User Experience, Interface and Brand Identity Design
The Still Walking Festival is a small scale irregular programme of walking events in and around the city of Birmingham. The festival explores unknown or undiscovered aspects of the city and offers an interactive, entertaining and engaging way to do this. The brief is to propose a new communication design direction which represents the Still Walking Festival brand, both online and in print and develop a supporting marketing strategy that provides a smooth journey for the end-user. Secondly, it is key to explore how to communicate with a new, younger audience.
Integrating inspiration from my target audience research; I explored 8-bit gaming and retro aesthetics to create an identity which was relevant to the target audience. This was then combined with contemporary design elements leading to a distinguished, recognisable and successful core identifier.
“Provide an exploration exchange platform encouraging the sharing of knowlege, observation and intrigue. Walk, explore, study, think, observe.� Mission Statement of Still Walking
Environment Insight Exploration Thoughts Experiences Knowledge I needed a colour scheme which inadvertently represents earth tones, providing a muted aesthetic which can be applied to the 8bit inspired identity. This is relevant to the audiences as it is not attached to a particular agenda, sex or theme,
and will let the applied images, graphic elements and typography do more of the talking. The scheme started with the turquoise blue as a representation of shadowed sky, then the other colours were added as complimentary colours.
These values were discovered from my target audience research which highlighted the ‘shared values’ that were common amongst the target audience. Through this, I was able to ensure that the communication would be most effective and answer the brief.
The fundamental idea behind the graphic elements used in this identity system is dots. Dots as a way of exploring, expressing and forming shapes. The inspiration comes from the target audience research which highlighted an opportunity to explore retro gaming and 8bit graphics. Elements such as the icon designs used to communicate the events, are made from square dots, thus staying within the identity system and bringing a clear tone to the communication design.
Digital is the core touchpoint around the campaign for promoting Still Walking as a walking event organiser and as a exploratory social media platform. As shown on the diagram, the core website forms the central part of the strategy, which is then supported by surrounding satellite touchpoints, including widespread social networking websites and the posters. The core website is reliant on the surround satellites which are traffic leaders, and encourage users to the website. The audiences are then navigated to the relevant conversion zone according to their needs and desired experiences.
Home
Explore Topics
Posts View
Festival
Info
Events
Contact
Social Media
Contact Form
The blog and exploration platform form a vital part of the strategy as they encourage repeat visits to the site. The key conversion goal is to get bookings on the walking events and users to share the site with friends.
Ticket Purchase
My target audience research highlighted that the audiences will often browse the Still Walking website, from drivers such as city centre advertising and social media, instantaneously, whilst on the move. This means that a mobile first design approach was appropriate, but it was nevertheless important to consider larger devices as part of the digital strategy. A responsive website that flows across devices was therefore the most suitable outcome.
Status updates are an integral part of the digital strategy as it encourages the user to share interesting exploratory topics with other explorers. Posts can also be configured to be pushed to Facebook and Twitter increasing the amount of exposure and leading more traffic to the site.
I took a mobile first approach to design due to the high level of traffic that is likely to view the site on a smartphone. These screenshots show firstly the homepage of the core website. When the user scrolls down, they are presented with a selection of topics to explore and they can then read more of the post by tapping ‘explore’. This maximises the scrolling and tapping of the user to ensure user engagement and interaction.
These screenshots show the Festival section of the website on a mobile browser. As the user scrolls down the page, they are given an introduction to the festival, followed by the opportunity to browse events. This sequence of actions is designed to lead the user to book onto an event of their choice through the mobile platform. The navigation is consistent from the rest of the site with easy access to ‘compose a post’ and navigation menu.
The tablet offers the same functionality and user journey as the desktop and smartphone websites, as it is simply the same site, using different CSS styling to adjust to the device’s screen size. The user would firstly be able to browse different themes and topics off the homepage. They can similarly browse the different events off the ‘Festival’ section of the site. They can then read more detailed information on the events which shall hopefully lead to the purchase of a ticket for the festival.
The Still Walking Festival advertising strategy is to encourage audiences to visit the website. This will then expose them to a wide range of communications. This is more important than just informing them of the event and dates, so the advertising has been designed accordingly.
Designed by Ollie Cox | 11700440 www.olivercoxcreative.co.uk 0121 288 3724