It was not so very long ago that minimalism in design was a fringe movement. In fact, the term – which originated in 1965 – was used derisively by the British Philosopher Richard Wollheim when he critiqued a group of artists for their ‘minimal art content’. That changed and in recent years minimalism in design has taken over not just in the artistic communities, but everywhere else as well. Millennials use it to design their homes and web page designers use it to create their pages. Some even go so far as to say that minimalism has evolved from a form of rebellion against the cluttered and gaudy styles of yesteryear. Rather than a critique, it became a symbol for the everyday consumer; a luxury product. As professor and critic Raskin says, ‘The richer you are, the less you have.’ The minimalist artist’s penchant for raw materials and almost brutal simplicity soon crept into the design and architecture world and quickly became more about conformity than revolution.

1. Minimalism in Design

2. In fact, the term – which originated in 1965 – was used derisively by the British
Philosopher Richard Wollheim when he critiqued a group of artists for their ‘minimal
art content’.
That changed and in recent years minimalism in design has taken over not just in
the artistic communities, but everywhere else as well.
Millennials use it to design their homes and web page designers use it to create
their pages.
Some even go so far as to say that minimalism has evolved from a form of rebellion
against the cluttered and gaudy styles of yesteryear.
Rather than a critique, it became a symbol for the everyday consumer; a luxury
product.
As professor and critic Raskin says, ‘The richer you are, the less you have.’
The minimalist artist’s penchant for raw materials and almost brutal simplicity soon
crept into the design and architecture world and quickly became more about
conformity than revolution.
It was not so very long ago
that minimalism in design was a
fringe movement.

3. Minimalism in design is about bringing
back design to its core.
• Everything is about functionality.
• You do not include elements that are not necessary.
• Trying to reduce the amount of ink you use.
• Use the simplest shapes you can.

4. So, Minimalism is just keeping things simple, right?
Close, but not quite.
Simplicity Minimalism
Google is arguably the best example of functional minimalism applied today. The startup interface of nearly all its services is clean
and minimalist.
For instance, the starting page of the search engine is plain simple: a search box, 2 search buttons, and the Google logo.
What’s more, the logo itself is in (next to) basic colors, which is another typical feature of minimalism.

5. The Marketing Benefits of Minimizing Brand's Logo
If you haven't already
noticed, there is something
a little different
about Starbucks. The next
time you are drinking a
$9 latte, take a look at the
logo on the side of the cup.
The iconic twin-tailed siren
is still there, but the classic
“Starbucks Coffee” is gone.
Last fall, the popular chain
decided to remove the text
and just leave the image.
This is an example of
minimizing a brand logo to
maximize the
brand's potential.
From Targeted
Marketing to Open Options
Back in the day, Starbucks had a very targeted plan. They
cornered a specific market and hit it hard. In their case,
they were making gourmet coffee drinks, and they were
doing it better than anyone else. It worked for a while, but
things started to change. Their customers wanted more, so
Starbucks delivered.
Today, you can go up to a Starbucks barista and order tea,
juice, pastries, and breakfast sandwiches. There are regular
customers who have never ordered a coffee. By removing
the text in their logo, Starbucks has allotted itself unlimited
potential by not being pigeonholed as a coffee shop.

6. Why Less Is More?
There is a reason why businesses subscribe to
the “less is more” theory with branding and
marketing. If an athletic apparel company
created a logo that showed a pair of shoes,
consumers may only consider them to be a
sneaker company.
Nike’s famous “swoosh” is a perfect example of
minimalistic branding. It’s a sleek and attractive design,
but it doesn’t suggest any specific Nike product.
That provides Nike the flexibility to market and sell any
products they want. And this sporting company has taken
advantage of this by expanding their product lines to
include everything from shoes to apparel, accessories, tech
gadgets, apps, and more.

7. Minimalism is about a
return to the basics of
• Space
• Contrast
• Organization
• Negative Space
• Dominant Visual

8. Space
Minimalism is built on space, and while you don’t
have to include massive amounts of white space,
element breathability is a must. Each piece in the
design puzzle must have room to stand on its own in
the design. Minimal outlines seldom feel cramped
and work.
This design used the number one to create a letter in
the word one. They could have simply used only the
word or only the number, but the combination of both
adds a unique twist. The ‘N’ isn’t incredibly apparent
at first, but once you realize it’s there, it makes it all
the more great.

9. Contrast
Creating contrast between subject matter is an
interesting approach no matter what you’re
designing. In this graphic, skyscrapers are created in
the negative space between trees in a forest.
You get the contrast of city vs. nature, but can also
see how the two work harmoniously together.

10. Organization
This image combines multiple elements within the
composition, and everything flows from one thing to
the next. The cloud of bats in the sky turns into an
arm, and the fingers attached to the hand create the
silhouette of a home.

11. Negative Space
This manual for the GTRC uses negative space in
really creative ways. If you aren’t familiar with who
the company is, it’s difficult to decipher the letters
right away. The shapes (and lack thereof) work
together to create an abstracted letterform.

12. Dominant Visual
Rather than showing just the treat, just the dog,
or a dog and the treat, this design showed both
without showing both. The cut out in the bone
represents the mouth of the dog, and the small
dot represents the nose. It’s fun and playful,
and is much more effective than having shown
the full figure of the dog.

13. Examples
This Spock poster doesn’t use many details at all, yet
you still know exactly what the figure is. The use of the
popular hand symbol as the eye ensures that you know
exactly who it is, and is a clever way to draw in fans.
Don’t use too much detail Play with text boxes
This magazine spread had some fun with their text boxes.
Not only did they place them in unorthodox places on the
page, but they shaped one into a ‘t’ to work with the -shirt
text. The placement of the boxes leaves a lot of white on the
page, and makes it look clean and modern.
This breast cancer poster uses the metaphor
of a puzzle piece to represent the missing
cure. The piece is also turned into a person,
and the placement of the empty space is
representative of what the cure could help.
Use metaphors

14. Do Minimal Designs
Matters in Media?

15. Design Media
How?

16. A Minimal Design Leads to…
Increase Media
Performance
Increase
Campaign ROI

17. How FedEx Express
"Neighbors" print
campaign helped
increase
performance
Minimalist ads often prove memorable,
in part, because they tend to capture
our attention. The bare bones nature of
the ads allows designers to manipulate
the negative space in a way that draws
the viewer’s eyes to the key image or
message. Where a viewer of a more
cluttered ad might spend a fraction of a
second on each element, the viewer of
a minimalist ad spends the entire time
focused on the single message, often a
logo and tagline. This additional focused
time combined with the surprise the
simple ads evoke likely improves recall
of the brand later.
DDB Brasil created this campaign to strengthen the perception that the speed with which FedEx Express delivers
orders is beyond the global scope. It’s so fast, in fact, that sending a package to another country takes as little time as
it would to put it into the hands of a neighbor.

18. How does Minimal
Design affect customer
conversions & Increase ROI
So when it comes to conversion of lead, what should
you consider? Simplification is one. It’s tempting to
overload your ad with as many images, text, graphics
and effects as you want. You want to create an impact,
after all—something that will immediately catch the
eyes of your market. But having too much on your ad
can cause pages to load slowly or bog down. Page
loading speed is actually a factor in how Google and
other search engines rank your website. And
unfortunately, patience is not a virtue for a majority of
internet users, and the longer it takes your website to
fully load, the harder it will be to keep your customers
from leaving and taking their virtual business
somewhere else. If they do decide to wait it out, if the
complexities in your design make it hard for them to
navigate your website, it is likely you will lose those
conversions. Whatever goals you set—may it be an
actual sale or simply getting them to register into your
mailing list—may not be met at a level that can be
considered successful. Simplicity does not have to affect
visual impact. Following a color scheme (ideally one
that is associated with your brand) is a good way to
create interest while sparingly using other potentially
distracting design elements.
Web publishers generally make two mistakes in regards to simplicity with their ads:
They populate their website with ads that are either too visually creative (difficult to consume instantly)
They give too many options (information overload).
Below you’ll find two examples, one featuring traditional ad design and the other featuring a more modern robust
design:
Here’s what Gillette did well:
• A single distinguishable call to
action
• A single headline
• The company’s brand name
• A single focal point or an eye
catching object
https://conversionxl.com/blog/banner-ads-suck-boost-ctr/

19. Basically, the human brain first recognizes an
object not by its specific parts but as a whole.
Our cognitive process leans towards
understanding objects in their simplest form.
Once the brain has processed that
information (in one tenth of a second), it is
then that it breaks the object down and
notices its components.
NNGroup analyzed over 1.5 million eye-
tracking fixations from hundreds of sites to
understand how people read on the web.
Here’s what they found:
• Users focus first on the information on
top of the page.
• Second concentration area was left hand
side of the page.
• Users tend to read the information
instead of scanning it if the writing is of
high quality. This also increases the
likelihood of clicks on any relevant ads or
call to action buttons in the page.
https://www.infolinks.com/blog/case-studies/beating-banner-blindness/

20. Conclusion
Minimalism is one of the design
trends that just never gets old. The
simplicity of it makes minimalism
easy to incorporate into a number of
other styles and trends. It is classic
and classy. It works with – and
emphasizes – many different types
of content.
Minimalist design will continue to
take over website, app and print
design. It will evolve and change as
design preferences always do, but
the roots of the technique will
remain.
Less is more.