Just Like You — A Website That Feels Like the Person Behind the Brand

I want to talk about Kim Spencer-McDonald and her business, Just Like You, Aotearoa. She’s a powerhouse of a woman — warm, friendly, knowledgeable, and incredibly good at what she does. Fashion, colour, shape… she just gets it. Kim doesn’t need to sell her services. As soon as you’re in her presence, you form an opinion straight away — purely based on how she shows up in the world.

You can book Kim for a consultation — colour analysis, wardrobe edits, personal shopping, and style education. It’s a brilliant option if you’re struggling to show up as the woman you know you are. We’re not all born stylists, but most of us have a vision of ourselves. Sometimes we just need help bringing that to life. That’s where Kim is a bit of a marvel.

It was such a treat when Kim approached me to build her website.

We started with her brand — colours, tone, direction. She already had a style guide, logo, and fonts sorted, which made everything flow. I loved working with her organised brain — it made my job easy in the best way and I was soooo relieved that she didn't want to splash out in pink - which seems to be the trend for women in business right now. Daring to be different made me gravitate toward her instantly.

From there, we talked about what her website should feel like.

Not what everyone else is doing — what works for her.

Warm. Engaging. Easy to navigate. Clear, without being cluttered.

Then came the photos.

It didn’t take long to realise we needed a full shoot to bring the site to life.

We set up a studio at her place — which eventually landed us in the garage. It gave us space for backdrops and lighting, shelter from the harsh light, and easy access to her wardrobe for quick changes.

We shot on a plain backdrop so her images could be used anywhere — layered over textures, backgrounds, and different layouts across her site and marketing.

It means she now has a solid bank of content she can use again and again.

This is Kim overlayed in a beautiful country styled living room.

And Kim overlayed on a shadowy gritty concrete wall, which shows you just how versatile this photo shoot is based on the way we set it up and captured her.

Kim also introduced me to Substack — a platform for writers and bloggers - it's a game changer. She’s the first client I’ve had using it, and I can see why she loves it.

She also asked for a Pinterest integration on her site — another first for me.

I genuinely enjoy that part of the job — figuring things out, learning new tools, making it all work together. That’s probably the nerdy side of me talking. We also connected her to the more common social places like Facebook and Instagram. Here are a few of my favourite images from our branding shoot (taken in Kim’s garage on her Dipton farm). If you’d like to see more of what Kim does, you can check out her website and follow her across her platforms — each of the links above connect you directly to Kim's pages.