AGORA Financial Logo by O'Dell Graphic Solutions

A 12 Year Branding Project for A Financial Publisher

Logo | Style Guide | Email | Online Promotional Assets | Conference A/V Stage Design & Signage | Books

Whenever I have some concept floating around in the ether, I know I can count on Mark to bring it down, make it better and get it done, reliably and predictably. While I value his talent as an artist and his skill as an architect of websites, it's his business acumen that makes him a real triple threat.

Addison Wiggin | Executive Publisher, Agora Financial

Mark O'Dell the best designer I know and I don't say that lightly. He's more than just a designer, he develops, he integrates and he truly understands our business.

Joe Schriefer | Publisher, Agora Financial

Mark O’Dell possesses the unique ability to take an idea from concept to completion. He excels in design, web development, and most importantly he has the talent to deliver. I regularly consult with and utilize his expertise on smaller projects and larger multi-million dollars initiatives.

Michael Pizzo | Managing Director, Agora Financi

I have worked with Mark on more than 20 conferences, events, and symposiums over the past 10 years. His ability to understand, and then create a visual representation of complex ideas is the best I’ve ever seen.

Bruce Robertson | Former Director, Agora Financial Investment Symposium

A Note About the Client from Mark O’Dell

Agora Financial is a very special client and represents more than a significant amount of my training and experience working in the design, publishing and direct-marketing industries. I began my career as a graphic designer there over 13 years ago and over that time, I have ascended to Art Director, Web Director and now through OGS, Art & Technical Consultant.

I have helped AF and their parent company, Agora Inc., design and launch more publications, websites, promotional campaigns, live events, books, movies and teams than I can remember —  needless to say assembling a body of work that represents all of the positions I have held, teams I have worked with, projects that I have worked on and skills that I have honed is a challenge. So for this piece I have chosen to highlight only a few recent items, ones that will hopefully show the impact that I’ve had on the over-all look and feel of Agora Financial as a brand for that last 13 years.

I am lucky to have had so many prosperous relationships with the designers, developers, writers and marketers at Agora Financial, that in the end I feel as though the working relationships with the people there are the most relative and valuable portfolio pieces I could ever display.

Logo & Brand Elements

In 2002 Agora Financial’s executive publisher, Addison Wiggin, needed a new logo for a company that was changing directions and names under his leadership, Agora Financial.

Being based in Baltimore we decided that it should feature a local icon, and being a publisher that would pride itself on its fierce independence from the mainstream, and what better icon than one that paid tribute to, and included an image of no other than George Washington.

The original design, which is not shown here, was a vector illustration I did of the monument. That design got AF off the ground and lasted for a few years, but eventually it was updated to feature a photograph that I captured on sunny day in Mt. Vernon.

Since then, this current version has been used to develop all of the branding elements for the entire company. A few of the items included in that style guide are displayed here.

Agora Financial & Agora Financial Reserve Logos by O'Dell Graphic Solutions
Agora Financial & Agora Financial Reserve Logos by O'Dell Graphic Solutions
Agora Financial & Agora Financial Reserve Logos by O'Dell Graphic Solutions
Agora Financial & Agora Financial Reserve Logos by O'Dell Graphic Solutions
Agora Financial & Agora Financial Reserve Logos by O'Dell Graphic Solutions

Responsive Website & Email Templates

In late 2013 Agora Financial began a comprehensive website redevelopment project that would incorporate not only a new responsive website design, but responsive email templates for all customer touch points. OGS worked with AF’s in-house design, development and marketing teams to launch the new website, email templates and many other online assets.

As with any active corporate initiate, upgrades and changes are constantly being conceived and implemented and as such the designs below represent but a step in a process that is still going on today. Feel free to see how it stands now by visiting agorafinancial.com

AGORA Financial Logo by O'Dell Graphic Solutions
Agora Financial Promotional Design by O'Dell Graphic Solutions

Promotional Assets

Instead of digging up every piece of direct mail, insert, renewal or HTML promotion that I have created for AF over the years, I decided to show the two most recent promotional items that OGS has done for AF.

The first is a printed piece that was integrated into an automated system that printed and sent a personalized mailer to the customer based on pre-determined trigger, such as subscribing to, or subscribing from a certain publication.

The second is a new design style for an HTML promotion. The design accommodates the typical long form sales letter format, but attempts to portray it in an editorial / infotainment style. In addition, an effort has been made to connect the dots from idea, promotion, to order form, to fulfillment of the product by incorporating not only the product’s branding and image of the editor into the sales letter and order form, but also incorporating recognizable AF branding elements throughout the process. This new format will be produced with various pieces of copy and tested, and will hopefully increase retention through decreased customer confusion.

Agora Financial & Agora Financial Reserve Logos by O'Dell Graphic Solutions
Agora Financial & Agora Financial Reserve Logos by O'Dell Graphic Solutions
Agora Financial & Agora Financial Reserve Logos by O'Dell Graphic Solutions
Agora Financial Promotional Design by O'Dell Graphic Solutions
Agora Financial Promotional Design by O'Dell Graphic Solutions

Live Events

For more than 10 years Agora Financial was the host of the most anticipated event in the independent investing world, the Agora Financial Investment Symposium in Vancouver, BC.

Held at the beautiful Fairmont Hotel Vancouver and attended by more than 1000 attendees, guests and sponsors, the event featured four days of presentations and break-out sessions from top investing and economic minds — not to mention even some politicians and rockstars.

Putting on a show such as this requires many hours of pre-planning and long sleepless days and nights managing and trouble shooting on location. OGS acted as Art Director and designer, planning the visual identity of the event, and as producer, planning and managing the audio visual production needs and vendors — not to mention on-site production of promotional audio and video materials during the event.

The images below represent some of the identities that OGS has done for the show — my favorite of which was is Assault On Enterprise (final illustration by Baltimore-based illustrator, Greg Houston), plus a glimpse of the scale of the set up OGS was in charge of keeping together at the symposium in Vancouver.

Conveying ideas effectively through sketching by O'Dell Graphic Solutions
Agora Financial Investment Symposium Design by O'Dell Graphic SOlutions
Agora Financial Investment Symposium Rim Of Fire Identity by O'Dell Graphic Solutions
Mark O'Dell of O'Dell Graphic Solutions Running Sound Agora Financial Investment Symposium

Movies & Books

In 2007 Addison Wiggin and Agora Financial began work on what would come to be known as I.O.U.S.A., a motion picture documentary on the looming national debt crisis. The movie went to Sundance Film Festival and achieved a notable level of success, eventually being purchased by the Pete Peterson Foundation… where it unfortunately went to die.

OGS has the pleasure of being part of the production team and even designed some promotional materials for the film. You can read all about it here.

OGS has also worked with world-renowned economist and founder of Agora Inc., Bill Bonner, on a few books published by J. Wiley & Sons. The most fun of which certainly had to be Dice Have No Memory. Bonner wanted a more interesting cover than the one originally proposed. I’d say, again with the help of Baltimore-based illustrator, Greg Houston, we nailed it.

I.O.U.S.A. Special Edition DVD by O'Dell Graphic Solutions