A Little Bit About Me
Creative Director | UX Designer, Researcher & Usability Analyst | Graphic Designer
Josh Scott, Founder and COO | Craftsy
“Nicole was the first member of our creative team at Craftsy and made a huge impact both as an individual contributor and, as we grew, as a leader of an increasingly big and diverse team. Nicole’s fingerprints can be seen on nearly every aspect of Craftsy today – from photography, to email design, to landing pages, to print ads, even to the design of our office space.”
Virginia Fuller, Sr Director, Brand Marketing | Craftsy
“Nicole reported to me for almost two years as Craftsy’s Creative Director, and I’d be happy to work with her again in the future. Craftsy is a constantly evolving company, and Nicole’s core skills in design and art direction enabled her to effectively tackle a wide variety of creative challenges that came along, often unexpectedly. Nicole was the primary owner of the brand’s look and feel during her time here, and I could always count on her to consider and incorporate new strategic direction while protecting and evolving the essence of the brand.
Nicole’s management of her team, and her growth as a manager, were also remarkable. Over her tenure at Craftsy, Nicole’s team grew from a couple of designers to a team of 14 graphic designers, interactive designers, and photographers, and she navigated this shift very well. She jumped willingly into our constant need to find process improvements while still receiving high marks from her team for her ability to inspire and motivate personal development. Perhaps most importantly, Nicole’s attitude is fantastic: she embraces change and always jumps into a new project with positive energy.”
Barry Snower, Director, Client Development | Waterfall
“Nicole was always a pleasure to work with. She has an impeccable eye for detail, and never missed a deadline. She is an incredibly talented, driven and dependable designer, that delivers 110% every time.”
With 12+ years experience in creative strategy, directing global brand design, integrated campaigns, and a certification in UX research and design, I bring extensive knowledge of brand and storytelling, user-centered design, vision, communication, and leadership.
Credentials
Creative Strategy
Delivering brand focused, revenue-driving creative and strategic ideas for brands across channels. Budgeting and resource allocation. Trend analysis and market research. Experience in developing new brand strategies and design systems and evolving existing. Adaptive and detail-oriented.
Leadership
Experience managing and coaching both large and small teams across multiple functions. Focused on ownership, efficiency, empathy, and data-driven decision making while establishing career-development programming. Strong communication and presentation skills.
User-Centered
Knowledge and expertise in heuristics of usability, usability analysis and user personas, information architecture, semantics and SEO, wireframing and prototyping, user flows and A/B testing, UI and visual design, analytics, conversion rate optimization
Technical
Adobe Creative Suite, After Effects, Sketch, Figma, InVision, UX Design & Research, User Surveys & Testing, Email Design, Display, Print, Packaging, Environmental, Experiential, Video Editing, Photography, Retouching HTML/CSS, CMS: Brightspot/Webflow/Wordpress, Prototyping, Keynote/PPT, Asana, Workfront, Marketo/Pardot
Experience
CREATIVE DIRECTOR
Simpro Software // Broomfield, CO // October 2022–May 2023
Oversaw all aspects of a global brand including design systems and integrated campaign strategies for the marketing team across all channels including video.
- Led and mentored a global creative team in the execution of a re-brand, differentiating Simpro from the “Sea of SaaS” and shifting positioning from tech to trade as a market leader while collaborating with external agency partners
- Coordinated projects, team resources, and sought opportunities to implement creative problem solving beyond the status quo
CREATIVE DIRECTOR AND LEAD DESIGNER
DispatchHealth // Denver, CO // July 2020–October 2022
Led the Brand Services department for an aggressively growing health-tech company in brand strategy and execution, supporting growth through national campaigns, corporate, and recruiting efforts
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Led the strategy, concept, and execution of a re-brand guided by a deep customer empathy and
supported by voice, tone, enhanced modernized aesthetics and content positioning DispatchHealth
as a household name with strong brand equity -
Oversaw concept and execution for all marketing and sales creative including a website, B2C and B2B email, marketing campaigns, print collateral, video, TV, photography, social, direct mail, and more
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Directed and created compelling data and storytelling visualizations to support B2B sales enablement and investor / board / internal communications
DIRECTOR OF BRAND DESIGN
GoSpotCheck // Denver, CO // 2018–2022
Lead vision, strategy, execution and performance analysis of all marketing, sales, and internal creative for a tech-stars winning, B2B, SaaS start-up
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Contributing to $10M+ in sales pipeline through event strategy including user conference design,
booth design, customer experience design, campaigns, and account-based digital channel advertising -
Ideation, art direction, execution of digital marketing creative, social, photography, events, video,
print, and UX/UI -
Creation and brand positioning of new product brand including naming, identity, style guides, and executional direction
CREATIVE DIRECTOR
Bluprint (Formerly Craftsy) // Denver, CO // 2011–2015
Built and managed the brand for an online craft learning start-up acquired by NBC/Universal, contributing to Craftsy’s rapid growth and success over 5 years
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Led and mentored an internal agency of 13 cross-functional designers, stylists and photographers while developing and upholding processes, procedures, and standards.
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Developed, mentored, and identified new disciplines for teams while encouraging and supporting data-driven design and decision-making
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Ideation, art direction, execution of email, display, social, product, class branding, print, events, eCom photography, and private label brands
OTHER CLIENTS
American Crew (Revlon Professional Brands)
Wilhelmina Modeling Agency
Samsung
Mazda
P&G Beauty Brands (Gillette/Venus)
Ilona Beauty
Contact Info:
p: 720.341.9226
e: nicoleaskari@gmail.com
www.nicoleaskari.com
Denver, Colorado, USA
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