Enterprise Sales + other font production & design courses at ILT Academy

Nadine Chahine

Hello all!

We have a big line up of online courses for the fall and I thought to share the biggest highlight with you, as this is very likely the only time we will offer it due to limited capacity: Our 3rd founder, Julia Hiles, who has 20 years+ in enterprise sales will be giving a course focused on enterprise sales for the font industry. 

The course will focus on: 

    The unique font marketplace and pricing

    Pros and cons of different licensing models

    Structuring pricing proposals to suit both foundry and client

    Understanding the concept and application of value-based pricing

    Aligning enterprise and e-commerce strategies

    Enterprise pricing and negotiation

    Psychology of the sale

    Infringement and Past Usage

    Identifying opportunities

    Finding the right contact partner

    Tips to identify past usage

    How to get the conversation started

    What to do in cases of no response

More info is online and you can directly sign up here:

https://ilovetypography.com/academy/enterprise-sales-101/

Also fyi, we also have more font production/font software courses:

Spacing and Kerning:

https://ilovetypography.com/academy/glyphs-kerning-spacing/

Hinting:

https://ilovetypography.com/academy/glyphs-hinting/

Glyphs Power Up:

https://ilovetypography.com/academy/workshop-glyphs-power-up/

More design courses:

Intro to script design:

https://ilovetypography.com/academy/intro-to-script-design/

Intro to Arabic type design:

https://ilovetypography.com/academy/introduction-to-arabic-type-design/

Intro to Latin type design:

https://ilovetypography.com/academy/latin-type-design-intro/

Type Design for non-type designers workshop:

https://ilovetypography.com/academy/typeface-design-for-non-type-designers/

And we will be also adding intermediate Arabic and Greek courses!

Paul Hanslow

Hey Nadine, sounds great!

What's the situation when an 'experienced' type designer wishes to partake in the intermediate Arabic course and haven't completed the ILT Beginner course? I'm partly asking for myself, however I'm certain their are other type designers—with a deep understanding of the fundamentals—wishing to venture into scripts they haven't designed.

Nadine Chahine

Thanks Paul! The intermediate course does not introduce the specifics of the script and is essentially about refining the design skillset of the students and going into more technically complex cases. Also, we tackle the relationship with Latin. 

For accomplished type designers who have not had any experience with Arabic, the Intro course is better as there we focus on training the eye and the brain to look at Arabic as Arabic, rather than reverse Latin. We've had amazing work done in intro classes so the level of the output can be quite advanced by the end of the Intro class.

If on the other hand, a type designer has some experience with Arabic, then they can jump into the intermediate class and I can fill in any gaps if needed.

The intro courses usually have a mix of non-type designer native speakers and non-native type designers. The mix is amazing as the first group has to learn everything about type design, and the 2nd group has to train their eyes on Arabic (or Greek or Cyrillic etc).

The most important thing here is for designers to understand why letters look the way they do and to be able to understand what is constant and what can change in Arabic letterforms. This is the holy grail of working in any script which is why we recommend that experienced type designers to start off in the intro class. This is so they understand the "why" of Arabic type design rather than just the "how"

Michael Gills

Hello @Nadine Chahine 

The Glyphs Power Up and Hinting both sound interesting but I'm not in a position to do them until 2025. Will they be running again next year? I signed up to the newsletter on ILT, so I'm hoping you send emails with announcements.

Thanks, Michael

Nadine Chahine

Hi Michael,
Thank you! Yes we try to run these once a year and if you message me your email I'll put you on the waiting list. Thanks xx

Nadine Chahine

Dear all, you are invited! Please join us next week in this free Q&A session with Julia Hiles to talk about enterprise sales strategies. You can sign up to our event here:

https://eventbrite.com/e/enterprise-sales-qa-tickets-1012444497747

This talk is for type designers and foundries only. Monotype not invited, just to be clear 😛 

Kent Lew

Thanks for offering this, Nadine. I’ll look forward to the discussion.

Nadine Chahine

Thanks, Kent!

Reminder: This is happening today! You can still sign up for this free talk on Enterprise Sales:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/enterprise-sales-qa-tickets-1012444497747

Igor Petrovic

It was a surprisingly direct and concrete talk. I expected it to be more of a promo for the course, but we got really valuable insights even at this entry stage. My recommendation, many thanks to Nadine and Julia!

John Hudson

I managed to be jetlagged enough to set the wrong time in my calendar. Sorry to have missed this.

Nadine Chahine

Hello all!
Some updates on our courses:
1- The Hinting course starts tomorrow and we won't offer it again for another year. 
2- We've decided to turn the Glyphs Power Up into a free-to-attend event and will be announcing dates soon. 
3- We are drawing up the plans for next year. If there are any courses you would like us to offer please do get in touch
4- Finally, and we are excited about this, we will be announcing soon an Introduction to Font Business for type designers who are starting out!

Thanks!

Nadine Chahine

Dear all,

We had an amazing response to Julia’s Enterprise Sales course last year and the recording is available for purchase for anyone who would like to catch up. We have also decided to split the course into different seminars so that foundries have the flexibility to sign up for the specific modules they need. If you get the course recordings you can also join in to all the 6 seminars that are planned!

This is the first seminar planned for this Thursday:

The Unique Font Marketplace:

Market strategy and setting up your website for enterprise success

This module lays the foundation for diving deeper into enterprise strategy in the comprehensive Enterprise Sales Course. It explores the unique dynamics of the font marketplace, how corporate procurement teams interact with it, and what these insights mean for foundries. It highlights considerations for a foundry when setting up their e-commerce platforms to support and not hinder enterprise sales. The seminar will also include discussing different usage (EULA extensions) and pricing options for e-commerce at a high level (Though this is not a detailed discussion on e-commerce pricing or design).

You can get more info and sign up here:

https://ilovetypography.com/academy/enterprise-sales-seminars/

Nadine Chahine

Hello all,
Happening tomorrow: This seminar is a juicy module and provides specific questions and strategies to help you determine whether a potential agreement will be high value, low value, or somewhere in between—an essential step for pricing effectively and confidently when quoting potential six- or seven-figure contracts. Too often, foundries guess and price in the middle, losing both the lower end (too expensive) and the top end (not enough) as a result.

A key focus of this session will be on pricing perpetual and unlimited agreements and understanding why this should NEVER be approached with a one-size-fits-all strategy.

It also includes some suggested wording to clarify some specific requests that are common for foundries to receive. These have saved so much time for many foundries.

More info here:
https://ilovetypography.com/academy/enterprise-sales-seminars/

ps. If you have any questions please feel free to ask! I'm keeping a roll here of the seminars we are organising and this one is a must for any foundry negotiating deals above $10k.