Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Dawn Nicole Warnaar. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Dawn Nicole, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. How did you learn to do what you do? Knowing what you know now, what could you have done to speed up your learning process? What skills do you think were most essential? What obstacles stood in the way of learning more?

I was in school for my MBA and working full-time as a Human Resources Manager at a Hospitality group in Charleston, South Carolina, when I met my now husband. Long story short, he’s in the Air Force, and getting married meant we’d be moving every one-to-three years. Many military spouses don’t work for this reason, so I’d either have to accept that or figure out a more mobile career.

Once I left my corporate job, I enrolled in a Graphic Design program, knowing I could work as a freelance artist from anywhere. For one assignment, we had to research artists that worked with typography and create a piece inspired by their style. I ended up choosing a lettering artist and creating my own lettering for the project. My professor said I had a knack for typography and an eye for design. That feedback sparked the beginning of my career as a lettering artist.

The main obstacle was that there isn’t a formal educational program or degree for hand-lettering, so it’s primarily a self-taught process. Being a self-starter willing to dedicate ample time to learning was essential to building success in the field.

I started over ten years ago, and lettering wasn’t nearly as popular as it is today, so I cobbled together a “lettering library” by buying a wide variety of books on the art of drawing letters. And then, I began to study and practice daily. I’ve learned a lot in the past decade, but honing your craft is lifelong.

Now, countless books, blogs, classes, and articles teach lettering, so the learning process would be sped up if you started today.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Hi, I’m Dawn Nicole. I’m an Air Force wife, and I’ve been married to my husband for 15 years. Sometimes he flies a C-17 cargo plane; other times, he “flies a desk.” We have three kiddos (ages 11, 13, and 14), two Germans Shepherds, and one Great Dane.

I create custom playful lettering and illustration for clients and brands. I also make workbooks, Procreate Brushes, and online courses for busy creatives who want to learn hand-lettering and calligraphy without the overwhelm of trying to learn it on their own.

Some of my most recent projects include designing the book cover for “Be Kind to Yourself” by Megan Logan for Better Day Books and doing live calligraphy in-store for Kendra Scott in downtown Charleston, SC.

One of my most memorable projects was designing a coloring book-style Valentine’s Day doughnut box for Krispy Kreme Doughnuts.

Most recently, I completed work on my upcoming book, “The Art of Playful Lettering,” with Better Day Books. It’s available for pre-order with a TBD December 2023 release date.

When I’m not lettering, you can usually find me with my nose in a book, working on a DIY home project, or practicing my latest endeavor: the love-hate sport of golf.

Are there any books, videos or other content that you feel have meaningfully impacted your thinking?

The best business book I’ve ever read is “Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less” by Greg McKeown. The central idea of this book is “less but better.” It gave me a variety of practical ways to put that into practice. It’s been years since I’ve read it, yet it’s stuck with me.

As a one-woman small business owner, I wear a lot of hats. Content creation and planning, blogging, social media, accounting, client work, photos, videos, editing, staying on top of legal requirements to maintain an LLC, etc. And that’s on top of actually creating any artwork. It’s a lot!

In the early years of building my business, I was “on” all the time. Even when I wasn’t physically working, my mind thought of everything I needed to do.

With my HR job, work wasn’t on my mind in the evenings or weekends. Once I left work, my time was my own. Sometimes, I miss that aspect of working for someone else. But ultimately, I wouldn’t trade the freedom of working for myself for anything. This book helped me learn how to manage my time better, set priorities, and quiet my over-active business mind.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

Pinterest and Instagram came out in 2010, right before I officially started my business in 2011. Getting in from the get-go made it easier to grow a large audience quickly.

Social Media has changed so much over the past decade. I used to put so much pressure on myself to be active daily on all of them. I have around 85.5K Instagram followers, 238.3K Pinterest followers, and 75K Facebook followers.

I’ve been at roughly those same numbers for several years, as I don’t put as much stock into them as I once did. I’ve learned those numbers don’t define me or my business. I know people with a massive following that hardly make any income and people with small followings who bring in six figures!

While Social Media can still be a valuable resource for your business, it’s no longer the “quick ticket” to website traffic and income it once was. And it’s not something you own. So it could disappear instantly, and you might be unable to do anything.

Building SEO on your website/blog and growing your email list is a much higher priority. You own those. No one can take them away from you. And the return-on-time-investment is typically higher with these than with social media.

I’d start there and pick one or two forms of social media to focus on growing (back to the whole “less but better” Essentialism mentality!)

Monitor your analytics to determine which things are most worth your time. For example, my YouTube following is relatively small at 16K, but it drives the most traffic to my shop, so I’m making a more concentrated effort to show up there this year.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://bydawnnicole.com
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/bydawnnicole
• Facebook: https://facebook.com/bydawnnicole
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/DawnNicole
• Other: https://www.pinterest.com/bydawnnicole/