Anne Marie Comaratta
Anne Marie Comaratta is the talent behind Stress Free College Admissions, a consultancy that provides high school students and their families with practical tools, up-to-date information, and support as they go through the college application process. Her goal? To make the process seamless and—you guessed it—stress free.
When Anne Marie came to me, it was because she was maxxed out on her one-on-one offerings. She needed a way to scale her business beyond face-to-face consulting. She wanted a website that would enable her to offer an on-demand, online course, showcase her in-person services, and provide students and their families with free information and resources.
To make it happen, Anne Marie needed a brand design, a professional photo shoot, and social media expertise to help her put her best foot forward. Turned out that I knew exactly the right women for the job.
Giving talented woman business owners the website they deserve never gets old!
The web design process
Anne Marie was ready to invest in her business. In addition to a custom website, she wanted a full brand, including multiple logo options, a primary and secondary color palette, and font suite. She also needed a brand photo shoot to give her photos she could use for the website and her social media. Speaking of social media, she was hoping for some help creating content and managing her profiles.
I leveraged my network and connected Anne Marie with some incredibly talented woman business owners, including graphic designer Amanda Awad, photographer Casi Hall, and social media guru Tina Anderson. I’ve worked with each of them on several projects, and I knew Anne Marie would adore them as much as I do!
While Amanda and Casi were busy working their magic, I set Anne Marie up with wording outlines so she could provide information for her website and her new online course. I also connected Anne Marie with my favorite websites to download some high-quality, free stock photos to round out her website and social media design options.
I was blown away by the new brand that Amanda created. Not only did she select a great font suite that included a fun, up-angle accent font, she chose a gorgeous color palette, handcrafted a set of icon and designed some graphics that could be used as background textures.
Casi knocked it out of the park with dozens of gorgeous photos. Her talent as a photographer is that she sees people for who they are, then brings out the best in them. Anne Marie’s knowledge, empathy, and impish sense of humor came through loud and clear in every photo. Casi also provided Anne Marie with a selection of “B-roll” photos of notebooks and books that could be used as secondary design elements.
Armed with fabulous brand assets, lovely photos, and well-written wording, it was time to start design. I felt like a little kid in a candy shop!
Anne Marie wanted her site to feel cute without being cutesy. She wanted an adorable site that felt approachable and welcoming while still being authoritative and information-forward. And perhaps most importantly of all, she wanted it to have a sense of whimsy and fun. I couldn’t wait to get started!
Her new site leverages her brand to its fullest extent. The up-angle accent font shows up as subheaders sitewide. It’s mirrored by Squarespace’s new section dividers, which I paired with thick outlines and secondary colors from the brand palette. Each subheader is paired with one of the new icons to give the site a cohesive but fun look.
From there, I paired photos of Anne Marie with the “B-roll” photos, sprinkled in a few of Amanda’s background graphics, and added some custom code to zhuzh it up a bit.
The new site takes full advantage of Squarespace’s new online course module. Students can enroll and pay directly on the site, then easily access their course lessons and downloadable workbooks. The site enables students to track their progress through each lessons, and the on-demand materials are available for students to watch and re-watch as often as they’d like.
Anne Marie also took advantage of my website maintenance retainer. When she’d like an update to her site, she simply sends me an email with the information. As with all my retainer clients, her note goes into a priority inbox and the change is made as quickly as possible. She can delegate website maintenance to me so she can focus on running her business. Gold.
What a pleasure it was to turn the site over to Tina so she could work her magic and amplify Anne Marie’s talent on social media :)
Take a look at Anne Marie’s new website home page!
