Final Project: IMC Campaign

Hey guys! This will be my final post for this course. It’s been a long semester – but I’ve had the chance to learn a lot of things and create some pretty cool stuff. This last project is a compilation of all the different tools and techniques that I’ve learned throughout the course. I was asked to pick an organization to use for the project – the organization I used is one that I am doing work for currently, Satchel.

Company analysis

The company that I have chosen for this project is one that I have recently become a team member of – Satchel. Satchel is a podcast media company, located in downtown Jackson, MS. Satchel has been around for about two years now and is continually gaining traction within the new media scene. Satchel was founded and run by Beau York, a young entrepreneur in Jackson.

Satchel is a podcast media company that allows users to listen to your favorite local podcasts, as well as other popular podcasts around the nation. Users are able to discover different podcasts, subscribe and support their favorite podcasts and able to share their finds through social media outlets. The app itself allows users to stream podcasts on the go and it allows them to download specific episodes to save for later. The main appeal of Satchel is the fact that it’s easy for users to use and allows them to support their favorite shows all within a single app.

Satchel is currently being targeted towards those that are current podcast listeners and those that have not yet got into podcasting. This mainly includes the age group of 18-40. Satchel has a wide range of topics for all ages, including: local channels, money channels, technology channels and political channels. Offering a wide range of channels allows for Satchel to gain users that are both college students and working professionals.

My current campaign strategy will be to create more awareness of Satchel and what all it has to offer. The campaign will focus mainly on users within the Jackson metro area and surrounding areas (throughout the state of MS). The campaign will focus mainly on new creating more listeners of podcasts, which will help to generate more subscriber support for podcast channels. The campaign will also help to attract new podcast registrations as well, for those that are interested in having their podcast featured on Satchel. The campaign will include a slight logo redesign, creation of print material, social media graphics, infographics and a website review.

Logo Design

The current logo for Satchel has been pretty problematic due to the fact that it looks very similar to Spotify’s current logo. The new logo still has a hint of a podcast (with the feature of the microphone). It also has a more modern font and a slightly more vibrant orange. The tagline get’s straight to the point – Let’s Podcast!

New Logo

Print Promotions

For the promotional flyer, I went with a minimalistic approach. It’s just a simple photo of a young lady enjoying the pleasure of listening to her podcast on her phone. It also includes a quick message and a few features of Satchel (which are being able to listen local and to get social). It then features a few minimalistic shapes to help emphasize the design elements. The minimalistic approach to the flyer design helps it to stand out a little more and to be rememberable. The printed material can be given out at different events around town that Satchel will participate in. They can also give them out when they have live studio sessions.

Flyer Design

The folder follows a similar design to the flyer – keeping with the minimalistic theme. The outside of the folder includes the logo with the tagline. It let’s the audience know that it is Satchel podcast and that the material inside belongs to Satchel. The back cover includes a mockup of the podcast app and tells the audience that the app is available on the Apple App Store. It also has a call to action – which is to download the app. The inside of the folder follows suit with the outside, with the logo and app store download visible on the left side and the tagline (Let’s Podcast!) located on the right side.

Folder Back/Front

Folder Inner

The postcard also follows along with the theme of the rest of the promotional material. It includes a photo at the top, which has a young woman enjoying her podcast listening. It also has a call to action for users to join Satchel. The colors align with the rest of the campaign as well.

Postcard Design

Social Media

Social media is a very important aspect to any marketing campaign. Every brand should be up on the latest and greatest social media efforts and should be willing to take the time to carefully plan out a strategic social media campaign. I have come up with a startup social media marketing plan for Satchel. The main parts of this plan include Facebook, with suggestions for Twitter and Snapchat.

The purpose of this social media campaign is to help generate awareness about Satchel and to get more individuals to download and use the mobile app. The audience will consist of any individual between the ages of 18 and 40. This includes all college age students and working professionals that enjoy listening to podcasts. The other target audience are new users – those that have never (or rarely) listened to podcasts and are willing to give it a try.

Satchel should focus on creating at least 1 post per week. This is usually the norm for Facebook posts. You don’t typically want to overdue it with postings to Facebook. It is also a great place to discuss and create events associated with the organization and to highlight certain podcasts. Satchel could even focus on promoting one particular podcast show per month (or week depending on the amount of shows they host). The focus should mainly be on what’s going on within the podcast, different shows featured on the podcast, events that are taking place with the podcast and generic information about the podcast. They should also focus on posting around the afternoon or early evening – I would say between 1pm and 4pm. This will allow for their main users to have a chance to see it either during a lunch break, a mid-afternoon break or when they get off work/class.

Facebook Page/Post Example

I would also recommend that Satchel use other social media platforms to compliment their Facebook page. The ones I would recommend would be Twitter and potentially snapchat. Twitter allows for Satchel to engage with their users and allows their users to interact and engage with them. Twitter allows for more of a conversation with your users. They could also have live Twitter talks during a recording of a podcast show and have their users tweet them requests, or answers to questions, etc. Snapchat would allow for Satchel to show their users what’s going on inside of their podcast studio. They could also use Snapchat’s geofilters for the downtown area. This will allow those that are in the downtown area to become more aware of Satchel and maybe even visit the studio (since it is downtown).

Infographic

The infographic created for Satchel highlights certain areas of podcasting. It highlights information that I think are important for Satchel to keep in mind when looking at their podcast as a whole. The infographic shows the number of Americans that are podcast listeners, the percentage of growth within the podcast industry, the device of choice for podcasts and the number of shows per week. It is important to look at each one of these factors when thinking about their marketing strategy and aligning their IMC campaigns with one another.

I hope you guys enjoyed this week’s blog post as much as I did creating it! It’s been a great semester – looking forward to creating more great things in the near future.

Project 14: Infographic

Hey guys! I was able to create a pretty cool project this week – the topic was creating an Infographic using Photoshop. This project was a bit harder to create, because PS isn’t the ideal tool to create a full infographic, but it still works well. The topic of my infographic was the Bengal tiger. Let’s get into it!

To start I created the background color. I imported a picture of my Bengal tiger to serve as the main part of my top graphic. I then went ahead and created a quick title with a title background. I wanted to created little touch points for the tiger, that could be used for web purposes. These pinpoints have an interesting fact about the tiger. To create the pinpoints I used two circles. One is smaller in size with the full color – the next is slightly bigger with the same color set at a lower opacity and placed in the background. I then created dotted lines from the pinpoints to the text for each. I copy and pasted the pinpoints to different areas of the tiger and then created the text for each point.

Next I focused on the endangered species graphic. For this graphic, I created 7 circles, six with just strokes and one with a fill. I then arranged them in a particular order and placed text in between each circle. I then created dotted lines to connect each circle to one another.

For the middle of the infographic, I created two rectangles, one for the text and one for the chart graphic. For the chart graphic I used a rectangle to show the past and filled it with an orange color. I then created another orange rectangle and lower its opacity. I placed another rectangle with a fill of 100% on top of it and made it smaller, so that it looks like a lower amount. I then used a custom shape to create an arrow which symbolizes a decrease.

The bottom part of the infographic includes a quick text area that has a few facts about the Bengal tiger. I then brought in a map and a map icon to show the country of India. I then added the source text at the bottom. There you have it – an infographic about the Bengal Tiger! It was fun creating this graphic and I’m sure I’ll probably go back and revise it later just because I’m very picky about my designs. Hope you enjoyed it!

Original source of information: http://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/b/bengal-tiger/

 

Project 12: Social Media

Hey guys! This week we have a pretty fun project to show off – it deals with social media marketing design. Everyone knows the social media marketing is huge for most companies – with the big three being Facebook, Snapchat and Twitter. For this week’s project, I had to design cover photos for Facebook and Twitter, and a geofilter for Snapchat.

The company that I chose to use for this project is Airbnb. Airbnb is a well known company used for traveling. You basically rent someone’s house or rental property instead of a hotel. Users are allowed to sign up and rent a place for a set amount of time, similar to renting a hotel.

For the Facebook cover photos, I made three that each had a different message on them. The first Facebook cover photo, I brought in an image of the beach. I then placed a red color overlay above the picture (to match Airbnb’s logo colors) and changed its opacity to 30%. I then added the text for the message and placed their logo on top. For the second Facebook cover photo, I brought in another picture of a beach and placed a message above the photo, with Airbnb’s logo above the text. For the last Facebook cover photo, I brought in a picture and also placed the text to the right of the photo, with Airbnb’s logo above the text field.

For the Twitter cover photo, I brought in a picture of a beach house and added a text field to the left of the photo. The photo was a bit too light and the text wouldn’t show up as well, so I adjusted the curves of the photo to darken them a bit. I then added the Airbnb logo above the text field.

Lastly, for the Snapchat-like filter, I brought in an image of a palm tree. I then brought in an image of an airplane. I added text between the two images for the quick Snap message. I then used the pen tool to created a curved dotted line, going from the airplane to the palm tree. I then added a background photo to make it look more like a photo taken in Snapchat, and placed a white filter over the photo.

There you have it – graphics to be used across different social media channels! I hope you enjoyed this week’s project. It wasn’t much in the way of work, but it’s very effective for marketing campaigns. This campaign focuses on using Airbnb for spring break traveling. It shows that Airbnb is available anywhere you choose to go. I hope, through this campaign, that users will decide to choose Airbnb for their spring break trips, instead of a traditional hotel. It’s basically like being at home, while away from home. This year’s spring break will be changed to an #Airbnbreak!

This is a disclaimer – this project is strictly for educational purposes and is no way associated with the brand represented.

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Email Campaign

Hey guys! New week – new project. This week’s project is a bit of an add-on to last week’s project – but it deals with creating an email campaign. Email campaigns are the graphic pages that are sent out through email blasts by a company or organization. I chose to stick with the Nintendo Switch email campaign for the Holidays.

I started by creating a place for my header and footer. For the header, I created three buttons that will be used as navigation items. I then brought in my main image and placed it under the header. I then created a place for text to describe the main image. I then placed in an image that would be used as a video. To show that the image is a video, I created the video symbol using a circle and a triangle, placing it on top of the image. I then created the text for that image section as well.

Next I created a mini banner by creating a curved rectangle with text showing my main message of ‘Making the Switch this Holiday season’. After making this banner section, I brought in a .png image of the Nintendo Switch and placed it on top. I then created a ‘buy now’ button, that will act as a call to action. Lastly, I finished up the footer by adding the logo and contact information. I then brought in social media icons. I also created two buttons for sharing and unsubscribing from the email list. A ‘view in browser’ button was also made, so that the user can view the email in their browser as well. There you have it – an email campaign for the Nintendo Switch! Hope you guys enjoyed the project for this week – see you soon!

This is a disclaimer – this project is strictly for educational purposes and is not affiliated with Nintendo and their products.

Project 11 – Web Ads

Hey guys! This week we have a pretty lengthy but interested project that I worked on. This project deals with web ads and creating them using Photoshop. The product that I chose to show was the new Nintendo Switch. I think it’s an interesting product to show and one that will definitely be sought after this next holiday season.

I first started by creating the button banner first. I changed the background to the color of the ‘red’ used in Nintendo’s logo. I then created the text for the button and a rectangle for the button as well. I then added the logo to the bottom. After creating these elements, I brought in an image of the Nintendo system.

I duplicated the layers for the button and the logo into the next banner, which is the rectangle banner. For this banner, I made sure to add another text layer with a holiday message. I then added an image of a bow to give it that holiday feel. The text was a bit hard to read with the bow in the background, so I changed the opacity a bit for the bow and gave the text a slight black stroke. I then brought in images of the Nintendo system and an image of Yoshi.

Again, I duplicated the layers for the button and created the leaderboard banner. For the logo, I brought in a different color logo and placed it over a white background. I then used images of users holding a Switch controller and placed these within the images.

I duplicated the layers for the button and logo from the rectangle banner and created the last banner, the skyscraper banner. I created a new text layer to add a holiday message. I then brought in another bow for the holiday feel. Next, I added the Nintendo Switch system and images of both Mario and Zelda to add to the Nintendo feel. The banners were then complete!

The last part of the project includes making an animated banner. I used the skyscraper banner to create an animated banner. I flattened the background image and only left layers for the Nintendo Switch console separate. I was asked to create just three panels of animation, but I ended up using 8 frames for the animation I wanted. I wanted to show the Switch being taken from the dock and made into a handheld system then going back into the dock. Each frame is just a different version of the last, steadily showing slow movement, then going back in reverse. I then looped the animation so that it lasts forever. I saved the animation for web so that it would create a .gif file. There you have it – web ads for the Nintendo Switch! Hope you guys enjoyed this week’s project!

This is a disclaimer – this project is strictly for educational purposes. I am not affiliated with Nintendo.

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Project 9: Mood Board

Hey guys, here’s a quick project that I just completed. For this project I created a mood board for my personal brand. I imported a few pictures into my art board that I feel represent my personal brand. I wanted the feel to be overall creative. I feel that my personal brand is one that is very welcoming and also very creative.

I included a picture of myself (from a recent photoshoot), a picture of a camera – which is what I use for design work as well as a hobby, a creative space that includes a MacBook and a picture of street art that I took on one of my photoshoots. Each one of these pictures represents a variation of my brand. You have the face of the brand, which is myself. I also chose to show the fun version of myself which I created – known as the floaty me. I use this character within my website and other aspects of my brand. The camera represents some of the work that I am able to do. The creative space gives an idea of the type of space that I normally feel comfortable in.

I made a color swatch from the different colors that are represented within each one of the photos on the mood board. The colors are very calming but creative at the same time. Overall I think this mood board represents me well. It shows a very calming brand that is also into creating new things. Hope you enjoyed the mood board!

Wireframe & Mockup

Hey guys, this week we finally are more in my realm of things, designing for a web platform. This week I created a homepage wireframe and mockup of one of my favorite restaurants in Jackson, MS – Wasabi. I have been working as a freelance UI/UX designer for over a year now and have had the chance to work on a few web projects and mobile app projects – so this project fell right into my normal daily process of work.

I began by uploading a picture of a background (sushi) to the webpage. After that, I worked on the navigation menu. I began by creating the different navigation tabs – home, about, menu and contact. I aligned them and distributed them evenly and placed them at the top of the page. After that I brought in the different social media icons and placed them within the nav bar as well. I added a black rectangle and reduced its opacity and placed it behind the nav items. I then created a red rectangle over the ‘home’ tab to show that it was the active page.

After working on the navigation, I created a quick logo for Wasabi and placed it within the middle of the homepage. I took the chopsticks from the logo and placed it at the top of the navigation menu as well. I then created the two tabs at the bottom for online orders and making a reservation. For these tabs, I created a colored rectangle and reduced its opacity. I then created the text and created a rectangle with 10px curved corners and placed it over the colored rectangles. The last thing I worked on was the ‘sushi of the day’ tab. I created a white oval and placed it in the center right portion of the webpage. I then created the text for it and made a quick arrow to show that it can be activated with a click.

There you have it – a quick homepage for Wasabi restaurant! I hope you enjoyed this project as much as I enjoyed working on the design for it. See you next time!

This is a disclaimer – this project was for educational purposes only.

Homepage Mockup

Homepage Wireframe

Logo Creation

For this project, we were asked to create a logo for a fictitious client. I chose to do one for a new hair salon in Los Angeles – targeted at the young professional (21-40 years of age) and with an eye for fashion. I chose to name the hair salon Reality Cuts. I figured that LA is full of reality shows and so incorporating the word ‘Reality’ into the name seems fitting. For the record, I’m not a big logo creator, I’m better at UI Design and not so much with logos. I tend to keep things pretty simplistic when it comes to logo work.

I started by finding a pair of scissors to use as the ‘R’ in the first word. I found a good vector and edited it a bit within Illustrator to give it more of an R shape. I then exported that into Photoshop to begin the rest of the logo. I placed the scissors first and created the rest of the word for ‘REALITY’ using a Fire Sans ‘hair’ size font. I then created the word CUTS using an Avenir medium font.  I had to group the scissors to the word Reality so that it would move as one complete word. After doing so, I centered the rest of the text. Lastly, I created the word Salon and made sure to center it with the rest of the text as well. I added tracking to spread the letters out in the word salon. I then created the lines to the left and right of the word Salon. I made the ‘Salon’ portion of the logo the same color as the scissors.

I chose the colors of the logo to give it a modern and younger feel to it. The turquoise and black also give it a sort of exclusive and professional feel to the logo. I chose to use just the pair of scissors as the favicon, so that customers can begin to recognize the turquoise scissors. There you have it – a simple yet modern logo for a hair salon in LA! Hope you enjoyed this project as much as I did.

Book Cover

Hey guys, this week was pretty fun being able to design a book cover for one of my favorite books of all time, The Great Gatsby. I’m not sure if many of you have read the book or seen the movie (the newer one with DeCaprio is better than the older movie) but it’s definitely a classic novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Here’s a quick rundown of the book (by Sparknotes):

“Nick Carraway, a young man from Minnesota, moves to New York in the summer of 1922 to learn about the bond business. He rents a house in the West Egg district of Long Island, a wealthy but unfashionable area populated by the new rich, a group who have made their fortunes too recently to have established social connections and who are prone to garish displays of wealth. Nick’s next-door neighbor in West Egg is a mysterious man named Jay Gatsby, who lives in a gigantic Gothic mansion and throws extravagant parties every Saturday night.

Nick is unlike the other inhabitants of West Egg—he was educated at Yale and has social connections in East Egg, a fashionable area of Long Island home to the established upper class. Nick drives out to East Egg one evening for dinner with his cousin, Daisy Buchanan, and her husband, Tom, an erstwhile classmate of Nick’s at Yale. Daisy and Tom introduce Nick to Jordan Baker, a beautiful, cynical young woman with whom Nick begins a romantic relationship. Nick also learns a bit about Daisy and Tom’s marriage: Jordan tells him that Tom has a lover, Myrtle Wilson, who lives in the valley of ashes, a gray industrial dumping ground between West Egg and New York City. Not long after this revelation, Nick travels to New York City with Tom and Myrtle. At a vulgar, gaudy party in the apartment that Tom keeps for the affair, Myrtle begins to taunt Tom about Daisy, and Tom responds by breaking her nose.

As the summer progresses, Nick eventually garners an invitation to one of Gatsby’s legendary parties. He encounters Jordan Baker at the party, and they meet Gatsby himself, a surprisingly young man who affects an English accent, has a remarkable smile, and calls everyone “old sport.” Gatsby asks to speak to Jordan alone, and, through Jordan, Nick later learns more about his mysterious neighbor. Gatsby tells Jordan that he knew Daisy in Louisville in 1917 and is deeply in love with her. He spends many nights staring at the green light at the end of her dock, across the bay from his mansion. Gatsby’s extravagant lifestyle and wild parties are simply an attempt to impress Daisy. Gatsby now wants Nick to arrange a reunion between himself and Daisy, but he is afraid that Daisy will refuse to see him if she knows that he still loves her. Nick invites Daisy to have tea at his house, without telling her that Gatsby will also be there. After an initially awkward reunion, Gatsby and Daisy reestablish their connection. Their love rekindled, they begin an affair.

After a short time, Tom grows increasingly suspicious of his wife’s relationship with Gatsby. At a luncheon at the Buchanans’ house, Gatsby stares at Daisy with such undisguised passion that Tom realizes Gatsby is in love with her. Though Tom is himself involved in an extramarital affair, he is deeply outraged by the thought that his wife could be unfaithful to him. He forces the group to drive into New York City, where he confronts Gatsby in a suite at the Plaza Hotel. Tom asserts that he and Daisy have a history that Gatsby could never understand, and he announces to his wife that Gatsby is a criminal—his fortune comes from bootlegging alcohol and other illegal activities. Daisy realizes that her allegiance is to Tom, and Tom contemptuously sends her back to East Egg with Gatsby, attempting to prove that Gatsby cannot hurt him.

When Nick, Jordan, and Tom drive through the valley of ashes, however, they discover that Gatsby’s car has struck and killed Myrtle, Tom’s lover. They rush back to Long Island, where Nick learns from Gatsby that Daisy was driving the car when it struck Myrtle, but that Gatsby intends to take the blame. The next day, Tom tells Myrtle’s husband, George, that Gatsby was the driver of the car. George, who has leapt to the conclusion that the driver of the car that killed Myrtle must have been her lover, finds Gatsby in the pool at his mansion and shoots him dead. He then fatally shoots himself.

Nick stages a small funeral for Gatsby, ends his relationship with Jordan, and moves back to the Midwest to escape the disgust he feels for the people surrounding Gatsby’s life and for the emptiness and moral decay of life among the wealthy on the East Coast. Nick reflects that just as Gatsby’s dream of Daisy was corrupted by money and dishonesty, the American dream of happiness and individualism has disintegrated into the mere pursuit of wealth. Though Gatsby’s power to transform his dreams into reality is what makes him “great,” Nick reflects that the era of dreaming—both Gatsby’s dream and the American dream—is over.”

Again, such a great novel and an inspiration for designing a book cover. For the front cover, I decided to go with a blue background color. I then added the image of the yellow car and the image of the man in the suit to the image and resized them to appropriate sizes. I then created the text for the title of the book and offset each word from the title. I chose a font that I thought represented an elegant style, similar to that of Gatsby’s parties. After adding the title, I added the author’s name at the bottom and added the tagline about the author’s name. I then found a great design to add to the top right corner of the book cover to give it a more elegant feel.

For the back cover, I added the same color background as the front cover. I then added a white rectangle for the ‘about the author’ section. I added an oval to the author section and placed a picture of F. Scott Fitzgerald onto the cover. I clipped the author’s picture to the oval shape and resized it to fit within the oval. I then added the bar code to the book cover.

For the spine of the book, I added a martini glass at the bottom, to represent the Gatsby’s party. I placed a blue rectangle on top of the martini glass and clipped it to the glass, to change the color of the glass to blue. I then added a fancy cursive font for the book title and rotated the font counter-clockwise. There you have it! A simple, yet modern look to the Great Gatsby.

Original Book Cover

My Designed Book Cover

Disclaimer: I am not associated with the book, publisher or author and that this is solely for educational purposes.

 

 

IMC Practice

This was a pretty fun project – being able to recreate a marketing piece for a brand. The brand that I chose was Spotify. I’m a pretty big Spotify user, especially when I’m working on different design projects. I use Apple Music on my personal computer, but for any work computers, Spotify is always my go to! The main branding with Spotify is their gradient overlay that they create for most of their marketing material. That’s what I tried to recreate with this project.

I started by uploading a photo of one of my favorite artists – Big Sean. I cut out the background, using the Magic Wand tool, so that I could paste the artist onto a white background. I then converted the image to a black and white image. Next a created a gradient map over the image. I chose to use a form of green for the highlights and blue for the shadows. I adjusted the levels of the gradient map (to lighten it a bit),  then I clipped the gradient map to the image. Next I added the Spotify logo and resized it to fit within the marketing piece. I then created a Text Layer for the call to action and a rectangle to place behind the text layer. I grouped the text layer and rectangle together and added a slight drop shadow to the group. The last step was to add the hashtag for Big Sean’s new album that he has used. There you have it – a new Spotify marketing piece!