total years of experience :12 years, 2 Months
Doing my first professional graphic design commission back in 2012 marked the beginning of my journey as an independent designer. Learning has always been my common practice, resulting in continuous development, and opening the door for new opportunities. My direction and scope of work has evolved over the years; expanded at some point to include web design, and eventually narrowed down to a more focused and coherent set of services.
I have proudly come to the point where my design career has already taken a clear shape and direction. With brand design at the core, both my marketing background and strategic mindset have become even more relevant to my work, enabling me to cover branding more in-depth; from building brand concepts and shaping their stories, to designing brand assets, manuals, and collaterals. For existing brands, I also provide a range of design services to support them, and help them align their marketing communications with their brand strategies and objectives.
Current scope of services:
- Brand development & design.
- Logo design and iconography.
- Digital designs (e.g. digital booklets, brochures, social media materials).
- Print designs (e.g. banners, booklets, brochures, flyers).
- Layout design.
- Illustrations.
Responsibilities:
- Developing brand concepts and visual identities.
- Creating designs intended for multiple mediums.
- Occasional copywriting.
Working at Seven Heaven, I had the opportunity to both learn and accomplish a lot through a varied experience and a challenging environment. While my primary role revolved around branding, I also worked on various projects that are categorized into advertising, publishing, and once, even web design. Alongside visual design, strategic and marketing planning was also an essential part of my job, and many of my works involved marketing and creative copywriting efforts as well.
Highlights:
- Built and designed brand concepts and visual identities for 5 businesses operating in different fields (food & beverage, training, medical, and recruitment). Also worked on a major rebranding project for a sports business.
- Created standalone logos for several brands.
- Planned and designed 2 major brand launch digital campaigns.
- Created a wide range of both digital and print designs for over 5 brands.
- Designed the layout of BMW Egypt official magazine (2017 issue).
- Planned and designed a website for a real estate business operating in the Egyptian market.
After the first eight months of my one-year term with the national marketing team, I was promoted to a senior designer. I was also assigned as AIESEC in Egypt Brand Manager, having proved great understanding and care to apply consistent and clear branding practices through my preceding work with AIESEC.
Among a wide set of designs I created for the national office, I was honored to work on a new project planned and run collaboratively between multiple AIESEC offices in the Middle East and North Africa region. It was called "Amal Project"—"مشروع أمل" in Arabic—which aimed at promoting the culture of entrepreneurship and innovation among the Arab youth in MENA. I developed the visual concept and created a brand identity and a brand manual for the project, completely from scratch. I also designed a set of digital templates and designs to be used by the different AIESEC offices participating in the project, across 5 countries as a start.
Working with the national marketing team of AIESEC in Egypt as a graphic designer was the next big step in my experience with this organization. We were responsible for planning and executing various marketing campaigns that promote AIESEC's unique portfolio of products and programs.
I joined the national office for a one-year term. During my first eight months there, I worked on 4 major campaigns, in addition to creating a variety of other designs. For most of my work with AIESEC in Egypt, I was not only responsible for designing visual materials, but I was frequently involved in the planning phases as well.
In 2014, I joined a 4-month project titled "Alexandria Model European Union"; AlexMEU for short. It is a simulation model of the European Union, giving young people the opportunity to develop leadership skills by experiencing one of the most influential systems in the world. A new edition of the project is organized annually by Step Up Youth Initiative: a non-profit NGO operating in the city of Alexandria, Egypt.
I volunteered in this project as a graphic designer, and worked in a team of around 20 people with other designers, photographers, video editors and social media handlers. We started off by creating a brand identity for AlexMEU 2014 edition, with the theme of "Democracy". Then, we planned, created, and ran a successful marketing campaign for the whole project; from pre-launch teasers to post closure media coverage.
Five months after joining AIESEC in Alexandria, my role has developed from working on scattered designs and campaigns, to becoming more integral and effective. As a media director, I was not only creating designs, but I was also a key player in setting the marketing direction and media strategies. An essential part of my job was to coordinate with the marketing team leaders inside the organization to ensure clarity and relevance of all the communication materials, and to maintain a consistent brand representation across the different mediums.
I joined AIESEC in Alexandria back in February 2014 as a marketing team member. Being recognized for my skills in graphic design, it didn't take long until I also became their main designer, working—with the help of my fellow teammates—to create most of the visual materials needed for the local office's marketing communications.
I have proudly worked on multiple citywide campaigns and created tens of designs for AIESEC in Alexandria; from digital designs intended for the social media, to print artworks promoting AIESEC inside college campuses, at one of the city's biggest job fairs, and at other events and venues as well.
Responsibilities:
- Responding to inquiries, both in person and over the phone.
- Handling class registrations.
- Preparing schedules and reports, as well as other paperwork.
- Coordinating with teachers to ensure efficiency and quality.
- Evaluating the customer experience, taking feedback, and resolving any complaints.
- Developing and maintaining a solid base of prospective clients.
I was part of a numerous team serving a major overseas client operating in the telecommunications sector (AT&T, USA).
Responsibilities:
- Handling sales and billing inquiries, over the phone.
- Building and maintaining a positive and profitable relationship with customers.
- Resolving complaints, and ensuring customer satisfaction.
- Handling customers with different attitudes, as well as different English accents.
- Making the relevant product/service offer to each customer.
- Maintaining a positive and accurate image of our client, in a way that reflects their values.
A one-month training that covered the following:
- A practical overview of major marketing and sales practices in a typical FMCG business, and how they interact with other functions inside the company.
- Insights into retailing and trade marketing, through real market visits.
- Insights into supply chain management.
Highlights: - Developed clear understanding of major business and marketing concepts. - Developed communication and presentation skills. - Managed working both as an individual and in teams. - Managed multitasking, working under pressure, and meeting deadlines. - Gained both theoretical understanding and practical experience in applying scientific research methods for problem solving and for business development. Also, learned using SPSS software for data analysis. - Done a feasibility study for a restaurant, through a team academic project.
