This is how it began, with a contest on Facebook:
And the winners are…
A month later and after my experience with Circa Lingua, I interviewed David Miralles for those of you who are interested in giving a boost to their CV. David is interpreter and translator but also a great designer for your CV. Do you know that employers spend an average of six seconds to know if a CV is suitable for their needs? David can help us to make the most of these six seconds, giving our CV a new structure and an original layout. Now let’s talk with David.
How did you get the idea of providing this kind of services?
It all started last January when I was working on my business development plan. I wanted to diversify my business in a way that I could give my own business a boost. One of my passions is graphic design, so I thought about how I could combine both graphic design and translation to give my business that boost and, of course, help my clients to develop their businesses.
I enrol for an InDesign course aiming at learning how to design my own marketing materials and help my clients with theirs and I successfully finished this course by the end of March.
But, you know, it’s difficult to promote services when you are starting from scratch. That’s why I thought that it would be interesting to start offering graphic design through a special offer that I’d launch for the summer.
After having analysed the need that my clients could have in summer, I discovered that quite a few potential clients were looking for a new summer job or were going to spend their summer looking for new clients and collaborations. And what’s the best way to find a new job? Standing out through an appealing and innovative CV. That’s how I came up with this idea.
Of course, this is just the beginning, I’m still doing some training in graphic design and will soon add new services, such a leaflets, catalogues or business cards design to my portfolio, always combined with translation services, of course!
It’s not easy to choose the right colour palette or create a balanced structure. Do you have specific studies or experiences in this respect? Do you use specific software?
That’s a very good question. Of course, colours are very important, not just for a CV, but for businesses and the feelings that we want to convey.
Personally, I normally go for three different colours and create a colour palette based on them, with different tones to play around. For example, this is the one I created for Circa Lingua:
I don’t normally use any specific software to think about the colour palette itself, as it’s a creative process. But I do use InDesign to define exactly the colours and maintain a certain coherence in all my marketing materials, such as my different CVs, website, leaflets, business cards, etc.
I have studied colours from a psychological point of view and how they can have an impact on clients’ decision-making processes. Every colour has its purpose depending on what we want to achieve. For example, we use red to convey urgency when we launch a new offer for a specific period of time, or green when we’re offering an added value to our clients. It’s amazing how we can benefit from using different colours!
Regarding the structure of a good CV, as you mentioned before, our prospective clients or employers spend an average of 6 second to scan our CV. We need to make them read our CV and turn these 6 seconds into 30 (or even more!). We can gain some more seconds with a good headline. If you add a clear structure with sized sections that can be easily distinguished from each other, our readers will find the information that they are interested in quicker. Besides, if you add a good colour palette and an easily readable typography, our readers will enjoy going through our CV. And the icing of the cake, an appealing copy that will make your potential clients read every single word in your CV.
It’s not easy to craft the perfect CV, but after having studied this process in depth and implementing all these strategies, I can guarantee that it’s worth it!
You offer three types of services plus a personalised and handmade design. I tried the start-up pack and I’m am absolutely delighted with the result. The boost and deluxe packs include translations along with proofreading and editing of the translation. To whom would you recommend these different packs?
As you mentioned, I decided to offer three different packs because every client has his specific needs.
The start-up pack includes the redesign of a CV. This is interesting for people that have already worked on the content of their CVs and want to attract more clients through an appealing layout. We cannot do everything right. Some people are very good at writing to convince their readers, but they don’t really know how to design a CV. (And why should they if they aren’t designer, right?) That’s why I created 4 fresh and appealing layouts that I can easily adapt to the needs of my clients.
The boost and deluxe packs include translations and proofreading along with copy comments and pieces of advise to improve the content of a CV. There are some people, most of them really good at what they do, that don’t really know how to sell themselves. The copy of a CV and a quality and flawless translation is as important as the layout. These packs are interesting for people that need to work on their CV because they’re about to start a job hunting or for entrepreneurs and freelancers that want to attract more clients through an appealing and tailored CV.
In addition, I also offer tailored layouts for people that built their own brands and want to match their brands with their CVs. This is a more advanced service, as I have to create a new layout from scratch and match it with my client’s needs, corporative colours, typography, logos, among a long list.
People seem to be very happy with all these options. Some of my clients have already found either a job or new clients thanks to their redesigned CVs. And, I’m going to be a bit cheeky here and confess something:
Before launching the offer, I wanted to be sure that it worked to offer a safe investment to my clients. That’s why I started redesigning my own CV. Once I got it redesigned, I applied for a job (just to see if they noticed my brand new CV). And this is the answer that I got from them:
They didn’t mention my CV in the email, but when they phoned me, they told me that the manager was very impressed with my CV. Then I realised that this service was ready to be launched.
Can you describe the process you follow to design a new layout for a client’s CV?
First of all, if I have to design a brand new layout for a client, I try to gathere as many information as possible: the purpose of the CV, the business or profession of my client (obviously the CV of a photographer and a technical engineer are going to be structured differently), if they have a brand. I take into account the corporate colours, typography, logos, the “voice” of the brand, along with the old CV of my client. There are a lot of aspects that must be combined in a good CV!
Then I structure the layout with InDesign. My CVs are normally one-page long. I have discovered that quality has a greater impact than quantity, and I like to know the space that I’ve got for each section of a CV.
Once I’ve got the layout with every section that I want to include, I write the first draft of the content. Then, I adapt it taking into account the “voice” of the brand and I translate (if needed) and proofread it. Once it’s all proofread, I send it to my client so he can check if something needs to be amended and added to the layout.
With all the content already placed in each section, I play around with colours, typographies in different sizes to adapt the content to the page. I like to innovate and create something different for each client, so creativity has an important role in this process.
During the last part of the project, I add pictures, logos, graphic elements such as icons or vector images, and hyperlinks. And then export it in different formats for my client. My clients are informed of the whole progress, as my aim is to create exactly what my clients firstly had in mind.
Can you give some tips for writing an effective CV?
Of course! I’m not going to tell you that content is important, everyone knows that. What has worked better for me is being different. There are many CVs out there, most of them far better than ours, so if we really want to stand out, we need to be different.
Talk with honesty and tell your story in a way that your reader can’t stop reading (remember when you were reading Harry Potter?). If you grab your reader’s attention, you have already won half of the battle. Then you have to analyse what they want from you to write in a way that matches your readers’ expectations.
And then, if you promote the reading of your CV through an appealing structure where your reader is able to find the information that he needs quicker, the success is guaranteed.
For more tips on how to write the perfect CV, you can visit this blog posts that I published a couple of months ago.
I would also like to mention that from this date to the end of the month, I have launched a new contest on Facebook. It’s a good opportunity to have a chance to win a CV layout, as Chiara did! If you want to participate, you just need to join us here.
Thanks a lot, David, for accepting my invitation and especially for giving me the chance to have an appealing and professional CV. I chose Cold Wildness model, but there are other wonderful layouts. Would you prefer a personalised design? Hurry up and contact David at david@circalingua.com.
